OK so I guess I'm officially in ROAM withdrawal. I've spend the better part of the day going through other riders blogs and searching YouTube for ROAM video. Since I found one the includes me, here it is:

Video from the last day of riding down the bike path in Virginia

Video of our arrival in Georgetown (a section of DC)

Reflections on ROAM

As one of the riders said at the EU reception, "Others will do it, but we were the first to ride velomobiles across the US." It was quite an adventure. Had we not had a time definite that we had to reach DC (the Europeans had planes to catch), we might still be riding. The last couple of weeks I would develop "hot foot" 90 to 100 miles into each day's ride. It would have been easy to stop someplace else to camp if we hadn't had the imposed discipline of Josef's planning.

It was a great group of riders from 7 countries. 22 Europeans and group of North Americans that varied in size over the ride. Over 50 riders participated in some part of the ride. 35 riders peddled into DC and John Abbey drove the truck carrying his damaged velomoblile.

There were several velos that were damaged along the route. The primary culprit was the dreaded rumble strip. Great for waking dozing truck drivers, they were the bane of our existence. It turns out that when you ride a velomobile on a rumble strip, the bouncing it causes screws up the rear suspension and creates a phenomena very much like skidding on ice in a car. Three velos flipped after losing control on rumble strips. Drivers were generally courteous although two riders were forced off the road by passing cars. Finally on the afternoon of the "victory lap" in DC one of the Dutch riders was hit by what turned out to be an unmarked secret service car making a turn. The rider was a little banged up but the velo will need some serious repairs.

That said, we velomobilists (velonauts if you prefer) definitely prefer roads to Multi Use Trails.

Local bike activists, rightly proud of the the trails they have worked so hard to establish couldn't quite understand why we kept ignoring their carefully planned routes to ride down roads. The reality is that velomobiles are best suited to smooth surfaces with the gentle curves of roads rather than the sharper turns of some bike paths. Packed limestone may be fine for mountain bikes but give us a road any day. Gravel, forget about it. We spent a lot of time on US 12 the least traveled of the cross country routes. While there were trucks, it had a wide shoulder and a smooth surface. There were times in Indiana riding on bumpy back roads when we all longed for US 12. At the end of the ride Mike, one of the North American riders presented Josef (our tour captain) with a replica of a US 12 sign

For four weeks I focused almost completely on riding and related tasks, (eating, sleeping and keeping the velomobile running). I frequently found myself asking what day of the week it was, and only looked at the news for stories about ROAM. I think this was my favorite.

I got to know some great folks that I hope to stay in touch with. Roll Over Europe anyone?

Made it to Washington!

We made it to DC. The highlight of the trip was our arrival in Georgetown (a section of DC)

We arrived at 6:30pm and decided to stay together as a group. In order to do that the first two riders stopped to block the crossing traffic at intersections so that all the velos could proceeded through the intersection. We were all blowing our horns and ringing bells. No one on the sidewalk had a clue what was going on but they were all snapping pictures and shouting questions.

After our impromptu parade, we ended up parking our velos in the lower level of the basement parking garage and posing for a group picture. Maybe in front of the Welcome to Washington DC would have been a better picture, but here's the garage shot.

The next morning we attempted a "victory lap" around the capital city only to be thwarted by a combination of mother nature (it rained hard on us for the first time of trip) and the park police who wouldn't allow us into Lafayette Park across for a picture in front of the White House and then proceeded to chase us off of several other photo op locations. We did manage to line up the velomobiles on the mall for a picture in front of the capitol.Another shot of the velos.

Finally here's one of me in front of the Washington monument which was closed due to the damage caused by the earth quake earlier in the week.

Fort Wayne IN

Made it back to the eastern time zone today. The highlight of the day was the town of Nappanee IN.

Velos parked in front of the round Amish barn.

Namanne has a large Amish community that in addition to the horse and buggy have embraced>BREAK

bicycles and tricycles. This was new to me so you can imagine my surprise when I rolled up to an intersection to find twist young Amish guys one on a Tour Easy recumbent and the other on a Baccetta recumbent. I chatted with them for a couple of minutes and learned that an Amish guy runs the only recumbent shop in Indiana.
One of the Dutch riders works for a company called Ciber that is located near Nappanee and treated the group to lunch at the Amish Acres resort.

Location : 1136-1798 N Harry Baals Dr, Fort Wayne, IN 46805,

Battery replaced

Happy to report a good experiance with Golden Oasis New Energy Group.  After one of my 20 ah batteries only held 12.5 ah I sent them reporting the problem an told them I would be passing through Chicago today.  This morning one of the SAG vans drove me over to swap the bad battery for a new one.  No hassles and they were very impressed with our cross county trip

Location : Jane Addams Memorial Tollway, Elk Grove Village, IL 60007,