Lubbock, Texas

Part 57 of the Cycle-Across-America series. (Read from the start in Boston or see the full index)

The next section of the journal was done on audio tape but with tape and transcript inaccessible in storage I’ll just share what I remember and then below the fold will return to excerpts of the handwritten parts of the journal for the next stage.

October 15th.
An ambitious day of trying a 90 mile trip to get to Lubbock and a contact where I can rest for a few days.

I-27 is the road south to Lubbock for everything else leaving Tulia. On the bike I go parallel a few miles to the east of it.

Plainview was my first stop, after over 20 miles. It was grey town on a grey day, littered with water towers, and maybe it was the weather, or the bias its name gives it, but Plainview didn’t impress me.

I did eat in a fantastic cafe though, straight out of another era. But then I noticed the photos on the walls were all of Steve Martin. Closer inspection told me that a Martin film called “Leap of Faith” had been filmed in Plainview, possibly some of it even in this cafe. I hated that the cafe celebrated something else rather than itself.

It made me think of the town I cycled through before Tulia. It was called Happy. Welcome to Happy, the Town Without a Frown, is how its sign greeted you. A tiny industrial feeling little town of those corrugated roofed hangar style buildings along with grain bins and elevators, but the power of suggestion worked.

And when I left Plainview, things got epic. Which in West Texas means lonely.

The cars were so few I counted them. 3 cars in 20 miles. You do everything you can to avoid traffic, but when you avoid it completely you miss its company and you get scared.

It’s mostly west that I looked, because although I was cycling south on this day, overall I was going west across the country, and I kept thinking of the early white settlers, those who had travelled this far west - and then for some reason stopped.

Why would anyone stop here? No rivers, no lakes, and no mountains. No trees even. Just burning sun, and ferocious winds. I passed a couple of historical markers. They were sad. They told of communities that had existed here but after a major dust storm or two had effectively been wiped out.

Within 20 miles of Lubbock I was staring at a field of cotton. For all the cotton I had seen growing in America, I had never touched any of it. I wanted to squeeze a piece of growing cotton. There were no houses, no people; I hadn’t seen a car for miles. Yet for 10 minutes or more I debated touching cotton.

I dropped the bicycle beneath me, looked all around me to make sure no one was within 10 miles of me, and I approached the cotton. In a dirty positively sexual moment, still expecting to be shot at, I quickly and guiltily bent down and softly squeezed some cotton.

It felt exactly as I thought it would feel.

As darkness came in I made it on to the Idalou Highway, and went as fast as I could on a wide shoulder with lots of traffic. I wasn’t going to make it into Lubbock in the daylight, but I was close, maybe 5 miles away so I stopped at a Texaco garage and called my host. I had to wait for a few hours for the van to arrive, but I was happy eating hotdogs outside as insects rained down on me from the roof.

[An account of what happened next constitutes the rest of this entry and it’s below the fold]

Read: Cycling Across America #57 »

For some time I’ve been meaning to put together a list of posts by other people that I’ve really enjoyed, but instead I think I’ll just introduce them one at a time.

Have a read of a post called “Junction” from Mr Sniffle & Cry.

I’ve read it 4 times.

Read: Post to Post #1 »

This is the day where every year, of the previous 9, somebody in the US has asked me how Irish people in Ireland celebrate the 4th of July.

Other Questions Frequently Asked:
  • Do You Know What They Do In Ireland?
  • Have You Ever Been To Ireland
  • Don’t You Travel By Train In Ireland?
  • What’s With You Irish And All This Guilt?
  • What of the US Impresses You Most?

See All Frequently Asked Irish Questions

Read: Frequently Asked Irish Question »

Texas is a Big State

Part 56 of my solo Cycle-Across-America series. (Read from the start in Boston or see the full index)

Excerpted from my journal as I continue cycling south through the Texas Panhandle heading towards Lubbock.

October 14th, Monday. Tulia, Texas

It’s like that feeling you get after being at the beach all day. Or wave watching at Doolin. Only it’s a very long way from the sea here.

That wind. My eyes are wrecked.

3,812 miles.

Didn’t manage that huge effort today. Or at least not the distance. I rode for as long as would normally do for a 90 mile trip but the wind kept me down to 62.

So if I’m to make Lubbock tomorrow then that must be my 90 mile day. There is a chance. Forecast is for a west to south-west wind. With the early start I never manage, and the wind more from the west than the south, I will do it. As saddle sore as I am it will hurt and I’ll need those thunderstorms also forecast, not to occur. That’s tomorrow’s problem.

This is the land that some people call flat, boring, desolate, nothing. Well it’s flat alright. Mostly. But it’s not boring.

It’s almost hypnotic, and it’s always beautiful. As for desolate, no it’s alive. It grows, it moves, it’s lived on. And the people here don’t call the High Plains of the Texas panhandle desolate. No, they warn me of New Mexico. Apparently there’s nothing there.

Here there’s always something. A house on a small ridge that is the horizon to the east two miles away. Dark roof and windows. Nothing beside it, not a shed nor a bush. The sun lights up its white walls against the huge background of the cloudless blue sky. Edward Hopper could’ve painted it.

Above me a flock of almost 100 birds circled and squawked for maybe 10 minutes. Then they came to a decision, formed a single file and flew east.

A lone bluebird landed on the road in front of me. I don’t think I’d seen one since Missouri. Any splash of colour is so striking. The twisted features of each cedar post holding the barbed wire, the swaying sea of tall grass, a single tree with a single crow, a train of 80 cars long hooting at me whilst its driver waves enthusiastically, a flock of Canada Geese leaving a flooded field that the dropping sun is shimmering all over through the grass, there’s always something here - how can anybody say there’s nothing - that I should get a train across the “boring” bit?

[The rest of this entry is below the fold]

Read: Cycling Across America #56 »

The Way to Amarillo

Part 55 of my solo Cycle-Across-America series. (Read from the start in Boston or see the full index)

Excerpted from my journal as I continue cycling south through the Texas Panhandle. And I wasn’t singing that song.

Sunday, 13th October

The wind has me exhausted. It’s like I’ve had my head in front of a hairdryer all day. And it was warm.

With the forecast for the winds to continue I’m in real danger of not making Lubbock on Tuesday as intended. If so, it’s not really a problem but I’m getting concerned at the frequency of these “extra” days. Once I leave Texas that’ll get more crucial as I have less roads and less towns and therefore less options to play with. Then again, when I’m in New Mexico is the time to worry about that.

This morning’s plan was to cycle on empty stomach the dozen miles or so to Fritch on Lake Meredith and then load up for the 40 miles into Amarillo. But I was told that none of the routes into Amarillo had shoulders and it being Sunday thought I might have difficulty getting a really good 40 mile feed in Fritch.

So I breakfasted in Borger after all. Taco Bell, first time in a long time. I was the only person there until some athletic but slight looking young fella came in for a drink. He was celebrated as the guy who kicked a 55 yard goal yesterday.

The new plan was a 24 mile ride due south to the town of Panhandle and then in from there the 29 miles to Amarillo. That suited the food better and I expected there to be less traffic.

Immediately out of town I was back in grassland with enormous views like yesterday. To the east from the north to the south I could see for 30 to 50 miles. The horizon was pure, broken only by grain elevators and very few of those.

[The rest of this entry is below the fold]

Read: Cycling Across America #55 »

The painting I did called Donegal Standing Stone I has just been placed back for sale again.

[Update: This painting is now SOLD]

It was marked as sold in the recent big spring sale because I was asked to hold it for someody who would pay for it a week or so later. I don’t usually do that because this is how I make my living and I’ve been burnt a few times, but we came to an agreed arrangement and then for whatever reason I never heard from the person again

So the phallic Donegal Standing Stone I is now available for purchase again.

It’s now priced at $99 plus shipping with payment by PayPal and the standard credit cards. If you were purchasing from Ireland or Britain I’d accept a cheque, and if you were purchasing from Dublin I’d take cash and we could scrap the shipping if you bought me a pint.

More About My Art:
   • Some Older Previously Sold Irish Paintings
   • Murals in Dublin
   • Reasons I Painted Certain Pictures
   • My Favourite Paintings

Read: Painting for Sale: Standing Stone in Donegal »

So there I was. Doing the 3 “R”s. Just on a basic level though. So everyone could follow.
Reading. ‘Riting. And ‘Rithmatic.

-Wow, that was an intelligent post
-Why thank you
-I wonder though?
-What?
-If you could do one without?
-Without intelligence?
-Yes. Without
-Hey, without is my middle name

More Irish Conversations Without Intelligence:
   • My Family Are Irish
   • I’m Going to Ireland in December
   • Are you from southern or northern Ireland?
   • Do You Have that in Ireland?

Read: With Or Without You »

The Texas Panhandle

Part 54 of the Cycle-Across-America series. (Read from the start in Boston or see the full index)

Excerpted from my journal. In the High Plains of Texas.

Saturday, 12th October

Slow progress through the Panhandle. My backside hasn’t been this sore since South Carolina. I might look for some new ointment.

3 days to Lubbock all goin’ well. The wind and me bum are the major issues at the moment.

About a mile south of Spearman is a field in which in 1934 Charles Lindbergh and his wife landed in their plane to refuel. They were on their way from California to New York and chose a small town with 100 miles worth of fuel still left rather than have to cope with the crowds and attention of a bigger town. It was turned 11am when I cycled past loaded up with a Combo meal of some description from the Dairy Queen.

It was a beautiful day, the sky cloudless again and the wind, although into my face, was less than 10mph. Had I known that in advance I could’ve tried to make the whole 90 miles into Amarillo.

The flatness continued. Milo, corn, bales of hay, the horizon broken only by grain bins, windmills, and low-roofed houses. It was 31 miles to the next town - Stinnett.

[The rest of this entry is below the fold]

Read: Cycling Across America #54 »