BRIDGER VALLEY — Rolling into Fort Bridger Friday evening, Bob Quick and his two fellow travelers parked their bikes, enjoyed a root beer float at the Jim Bridger Trading Post and moved on to Lyman to meet with representatives of the Valley’s Fire Department.

Quick, “a heart survivor,” is on a mission. He is on his third trip, on a bicycle, across America. He has survived two heart attacks, 26 heart procedures, has 19 stents in his heart and an ICD on his chest (a pacemaker defibrillator) and said he has been dead twice.

In relating his life’s story, Quick said he is an ex-drug addict and had been a drug addict most of his adult life. He was addicted to methamphetamine for years. But on the day he died, “when I woke up – a whole different world, I was a whole different person. I had no more addictions.” He now says he has been clean for 14 years and never locked back. Realistically, Quick says, he shouldn’t be here and credits his new mind set and appreciation and thanks to firefighters with the way his life has turned around. He said they never gave up on resuscitating him.

Quick started this, his third and final ride across America, at Roy, Utah, earlier this month. When Quick pulled into Fort Bridger Friday evening, he and his traveling companions (good friend Rusty Healey and a photographer to document his trip) had peddled up-and-down the Three Sisters from Evanston. After meeting with the Valley Fire Department in Lyman, the firefighters put the three men up in the Gateway Inn in Lyman so they could rest before they journeyed on east.

The pace isn’t fast as the highway turns by one-push-of-the-pedal at a time. But the pace is consistent as the bikes travel on as the miles pile up. T