Summer Heat

Hi everyone,
   Answers to a couple of questions in the comments section: 1) people have waited with me to fix my flats.  It is not a long process, but it is good to have company.  I am getting "flat resistant" tubes to put in my tires, while they are heavier, I am concerned about the quality of road coming up in the less populates states.  Hopefully that will fix the problem
2) We spend about 6-7 hours building on the build sites each day that we build.  Usually from 8-9am until 3-4 pm.

   We are currently in Madison, Wisconsin.  There is a huge capitol building here, as it is the capitol city of the state.  This city is know nation wide for being very bike friendly.  There are many bike paths that can take you all around the city.  The heat has been very intense, but has broken on our first off day today. What a great chance to rest my legs and use my massager.  We have our 7th out of 10 builds tommorrow before we head out on an 11 day stretch of ride days.  That will be an intense stretch as we head into Minnesota.  I will be keeping up with you in the next day or two about the build!

Picture details

1st-The build day in South Bend, Indiana was by far the best one of the trip.  That is why I have so many great pictures of it. The site was so well managed and they had work for every rider.  I spent the day helping to put roof trusses on the garage and nail up the wood to cover the roof.  It was a lot of work hammering nails into the boards and climbing up on the roof.  I had a great time.  Here are pictures from the build and some riders you may have not seen yet.  There is a picture of both Baxter and Lexi as well as another rider Kevin on the roof.  There is also a picture of the whole group getting ready to start the build.

2nd- We met the Mayor of South Bend (the picture by the flags) and he was a great guy.  He told us about the struggles the city is going through and his plans for recovery.  He gave Colin and I tickets to the College Football Hall of Fame and we enjoyed our time checking out the museum. 


3rd- We rode through Chicago and I was not able to get many pictures, even though there were beautiful lakeside views with skyscrapers in the background.  It was a very long ride that day (105 miles) and it was raining on and off and there was a lot of traffic.  I was very focused on getting in to the host and less focused on pictures.  We stayed in an office building of a group contact in Chicago.  The office was very modern and some pictures are included.  Also are some pictures from the athletics fields of Northwestern University.  NU is a prestigious university that has many successful sports teams.





On to Wisconsin and 2 build days this week with one off day!

More pictures

School 7

Dear staff and students,
   I have noticed a huge increase in the amount of blog views and comments since the trip started.  This is all very exciting!  It it great to see everyone so engaged.  Keep it up, especially the well written comments.
To answer a few questions in the comments section that were asked...
I like the Mets, it takes me about 10 minutes to change a flat tire (it is actually an inner tube that goes inside of the tire)- I have no had three so far unfortunately, and we will have our first off day this Thursday in Madison, Wisconsin.

    There are many students leaving comments that I am excited to meet for the first time this September!

Sincerely,
Mr. Goldstein

 Here I am at the Bowling Green University football stadium in Ohio

 With my buddy Ambroise at the Michigan

 Katie Petrillo (one of our 4 leaders) and I at the Indiana sign- 4 miles into our ride

 University of Notre Dame Basketball Arena

 Two pictures of the Notre Dame campus

The gang hanging out at the church with the gang...

Michigan and Indiana

Michigan 

So we were able to visit Michigan for one day!  It was the most southern part of Michigan (Camden).  It was a very small town and it consisted of one block of a main street.  The host Trevor had us in his church and it was a very nice gentleman.  We shared the bond of having played rugby in the past, but his experience was very different than mine.  He grew up in South Africa where everyone in his private school was required to play rugby.  Very interesting!  Imagine if School 7 required all students to competitively.

In Michigan, I did receive my first flat tire, which was very disappointing.  I had aspirations to make it across the country without a flat tire, even though that is very unrealistic.  I had 15 plus flats during my last trip. 

Indiana

Indiana has been great so far.  I have fond memories of it from my 2009 trip.  They have friendly people, great towns, and interesting things to look at on the ride.  The ride was super fast again as we were averaging over 20 miles per hour on long flat roads.  The ride was 91 miles so it was great to move quickly and make great time.

Our destination was South Bend, Indiana.  The home of the Notre Dame, one of the most popular football programs in the country (The Fighting Irish).  Riding past the university was great and I will have pictures to follow.  The most interesting story of the day…. Ambroise and I decided to go to the athletics office and snoop around at the university.  We spoke to a woman in an office about possibly receiving free t shirts as a memento.  After telling her what we were doing she gave us some great high quality Notre Dame polo shirts.  I will have a picture soon and a post about what we call “donation magic” to follow coming up soon.

Avon Lake Hosts

 Hannah from our group posing with the corn hole game at the church in Avon Lake.
This is a great game not really found in the Northeast.  Google it!

 A picture of our group hanging out in the youth center at their church which is soon to be finished.

 This is the bike clinic some of our riders did for the community there.

 An awesome game called Kan Jam, it is played with a frisbee and two teams, a lot of fun.

A pic I forgot from downtown Cleveland.