Tuesday, June 21st, 2011 (Rest Day 2)
Today we woke up and had our free (already paid for) continental breakfast. Turn's out that we're celebrities in town now, because everyone was asking us things like, "Are you the boys going across the country?" & "oh, so those are your bikes out there!", and other things. It was pretty sweet! Turn's out we're the cover story of the Newton Daily Newspaper, so most of the town recognized us!
After breakfast we took off and had to turn back within 3 miles. My knee was nowhere near better. Every time I pedaled, a sharp pain would shoot through my left knee. It felt as if someone was jamming a knife under my kneecap every revolution of the crank I made.
While riding back into town, (we only made it just over 2 miles) the pain was so bad that I unclipped my left foot from the pedals and used only my right leg to pedal myself back.
We decided to go right to the clinic to get my knee checked out.
They told me to come back later in the day, so we decided to go upload some pictures from one of the computers at the newspaper office in town since the man we talked to yesterday said it would be okay.
While we were there I checked my email and saw one from a reporter at ABC5 News in Des Moines. He said he saw us in the Newton Daily Newspaper (we were front page news since it was such a small town) and he wanted to know if we would be willing to do an interview to get on the news, so I gave him a call, and he came out to Newton that afternoon.
Our velomobiles were in the parking lot of the hospital I was being seen at, so that's where he filmed us. he got b-roll of Adam riding around since I was in my appt., then when I came out he interviewed me. It was really neat, i had never been on TV like this before, only over skype once.
It was the real deal, he attached a mic to my shirt and had the camera right in my face while he asked me questions regarding the purpose of our trip, the velomobiles, and what message we hope to convey by doing this ride.
People watched us get filmed in little bunches all around the parking lot, pointing at us and saying things to eachother. It almost made us feel famous! (Yeah, right)
After the interview he left, and I went and picked up the steroids I was prescribed from the drug store in town.
After leaving the drug store we headed back to the hospital to see if we could get some cardboard to make a sign. We decided we didn't want to pay for another night at the holiday inn if we didn't have to. We were going to make a sign that said we needed a place to stay for the night. While we were inside the hospital asking around for cardboard, the ladies inside said they read about us in the paper that day and started talking to us. One of the women, Betty Ward, offered us to stay in her house that night. She was the sweetest old lady you've ever met.
She lives right across the street from the hospital so it was really convenient to stay with her. Her husband, Dean Ward was also incredibly kind-hearted and insisted on moving his car out onto the driveway so we could keep our velomobiles in the garage.
We stayed in the basement of their house that night in two guest bedrooms that they had. They insisted we stay there, even though we told them we would happily set up camp outside. After about an hour of watching ABC5 in the basement and waiting for our segment, they called us up and we had dinner with them.
Once our segment came on, they quieted down and turned up their TV so we could all hear it. Our segment was actually very well done and was at least 5 minutes long, which we were very happy about!
Miles covered today: 0
Miles covered total: 340
Overnight Town: Newton, IA
After breakfast we took off and had to turn back within 3 miles. My knee was nowhere near better. Every time I pedaled, a sharp pain would shoot through my left knee. It felt as if someone was jamming a knife under my kneecap every revolution of the crank I made.
While riding back into town, (we only made it just over 2 miles) the pain was so bad that I unclipped my left foot from the pedals and used only my right leg to pedal myself back.
We decided to go right to the clinic to get my knee checked out.
They told me to come back later in the day, so we decided to go upload some pictures from one of the computers at the newspaper office in town since the man we talked to yesterday said it would be okay.
While we were there I checked my email and saw one from a reporter at ABC5 News in Des Moines. He said he saw us in the Newton Daily Newspaper (we were front page news since it was such a small town) and he wanted to know if we would be willing to do an interview to get on the news, so I gave him a call, and he came out to Newton that afternoon.
Our velomobiles were in the parking lot of the hospital I was being seen at, so that's where he filmed us. he got b-roll of Adam riding around since I was in my appt., then when I came out he interviewed me. It was really neat, i had never been on TV like this before, only over skype once.
It was the real deal, he attached a mic to my shirt and had the camera right in my face while he asked me questions regarding the purpose of our trip, the velomobiles, and what message we hope to convey by doing this ride.
People watched us get filmed in little bunches all around the parking lot, pointing at us and saying things to eachother. It almost made us feel famous! (Yeah, right)
After the interview he left, and I went and picked up the steroids I was prescribed from the drug store in town.
After leaving the drug store we headed back to the hospital to see if we could get some cardboard to make a sign. We decided we didn't want to pay for another night at the holiday inn if we didn't have to. We were going to make a sign that said we needed a place to stay for the night. While we were inside the hospital asking around for cardboard, the ladies inside said they read about us in the paper that day and started talking to us. One of the women, Betty Ward, offered us to stay in her house that night. She was the sweetest old lady you've ever met.
She lives right across the street from the hospital so it was really convenient to stay with her. Her husband, Dean Ward was also incredibly kind-hearted and insisted on moving his car out onto the driveway so we could keep our velomobiles in the garage.
We stayed in the basement of their house that night in two guest bedrooms that they had. They insisted we stay there, even though we told them we would happily set up camp outside. After about an hour of watching ABC5 in the basement and waiting for our segment, they called us up and we had dinner with them.
Once our segment came on, they quieted down and turned up their TV so we could all hear it. Our segment was actually very well done and was at least 5 minutes long, which we were very happy about!
Miles covered today: 0
Miles covered total: 340
Overnight Town: Newton, IA
