Under blue skies on a blazing hot day this summer, John Kerry hopped onto his bike, clipped into his pedals, and spent three hours on a grueling ride up a mountain in the Alps.This was a year after he fell off his bike and broke his femur. This was after days in the hospital and months of physical therapy. This was after he became the butt of jokes from Donald Trump. Now he was back on the bike, trying to ride the same Alpine pass, featured in the Tour de France, that he’d failed to complete a year earlier.“I wanted to go back,” Kerry said. “I just was not satisfied. . . . I said, ‘I’ve got to go pick up where I left off.’ ” It has sometimes seemed, too, that Kerry as secretary of state has tried to change the world’s ills through sheer determination and stamina. And in some important cases — like the deal to limit Iran’s capacity to create a nuclear weapon, or helping persuade nearly 200 nations to sign onto a climate agreement — his tireless efforts yielded historic results.
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The former Massachusetts senator plans to return to Boston. He said he will seek work in the private sector, declining to provide details while he still holds his public job. And he said he looks forward to shedding the diplomatic reserve that has prevented him from speaking out on domestic politics over the last four years. As Kerry sat in his State Department office, he was nursing a cold, sucking on cough drops and drinking vitamin water — a key source of nutrients for a man with a frenzied, peripatetic schedule.. . . Kerry’s tenure has been marked by diplomatic risk-taking and a crushing schedule. He has logged 1.4 million miles, more than any secretary of state in history. He’s spent the equivalent of 124 days in the air. The schedule is so extreme — and unpredictable — that members of his press corps have called traveling with him the “Kerry Go-Round.” . .
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Kerry just turned 73, and while he’s had both hips replaced it hasn’t prevented him biking up mountains with people who are three decades younger. Some who are Kerry’s age might consider retirement, or at least an extended vacation. He is not. He will make Boston his home base, but is also planning to work in Washington. He has been contemplating a range of things that will occupy him once he formally leaves office at noon on Jan. 20. He wants to write about his experiences. He’s been talking to environmental groups about being engaged in continuing to fight climate change.“No question I’ll be speaking out and engaged politically in the debate of our country,” Kerry said. “You can imagine, it was very hard to sit there during the presidential race and bite your tongue and lip and stay silent. As of Jan. 20, I don’t have to do that anymore.” He also intends to work in the private sector for one of the first times since he opened a cookie shop in 1976 in Quincy Market.“I’m going to continue to work for peace and conflict resolution in a constructive forum that I’m trying to think about and shape right now,” he said. . . He would not elaborate much on what that might entail. He’ll spend time with his grandchildren — one of whom sat in his lap while he signed the Paris climate deal. A few bike rides could be in his future. . .