OWLS HEAD, Maine — Fifteen states and more than 3,500 miles later, John Bottero is back in Maine and has two months full of memories biking from the West Coast to the East Coast.
Bottero decided to bike from Portland, Oregon to Maine as a way to raise awareness for the museum he's the executive director of.
At the Owls Head Transportation Museum, Bottero said they are raising money for renovations.
"Most importantly, we also are raising money for STEM education, bringing kids from schools over for stem," Bottero said.
The goal is $250,000, and with a donor to match donations, Bottero said. So he took off back in May from Portland and traversed up to 7,000 feet in elevation a day getting over the Rocky Mountains and the mountain passes of Vermont and New Hampshire.
"Really, a large portion of it is physical, but equally it is your mentality. You have to have your mind in the right place," Bottero said. "The last couple of days every time I thought about coming home, I would choke up a bit thinking of how I would react to finishing this ride."
Bottero said there was no better way to go cross-country than use the mode of transportation most dependent on human power.
"In its purest sense, it is human power. We can all get in a car and put our foot on the gas, but I've always been interested in things that are done by human power," Bottero said.
The mission for the Owls Head Transportation Museum is still collecting funds, even though Bottero's journey across the country is finished.