Coast to Coast for a Cause 2022

Yo what’s good - it’s Dustin again. Today is the day we’ve all (at least the three of us) been waiting for, a day of rest. It was also the first day I didn’t have to listen to Brian snore all night - so I proceeded to get a cool 12 hours of sleep, thank god! Our Warmshowers hosts Boyd and DiAnne cooked us up an amazing omelette with smoked Gouda, freshly picked mushrooms, and deer sausage - it was delicious!  Lucky for us we got into republic for their annual celebration - Prospector Days. Boyd was telling us that it’s a tribute to the origin of the town. It originally was a place settled to do mining and that brought more industry and civilization. We started the day walking to downtown to see the parade and it was a classic small town parade full of local heroes like fire and ems, the sheriff, and of course the miss Ferry county riding on a tricked out horse. They also has some classic cars which I found cool and Julia and Brian pretended to find cool. And the best part - literal...

Hey it’s your girl Julia again! So today was our longest day yet at 63 miles, where we had the pleasure of having 25 of those miles uphill. But hey we did it! And our quote of the day was “this isn’t as soul crushing as yesterday.” To start off the day we woke up at the Omak Best Western, which let me just say was HEAVENLY to finally sleep in a real bed and not the ground. Don’t get me wrong I enjoy camping, but having multiple days of slanted ground where I felt like I was going to slide out of my tent was not the most restful night sleeps.  Since today was going to be another rough day of uphills we gave our panniers to my parents, who graciously supported us today out of their car with food, extra water, and moral support. It was extremely appreciated!  Our first adventure of the day consisted of us almost getting eaten by two vicious wolves….. ok they were actually two dogs and one of them was probably the size of a Chihuahua, but hey still terrifying.  The first litt...

Today…was a day. Let me set the scene for the beginning of the day for you. It was raining, it was pouring, Jon and I were snoring, and Dustin’s Chef Boyardee on our little burner was boiling. Eventually we all crawled out of our tents, packed everything up, promised we would leave at 8:00, and actually left by 8:45. Today was the first day of biking in the rain which, thank goodness, was mostly just a drizzle throughout the day. That being said, it was COLD and even though we layered up in the morning, during the first 15 miles of “flat” biking, we were quickly shedding them as we heated up. This proved to be a mistake as we began our 7 mile all uphill ascent of Loup Loup, the second peak of the Cascades that we had to go over. It took us a few hours, many breaks, Dustin’s entire bag of snacks, and soaking all of our clothes but WE DID IT. At the top we had to take some serious considerations about how we wanted to continue. The shoulder of the road wasn’t in great condition...

Quote of the day, “hey guys, we’re 5% done.” -Brian … “that’s like me saying hey guys we are 3% done yesterday.” - Dustin Hey y’all, it’s ya boi Dustin again. This morning was interesting: I woke up at 1 am because I was really thirsty from drinking too much beer the night before… then I realized.. huhhhh… my waters in the car, and Julia has the key… so I turned on my bike headlight to use as a flashlight and absolutely BLINDED myself. I got up and grabbed one of the empty water bottles out of my bike, and not trying to wake up Julia, put it out in the rain with the cap off hoping it would collect enough water to quench my thirst… and to put a long story short, it didn’t collect any water, and I also woke up julia… (but didn’t get the keys). So in the morning I downed a bunch of water and felt better. So we saw that we were going to have to climb literallly three mountains (one of which we accidentally climbed yesterday looking for the campground and had to come back down)… soooooooooo...

Hello, it’s yours truly Julia! Sorry for the delay in this blog post, but you know how the mountains get when it comes to cell service. With that said, yes we are officially in the Cascades, and yes we have already climbed 2,000 ft elevation.  Our day started pretty chill, packing up camp, enjoying access to clean water, and deciding to fully utilize Jon and the support car. We knew we would be trekking up mountains, so off came the panniers and into the car they went. Thank god for Jon, but you’ll understand that later.  First, 25miles…. LOVELY. It was on this cute, straight, flat road twisting by the river creeping towards the looming mountains. The scenery was gorgeous and filled with cows. We finished the first section at the National Park visitor center, where Dustin and Brian took a nice nap under the trees.  But then came the hills…. oof. I will not lie, it was pretty awful. Were we using every “photo lookout” turnoff to rest? Of course. But hey at lea...

Hi everyone! My name is Brian Legato, a rising second year dental student at UConn and I couldn’t be more excited to share all of our stories and photos. A little about me is that I graduated from the University of Hartford with a degree in biomedical engineering and after a gap year in which I studied for dental school entrance exams, played a lot of video games, and briefly worked as a substitute teacher.  Some of my hobbies include making wire jewelry, yoga, playing piano, and video games (when I can find some free time). I have one older brother who works as a history teacher and has taught me more than a thing or two as well as two amazing parents who have done so much for me throughout my life. I’m incredibly excited to be on this trip and that I get to talk about our first day!! Day 3: We started the day in our Airbnb making some last minute packing decisions as well as mentally preparing ourselves for a long day of biking. Part of that morning included me attempting to Fren...

Who is Dustin? Hello y’all, my name is Dustin Moore a rising second year medical student! I’m from Berlin, NH; my favorite pastimes are living by the moto ‘live free or die’, complaining about wreckless government spending, and talking about my cat Finn too much.  But more seriously - Outside of class I’m just some crunchy hippy who loves to camp, ride my bike, and drink beer. This summer my friends and I are riding across the country to raise money for the Hole in the Wall Gang Camp and I’m so excited to get to help send these kids to camp while having the time of my life in our last free summer.  Day 2: Today our day began bright and early   as we naturally woke up at 7am eastern time (4am our current time). We gathered our things and ran down for the continental breakfast before heading out to Burlington, WA to fit Julia’s and Brian’s bikes.  We hit the store to buy some food on the way… and just a little sneak peak of our diet for the next few months ~ Trail mix,...

Welcome everyone to our Coast to Coast for a Cause 2022 Blog! We are hoping to use this space to share our stories and adventures as we travel (on bike!) from Washington state back home to Connecticut.  Were we English majors in college? No. Will we ever be published novelist? Probably not. Will we have grammar and spelling mistakes in these posts? Most definitely. With that said, we will try to make this blog as interesting to read as possible, and make you feel like you are sitting around the campfire with us as we dive into our tales of the day!  At this point you are probably wondering, “Who is even writing this blog right now?” and “What is Coast to Coast?” Well, I am so glad you asked! We (Dustin Moore, Julia Neri & Brian Legato) are three students from UConn  Schools of Medicine and Dental Medicine. We will be sharing the duties of blog posting, so today your author is Julia! I will try to give you a quick “About Me” today, and then Brian and Dustin can introdu...