Former Whittier couple begins 2,300-mile cycling trip along the Mississippi River

By Mandy Hale
Special to the Turnagain Times

Part I

When I revealed to my mother that my husband Tom and I were going to ride the length of the Mississippi River on our bicycles starting in September, there was a moment of silence. Then she exclaimed, “You’re crazy! That’s dangerous!”

Now, my mother is 83 and starting to lose her nerve a bit, so that reaction is understandable; especially in light of the fact that she was talking to her 60-year-old daughter. What woman in her right mind starts her seventh decade of life by bicycling over 2,300 miles, camping out or staying with strangers along the road? Many would agree that my mother has a point after all.

However, I had been thinking, planning and dreaming about accomplishing this ride for almost a decade. I thought, what better way to celebrate this milestone birthday?

I grew up along the Mississippi, in La Crosse, Wis. I didn’t really appreciate that beautiful, enormously powerful river until many years after I had moved away to Alaska. Warm enough to swim in, the Mississippi is filled with sandbars, egrets, turtles and smiling families in canoes and houseboats. It is easily accessible along its entire route, and mostly lined with farms and forests, replete with campgrounds and recreational areas. So different from the fast, cold rivers of my adopted state, it calls me now to return and explore at the river’s own pace – leisurely but resolute.

My friends tease me, asking, “How hard can it be—after all, it’s all downhill!” Of course they are speaking from the motorized vehicle point of view. Believe me, there is nothing that’s flat when you are riding a bicycle.

My friend Sharry and I have ridden several supported tours together. We laugh about our recently acquired habit of constantly assessing roads that we drive for their “bikeability.” I’m not worried about the hills that we will inevitably encounter. After all there is nothing even remotely resembling a mountain pass along our route. But there is gently rolling terrain, and I know from experience that these short steep bumps can be more challenging over a long day than Thompson Pass out of Valdez. But we are free to go at our own pace, with no hard and fast schedule, carrying our bedroom and kitchen in our panniers, looking forward to the roadside pubs and a cold beer at the end of the day.

We’re now in the final stages of the pre-trip madness, making lists and checking them twice, packing and unpacking the panniers, tuning up the bikes and buying those last minute items that make living outdoors for two months bearable. We are lucky enough to have a couple of good friends who have done this sort of thing before, and who have generously shared their own lists and wisdom with us. Zip ties and duct tape of course. Twenty feet of light line and a package of mini-clothespins; brilliant! Even with all the essentials and a few frills my panniers are only half full. I struggle to keep them that way. I swore I would write a list in December and absolutely stick to it. No sneaking in that third pair of shoes or the other ten shirts to wear off the bike. Travel light is my story, and I’m sticking to it.

In this regard Tom and I are total opposites. When going hunting or camping with the Suburban, his philosophy of packing is “I’m not done yet—the garage isn’t empty!” He loves to be comfortable, and he has not done a lot of self-contained cycling before. Neither have I, but I think I have a more vivid imagination for pain than he does.

For this trip, however, he has controlled himself admirably well. His panniers have some room in them also, and he is carrying the cooking kit and the tent. Of course, neither one of us has put the strapping tape on our boxes yet, so there is still time for good intentions to go astray.

Tom and I will leave for Lake Itasca in northern Minnesota at the very beginning of September. We hope to find moderate temperatures and sunny skies. Our friends tell us we are leaving at just the right time of year, given how gray September in Alaska often is. The Mississippi River tumbles out of the lake at 1,475 feet above sea level, just a trickle wide, easily spanned by even my short legs.

By the time it reaches Minneapolis, 515 miles later, it has lost nearly half its altitude and gained a brawny working-class strength, bearing consumer goods bound for the Heartland and shouldering south barges loaded with grain, timber and iron ore.

We will drift south alongside the Old Man, following the geese and the turning leaves, bound for our Halloween date in New Orleans and points south. Laissez les bons temps rouller!

Tom and Mandy Hale met in Whittier in 1973, where they got married in the first civilian wedding ever performed there. The couple and their son and daughter lived in Whittier until 1988. They now live in Palmer. They will be writing about their journey for the Turnagain Times.