Switching GEARS

Patricia Starr recently completed a cross-country bike trip to raise funds for Santa Barbara City College

8/18/04

By CHARLOTTE BOECHLER

NEWS-PRESS STAFF WRITER

Patricia Starr pedaled by thousands of traffic signs on her cross-country bike trip. Little did she know as she made her way from Astoria, Ore., to Portsmouth, N.H., that they could very well have been referring to the directions her life would take during those 50 days.

The Santa Barbara resident discussed them during a recent telephone interview from her East Coast hotel room where she was relaxing just a day after she and the 50 or so others on the America By Bicycle tour crossed the finish line.

It became clear while talking to her that of all the signs she passed, the one that best represented her journey was NO U-TURN.

There was no going back for this 67-year-old musician who was determined to raise money for Santa Barbara City College music scholarships with every push of the pedal.

NO PARKING ANY TIME

If only such a sign had been in the parking lot when Ms. Starr and her husband, Gabriel Gonzales, checked into the Holiday Inn in Brantford, Ontario, Canada, on Day 41, things might have been different.

"We locked the van up at night, as we always did," recalled Ms. Starr, whose husband used the vehicle to meet up with her throughout her long days of riding. "It was parked 20 feet away from the entrance."

She got up the next morning and noticed the socks she put out to dry were still wet from the rainstorm the night before. So she asked her husband to get another pair from the van.

"He went out at, like, 6:15 a.m. and came right back in with this look on his face and said, 'Baby, the van isn't there.' "

An employee of the hotel, which is located about an hour from Toronto, who overheard the couple reporting the incident to the local authorities, mentioned seeing the van at about 6 a.m.

"At that point, we knew it had only been missing for 15 minutes," said Ms. Starr, "so that gave us hope all day long that they would be able to find the van."

They did.

"A lady constable called and said, 'We found your van!' My heart was going thump, thump, thump because I thought it was good news," recalled Ms. Starr.

"Then she goes, 'But . . . '

The van was found, all right. Or, at least, what was left of it. It had actually been torched.

"The temperature was so hot that the hood itself melted onto the engine," said Ms. Starr.

"The entire thing was gutted."

Among the items the couple lost was $2,500.

"Gabriel had stashed some money behind the air-conditioning vents in the back that nobody would know about unless they took the van apart," said Ms. Starr. "We lost the money, but chances are the thieves didn't get it, either."

She said no one has been charged with the crime.

The couple also lost most of their clothes.

"My home had burned in Santa Barbara in the Sycamore fire. Now when I leave home, I put all my favorite clothes and things in one big suitcase and take it with me in case there's another fire in Santa Barbara and my house burns down -- never giving a thought that the van was going to burn down," said Ms. Starr. "I had, like, a beautiful silk shawl in it that my mother-in-law had bought for me in Europe."

The couple, who didn't have time to shop, had to wait until the end of the trip to replace some of their belongings.

"Gabriel had only the clothes on his back," said Ms. Starr. "I just washed his shirt out every night."

Which explains why one of the first places he went when the trip was over was to Kmart. He came back with two bags of shirts and a beard trimmer.

"I felt like I was in the middle of a forest for six months," said Mr. Gonzales, 46, of the inch-and-a-half or so of fur on his face. "I looked like a bear."

About the only thing that didn't go up in smoke when the van caught fire was Ms. Starr's plan. She continued to ride up to 120 miles every day. But it wasn't easy. She was used to Mr. Gonzales checking up on her throughout the day in the van. They even used hand signals to communicate whether she needed him to pull over -- a tap on the head meant "stop," a salute meant "keep going."

Because Ms. Starr is hypoglycemic, or has low blood-sugar levels, she often needed food between the long stretches.

"Most of the other bikers survive on energy bars," she said. "I can't have anything like that because if it boosts me up like that, it drops me so far down I can't even function."

So she relied on soy milk, yogurt, sandwiches -- and whatever else her husband cooked up on his portable grill.

"I opened up the hood of the van, put a can of beans and wienies on the manifold and in about 20 minutes to a half an hour you had gourmet beans and wienies," he said with a laugh. "It warms them up just perfectly."

But, with the van gone, Ms. Starr was forced to pack on additional calories at breakfast.

"She'd go back and get a couple more pancakes and stuff them in the pockets of her shirt like a little chipmunk," said her husband.

Mr. Gonzales, meanwhile, was stuck each day in the support wagon going back and forth along the route for hours looking for cyclists who tuckered out or, at least, had bicycles that did. He got so bored he decided to ride the rest of the way with his wife -- something he swore he wouldn't do before he left Santa Barbara since he has a condition that usually prevents him from completing bike rides. It's called "TT" -- Tender Tush.

"I attempted one of the toughest days that I could ever imagine. It was a 5,600 elevation climb. It was a 10- to 12-percent grade," he said. "My butt still hurts!"

He lasted only 50 miles.

"I thought I could keep up with Patricia," said Mr. Gonzales. But, truth be told, he couldn't even keep up with the person responsible for picking up the slack. "She had to go back down the hill four times to make sure I was still alive."

Needless to say, the couple won't be riding back to Santa Barbara on bicycles.

They just bought a car.

And, no, it's not a van.

CURVE AHEAD

The couple's 1986 Chevy wasn't the only body that suffered damage along the way. So did Ms. Starr's. Just five days before reaching the finish line, she failed to negotiate a corner and slammed into a bridge railing on her way to Syracuse, N.Y.

"I kept bouncing from one section of it to the next until I was completely entangled in it," she said.

Ms. Starr ended up with bruises on her chest, arm, calves and thighs. Not to mention some cuts. She was able to get medical treatment on site from a couple of the other bicyclists.

"The two doctors actually cut holes in my Hanes hose so I could put bandages on my legs," she said with a chuckle. "That took care of that pair."

The incident with the van took care of the 15 or so others. Which left Ms. Starr, who wears Hanes support hose no matter what she's doing -- including riding a bike across the country -- with only one pair for the remaining five days: "They have the biggest run in them you've ever seen."

The incident in New York wasn't the first time she was hurt on the trip. She actually broke her toe while traveling through Boise, Idaho.

"I stubbed it on the night stand," said Ms. Starr flatly, who simply taped the toe to her foot. "That toe was not going to stop me."

SLIPPERY WHEN WET

The weather wasn't going to stop her, either. Although it certainly tried. Particularly while pedaling from Mankato, Minn., to Rochester, Minn., in a sweltering 90 degrees.

"There was a huge hill in front of me," said Ms. Starr. "I thought, 'I can't possibly make it up.' "

Then she noticed, out of the clear blue sky, four little clouds appear above her.

"The currents were blowing them so they made shadows on the pavement ahead of me," she said. "I rode up that hill in the shade all the way to the top."

She figures somebody was watching out for her.

"I wouldn't have made it if I had to do it in the sun."

REST AREA -- 1 MILE

There were times, too, when Ms. Starr got completely drenched. Like when she and her husband, along with the rest of the group, got to take a day off in Niagara Falls.

The couple, who have been married since 1998, always planned on doing something romantic there.

"There was, like, 600 people on the boat," recalled Ms. Starr. "You actually go under the falls themselves. The water, it's coming down right in your face. You can't even hold your eyes open to see it because it's so close."

STOP

Ms. Starr completed the cross-country bike trip in 50 days -- pedaling the entire way -- which helped raise more than $10,000 for City College music scholarships.

She and the other ride participants were given a police escort to the finish line in Portsmouth, N.H.

"As soon as I got into the caravan that was being led by the policeman, the tears started rolling," she said. "We were 3 miles from the beach, we were all together, I knew I couldn't get lost."

Ms. Starr dipped the back wheel of her bike in the Pacific Ocean on June 20 and dipped the front wheel in the Atlantic Ocean on Aug. 9.

"I knew I had done something that was just awesome. I can assume every person on the ride had the same feeling, but," she chirped proudly, "I am 67."

Ms. Starr and her husband said they plan to relax once they get back to Santa Barbara at the end of the month.

Perhaps they'll take a nice, long bike ride.

The following are edited excerpts from the online journal that Patricia Starr and Gabriel Gonzales kept during the cross-country trip:

Day 1 -- Astoria, Ore., to St. Helens, Ore.: Lots of big trucks whizzing by but they seem to respect you -- I wished I weighed 100 more pounds when all the truck suction tried to move the bike. After performance anxiety yesterday, I was able to zip up all the necessary hills and actually made the 70 miles in six hours, so I was very happy. Had a flat rear tire, so that was a delay of half an hour. But nothing could mar this beautiful day.

• Day 9 -- Rest day in Boise, Idaho: I needed new pedals on my bike so it was off to the bicycle shop this afternoon. I hadn't really worn them out but had almost worn out the shoes that fit them so I needed to take care of that pronto. After the bicycle shop, we went over to the Capitol Building to see if we could say hello to the governor, but he was not in because of a herniated disk. His secretary was gracious, though, and invited us into the governor's office, pulled out his chair and said I should sit down for a photo. Gabriel obliged.
• Day 18 -- Riverton, Wyo. to Casper, Wyo.: One Wyoming man said they like the wind because it makes a lot of people move away -- total population here is about 450,000. When we came into town, the gusts were so bad they blew me into the gutter and my bike went over. I had clipless shoes on so I jumped off the bike. I got back on and the same thing happened again. Finally, I made it to the motel. The 120 miles was almost ho-hum -- everyone was talking about the wind instead.
• Day 22 -- Hot Springs, S.D., to Rapid City, S.D.: As Patricia started up toward Mount Rushmore, the hill was very steep. Much of it at a 10-percent grade for around 9 miles. I let Patricia get way in front, as there are not many turnouts for me to pull over along the way to wait. I found her a little more than halfway. She was being bitten by a bunch of flies and they drew blood like vampires -- two little holes every time they bite. Then, as if to add insult to injury, as she was jumping around to avoid the flies, she jumped into some tar on the road. Rocks stuck to her shoes and bike tires. The temperature was so hot it had melted this part of the road.

  

• Day 31 -- Mankato, Minn., to Rochester, Minn.: As I left Mankato about 8 to 10 miles out, a reporter from Idaho Falls called me for an update on Patricia's ride. I pulled over to the side of the freeway to do the interview. After I finished, something punctured two of the van tires that were on the soft shoulder of the road and blew them out. I was towed to a town 40 to 50 miles ahead called Owatonna. I finally got someone to work on it.
• Day 48 -- Troy, N.Y., to Brattleboro, Vt.: I have a piece of roadkill lying on the bed at this moment. Gabriel wanted to ride this week because he was getting pretty bored riding in the support wagon. The only problem was that the extra bike only became available today, which turned out to be one of our heaviest climbing days.
• Day 50 -- Manchester, N.H., to Portsmouth, N.H.: This was the last day of the ride. There has never been a day when I felt like not doing it, although there were many times when I wished I was already at the motel when I still had umpteen miles to go and huge hills to climb and more headwinds to face. I was nervous about this day as we have come so far, but the pressure was really on now to get to the finish or my dream would be shattered. I felt this pressure for the last week since I crashed into the bridge railing. About 15 miles into the ride, my chain started making the most awful clanking while I was climbing a steep hill, so I hopped off and someone rolling by me said it sounded like I had broken a spoke or possibly had something caught in the chain. My heart almost stopped right there. A broken spoke would have put me out completely. We always said if I had a serious problem, I would hop on Gabriel's bike which was always on the back of the van and continue. That was, of course, no longer an option. I guess someone was still looking out for me as a few more rolls of my bike and the noise stopped. I was able to continue. The day was absolutely gorgeous and when we got to the beach, it was crowded. Gabriel had arranged for the local TV news to be there so they interviewed me as I was dunking my front tire in the Atlantic. What an awesome feeling to know I had pedaled 3,622 miles to get to this point. I was able to do the impossible by sheer determination to never give up

  Source: www.sbstarrsview.com

  TO HELP

• To donate money to the Patricia Starr Endowment Fund for Music Scholarships at Santa Barbara City College, call 897-3537 or go to www.sbstarrsview.com on the Web. All donations are tax-deductible.

  COURTESY PHOTOS

  What a Starr! Patricia Starr waves just moments before completing her cross-country bike trip in Portsmouth, N.H. In addition to raising funds for Santa Barbara City College music scholarships, the 67-year-old was also hoping to break the Guinness Record for the longest distance bicycled by a woman her age. Guinness officials are in the process of determining if she has broken the record.

  Slam dunk! Patricia Starr dipped her back tire in the Pacific Ocean on June 20 and finally dipped her front tire in the Atlantic Ocean on Aug. 9.

  During a day off in Boise, Idaho, Patricia Starr and her husband, Gabriel Gonzales, were allowed to visit Gov. Dirk Kempthorne's office.

  Patricia Starr was presented the key to the city of Mitchell, S.D., by Mayor Alice Claggett. Behind them is the van that was stolen and torched in Canada.