‘The universe is with us’: Fremont man and brother cycle cross-country
FREMONT - A Fremont man and his brother recently fulfilled a bucket list dream when they mounted their bicycles in Washington D.C. and rode all the way to Oregon.
Ed Chimahusky, 68, of Fremont, and his brother, John Chimahusky, 70, of Oklahoma, launched their trip on May 2 and dipped their tires into the Pacific Ocean, 3,944 miles later, on July 26.
The first spark of the idea came when John was traveling by car along the Lewis and Clark trail about 20 years ago and picked up a book about bicycling the route.
“I looked at it and set it aside, but it stuck in my mind,” John said.
Brothers prepped for cross-country trip with 850-mile ride
The brothers took many weeklong trips throughout the years, and they prepped for the cross-country trip with a 350-mile ride in 2021 and an 850-mile ride in 2022.
“We wanted to get our gear in shape and make sure we were ready, that we had the will to do it and had what we needed to take on a long trip,” John said.
John planned the trip, splitting it into three legs. The men cycled the Eastern Express Route from Washington D.C. to Walden, Colorado; the TransAmerica Trail from Walden to Missoula, Montana; and the Lewis and Clark Trail from Missoula to Seaside, Oregon. They overnighted in hostels, campgrounds and, on occasion, a hotel. They slept with seven other people on the floor of a church and were welcomed into homes for free through the Warmshowers organization which offers complimentary AirBnB stays to cyclists.
“We pretty much knew where we were going to stay every night and how many miles we’d ride every day,” Ed said.
Friends help brothers repair a broken bike wheel in Missouri
Mechanical issues delayed the trip on occasion, but each time, someone reached out to help. When John’s wheel broke in Missouri, two friends delivered the tools needed to fix it.
“They drove 88 miles to us. We bought them a beer at Appleby’s, and they went home,” Ed said. “In Saratoga, Wyoming, my derailleur failed. A bike shop in Laramie, 60 miles away, overnighted a new one. John had five flats, and I had none. Other than that, the bikes handled pretty much flawlessly.”
The brothers encountered typical summer road construction detours that can add hours to a trip for bicyclists, and inconsiderate drivers can make a bike trip dangerous.
“We had one six-mile detour. There were times we thought the trip would end because of road construction closures, but most of the time, the workers let us pass,” he said. “Most of the traffic was good. Ninety-nine percent of drivers would go around and give you room, but there were times we could almost reach out and touch a truck."
Brothers faced 50 mph headwinds in Oregon
For the most part, the weather was favorable throughout the trip, but there were a few difficult moments. They faced headwinds with 50 mph gusts at the Columbia River Gorge in Oregon and were forced to pull off the road when trucks drove by because “the trucks were trying to suck you under them,” Ed said.
“We had a saying: ‘The universe is with us,’” Ed said. “We got by the construction zones, we had a lot of help, and we didn’t have a lot of rain. Ninety-nine percent of the time, things went well.”
Ed and John kept connected to family and friends back home through an online journal they named, “Two Old Guys Take on a Continent,” and they made new connections all across the country. They met a German man participating in a bike race, a 77-year-old recumbent cyclist on her sixth bike tour, and a man who showed up at their hotel, just hours after meeting them, with a cake for John’s 70th birthday.
“The best thing about the trip wasn’t the scenery but the people we met,” John said. “It wasn’t just the other bikers. It was the store clerks and the bartenders and the people at rest stops and campgrounds. We’d share our story, and they would share theirs.”
Contact correspondent Sheri Trusty at sheritrusty4@gmail.com.
This article originally appeared on Fremont News-Messenger: Fremont man, brother bicycle from Washington, D.C., to Pacific Ocean
