Eastbound & Brown

The Scribe rides, and writes, his way from coast to coast

Kim Brown might be best known to Stowe Reporter readers for his wintertime tales in the Ski Bum Corner column. But now he is embarking on a new adventure, one that’ll take him from coast to co—

“All right, hold on a second, I need to make sure this is the right lane,” says Brown, talking by phone while trying to find the exit onto Interstate 70 out of St. Louis.

We hold on a second. We don’t want The Scribe getting into a car accident before his 66-day bicycle trek even starts. Not after he cracked his sternum on a tree branch in the Mount Mansfield backcountry this past ski season. Not after he already had to abort a cross-country bike trek in the 1960s after an accident.

“OK, I’m back. I’m gonna give you the whole story, if you’re patient,” he says, after settling onto the interstate. “I was a Boy Scout, and when I was 12…”

When Brown was 12, he was reading an issue of Boys’ Life magazine and came across a story about a Scout who rode cross-country on his bicycle, and he thought to his young self it would be a fun thing to do.

“Some time later, when I was 23, I was sitting at a bar …”

And while sitting at that bar, he talked with a friend who was about to head out with her boyfriend to Colorado. He said he wanted to do a cross-country bike trip. She said, “Well, why don’t you?”

“Nine days later …”

He was on the road, riding west. He made it to Michigan from Boston in 14 days, making good time, until he got hit by a pickup truck and broke his femur. Game over. For a while, anyway.

“So, I’d say this idea has been brewing in my mind for 44 years. Those two weeks I was on the road were really memorable to me,” Brown says. “You just don’t get the same perspective in a car.”

Over the next four decades, Brown skied a lot, rode his bike a lot, and wrote a lot. And now, The Scribe, as he is known in his ski column, will be riding and writing his way across the nation starting this weekend.

The self-described “ski bum by winter and hacker by summer,” and crazy guy on a bike (seriously, that’s the website to which he’ll be posting his adventures over the summer, crazyguyonabike.com/kimbro77), will be dipping his rear tire in the waters off the shore of Pacific City, Ore., on June 13. Yes, that’s Friday the 13th.

“But my daughter’s suspicious, so I may dip it in on the 12th, and technically take off on day two.”

From there, Brown has set an itinerary that features six days a week of riding an average of 75 miles a day. The route heads north to Washington, and then east over the northern Rocky Mountains, where he will be joined by his wife and daughter for a week, them in the car, him on his giant TCX 1000. Then it’s through the northern states into Chicago, and onward to the Erie Canal.

On his days off the bike, he plans on keeping busy, seeing the sites, relaxing and meeting people. The ski bum will even get some turns in, visiting friends for a day of skiing on Mount Hood. He’ll stay, for the most part, in hotels and motels, although he’ll do a little camping and couch surfing, too.

“I’m doing the classic credit card trip,” he says.

If all goes as planned, on Aug. 16, he will dip his bike tire in the Atlantic Ocean, on Coney Island. He is inviting anyone who wishes to ride the last 40 miles with him — and he will buy them all dinner.

Brown arrived at his decision to end his trip on Coney Island after considering other Right Coast destinations. Portland, Maine? He didn’t want to ride past his home and over two whole mountain ranges to end his trip. Cape Cod? Been there, done that. The New Hampshire Seacoast?

“Do I want to ride my bike through Vermont to New Hampshire, where they’ve been known to tap their telephone poles for maple syrup? No, no.”

Brown is 66 years old, and will turn 67 next month, “somewhere around Chicago.” He has been coming to Vermont since 1949, on skis since 1951 when he was 4. To fund his adventures, Brown has run an architectural design business for much of the past few decades.

Brown’s scribblings have brought many a chuckle to Stowe Reporter readers. But this crazy guy on a bike, who is about to embark on a bike trip lasting as many days as he has years under his belt, is also one tough cookie. He has literally been knocked out of the saddle and got back on that horse. So, is he a little nervous?

“People tell me the biggest challenge of these rides is that you’re on the bike every day, day after day, and you spend it all alone most of the time,” he says. And, during that alone time, you can bet your saddlebags The Scribe’s going to come up with plenty of things to write about. “I think I’ll have a lot of thoughts about things that’ll emerge just because of the nature of a solitary bike ride.”