July 2, 2013: MIM Day 17, Yelm to Mercer Island / Seattle WA

The Grand Tour, Fred and Seth's Most Excellent Adventure, is complete. Both of us made it up the final hill and rolled into Larry and Marcia's driveway on Mercer Island at around 3 PM this afternoon.

This last day was 73 miles, with 2,000 feet of climbing including a 14% half-mile climb as soon as we got onto Mercer Island and just two miles from our destination! Larry, with whom Kathy and I plan to visit for a few days, met us as we came off the I-90 bike path that crosses Lake Washington on the East side of Mercer Island. After greetings, he warned us about the "little hill" and led us on a circuitous path to his house. We pulled up to the driveway where Kathy and Larry's wife, Marcia, waited for us, surrounded by American Flags and signs celebrating our accomplishment.

Everyone has been asking, "What's next?" For now, the only serious plan as far as I am concerned is to do whatever Kathy would like next summer. She has been talking about a bike-free trip to Italy and if that's what she wants, that is what I will happily do. I can't begin to express my appreciation of her support of this endeavor over the past five years. The least I can do is to help her to fulfill one of her own travel dreams.

Below is our track across the U.S. Each year's portion is a different color. The first stage was Little Rock, AR to Gainesville, FL, in 2008, shown in red. In 2009, we continued down to mile marker 0 in Key West, shown in white. Fred and I skipped 2010, spending a week cycling in Provence with our wives and our friends Steve and Debi. In 2011 we rode from Colorado Springs to West Yellowstone (light blue). The following year, 2012, we took on the plains, starting again in Colorado Springs and finishing in Little Rock (yellow). For the finale this year, we cycled from West Yellowstone to Mercer Island, in the shadow of Seattle (purple).