Spaced Out

Shortly after leaving New Smyrna, we found ourselves pedaling along a 30 mile stretch of US1. Generally speaking, the ACA route keeps you off of major highways unless there are either no other options, or else the road has good accommodations for bicyclists. On the whole, we had been impressed with Florida’s efforts to integrate bicycles into their transportation network. In many communities there are excellent bike lanes and signage. Most bridges that we crossed (and we went over a heck of a lot of them) had either wide bike lanes or pedestrian/bicycle walkways. To be sure, the system is far from perfect. Often times you’ll be merrily riding along in your own lane, only to find that it comes to an abrupt end, dumping you back out into the traffic. For sure, there’s work to be on the system, but it is better than most. Bicycle-vehicle collisions are a concern anywhere, and we learned that bicyclists in Florida have been dealing with a number of issues in this regard. We were told that the Florida legislature enacted a law that requires motorist to approach no closer than 3 feet when there is no bikeway. Our experience was that most people complied, although on any busy or shoulder less road, it was still pretty much “bicyclist beware”. Until the day that bicycles become a legitimate concern in roadway planning and our transportation system, long distance touring will require one to ride in less than ideal conditions at certain times. We knew that going into the trip, and our initial estimate that the route (from a traffic perspective) would be 90% enjoyable, 8% “challenging“, and 2% tense and insanely nerve wracking was holding true to form.

As we neared Titusville and Cape Canaveral, we began to notice citrus orchards for the first time. Our journey south was taking us through the transition zone of the subtropics. The subtropics refers to the a range of latitudes between 35 and approximately 23.5 degrees from the equator. We actually entered the subtropics in South Carolina where we first notice a large number of palmetto palms, and even a banana tree or two. These areas typically have very warm to hot summers, but non-tropical winters. A subtropical climate implies that the temperature usually does not go below freezing. This is a threshold temperature for a gamut of plants, and applies to most of southern Florida. Interestingly, the poleward limit of sub tropical climates is higher on the west coasts of the northern continents and lower on the east coasts, because occasional winter cold snaps reach farther south in the east. Some subtropical cities in the US include Houston, Orlando, and Los Angeles. Cities such as Miami are not subtropical, and have truly tropical climates.

Between Mims and Titusville the traffic picks up considerably and the highway shoulder disappears, making for a less than optimal bicycling experience. Titusville is a peculiar town. Located directly across the intracoastal from the space center at Cape Canaveral, one would think that it would be a modern, prosperous city. The polar opposite was true. The section of town we rode through was that of a city in decay. The road surfaces were in horrible shape, houses were neglected, bars were on the windows of the stores and homes. Maybe the town was still recovering from a hurricane or some other calamity...frankly we don’t know. Quite simply, the prosperity that we saw in nearly the towns we had been in Florida had skipped over Titusville. The place gave us the “willies” and we couldn’t get out of there soon enough. It may have been the gateway to “The Space Coast”, but we rocketed out of there as fast as we could.

We spent the night at a county campground 6 or 7 miles south of Titusville. Although it was a wonderful facility ideally situated on the intracoastal, (where you could watch launchings from the Space Center) it confirmed our suspicions that there were indeed some problems in paradise. The park was surrounded by a chain link fence with barbed wire on top. When we registered at the office, they made a photo copy of our picture IDs to “have on file”, just in case. We were told that the gate would be closed at 10 and reopened at 6 in the morning. It’s not uncommon for campgrounds to have quiet hours, but we almost felt like inmates being shut in for the night. Fortunately, we were doing “easy” time and enjoyed the balmy, nearly tropical evening. It rained some, but by morning the sky had cleared.

We fixed a light repast and broke camp early to beat the US1 traffic and put some miles between Titusville and us. The town was definitely an anomaly and there may be an interesting story behind it, but we were content to see it in the rear view mirror as we proceeded on.