Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Hunter's Campfire Nothing hard is ever easy: A bicycle tour attempt.

Murphy strikes!!

Got most everything loaded 'cept for odds and ends, about 35 pounds of stuff by luggage scale, not bad.

Leave house at 5:30am to get wife from work in 09 Corolla. 400 yards from house a rattle and squeal from up front and the battery light comes on.

Broken belt. Idler pulley seized.

Go get wife in other car.

6:30am call Enrique, auto shop guy at school, ace mechanic and ace bicycle mechanic (he competes).

OK, I just woke him up. Enrique says bring it on over to his house this morning where his tools are and we'll (he'll) fix it today.

One more day lost.

But coulda been worse; this coulda happened two hours later and my wife wouldn't have known to call Enrique and we woulda paid regular rates and it would have took a couple of days.

EVERYONE needs a buddy like this

Birdwatcher

Good luck Birdwatcher. Almost a month ago my wife and I purchased our first bikes in over 15 years. Been using them a lot since then and they really are a lot of fun. Enjoy your trip. I will be following along.

Turns out Corollas don't have an "idler pulley" to seize, what they have instead in that position is a "water pump". How I was able to drive it like that 15 minutes over to Enrique's house I dunno, maybe it was the Mobil 1 angels at work. Anyways I'm told that cars are smart enough now to turn themselves off if they begin to overheat.

The short of it was this; Enrique used to run a shop but quit and took a considerable pay cut to become a teacher so he could have more time with his kids. Still, his garage alone beats many shops.

So for the princely sum of four carne guisada tacos w/cheese and two large 1/2 and 1/2 sweet/unsweet ice teas plus $117.57 in parts at the store we were good to go before 10:30 this morning

Gonna head out at last tomorrow morning.

Birdwatcher

Good luck to you Birdwatcher. Stay safe on the road sir. Like many others here I look forward to the reports and any photos you post from your great adventure!

Sounds like it may too late to offer equipment advice but they do make these:

http://www.amazon.com/Shimano-Compa...?ie=UTF8&refRID=1272RJYF4CJHR49MCK4H
http://www.amazon.com/Nashbar-Ragst...?ie=UTF8&refRID=1RGA6ZKDQE9H9S9TMHVM

Have a safe trip and for goodness sake wear something high visibility on your upper-half, relentlessly.

The glow from Mike's face as he pedals will be enough to alert other folks. Maybe for miles around...

One of the things one does on tour journals is make a �gear list�, since I'm still at home might as well get this formality taken care of. Much of this stuff will likely be jettisoned along the way. At least this is what most newbies end up doing.

1)Ascus Netbook 11� laptop w/charger. Best Buy's cheapest. Still, it has 4gig of RAM and actual all-day battery capacity.

2) Bandannas, nylon. Three. Worn under hat or helmet.

3) Batteries AA, pkg ten lithium, for head and tail lights, camera and GPS unit.

3) Bear Spray. Works on lots besides bears. For occasions where a bullet is just too much.

4) Binoculars 6.5x32.

5) Boxers, nylon, four pairs. They don't weight hardly anything and seems like I don't need 'em to ride in anyway, but these are official REI boxers and I have more'n $100 invested in 'em (well, more'n $90 with the member discount) so they're coming. Might end up in Goodwill somewhere.

6) Camera. Old Nikon I've had for years, still takes an SD card. Might expire en route.

7) Card Readers. Two. For SD cards in camera.

8) Cell Phone w/charger. I'm still using an old flip phone, which explains why I need the camera.

9) Chain. My old Scram 530 weren't stretched at all when I switched it out last week. So I put it in the new chain box and brung it as a spare. Prob'ly overkill.

10) Chain Tool. In underseat tool bag.

11) Cup. 24oz, copper lined with tin. My favorite reenacting accessory, one of them items that makes you feel better just having it around. Crafted by only the finest Pakistani tinsmiths, of course.

12) Cable Lock. Plus three other lightweight cables to thread through front and rear pannier handles and loop onto lock. Enough to deter casual impulse thefts at least. Real locks are heavier than I willing to carry.

13) Dental Floss. I got so many gaps in my teeth now its sorta pathetic.

14) Directions. 14 pages, printed out. From Google Maps Bicycle.

15) GPS Unit. Basic Magellan. No routes downloaded. I'm gonna use it to catalog active purple martin colonies seen en route and so make a 2,000 mile long sampling transect. I dunno if anyone has ever done that.

16) Hats. Three. 1) Wide brimmed Columbia w/stiff brim (I hate it when the wind flip the brim down over your eyes. 2) Beat-up cheap straw that will die the first day (the wind destroys the brim) and 3) Wide brimmed screen type hat, the only one that works under a helmet (I made cut outs for the helment straps).

17) Helmet.

18) Fuel Bottle. Aluminum, for stove. Short enough to fit in bottle holder behind front wheel.

19) Granola. Cereal. Just the bag the box discarded. Raw oatmeal mixed with granola and eaten cold soaked in water is likely to become the primary fuel on this trip (hey, the Scottish Highlanders did exactly the same). No prep needed and I can resupply en-route.

20) Inflatable Pillow?? from REI. This was a big hit with 3 yr old granddaughter on Sunday. Ain't seen it since. $25 out the window. Oh well, for the past half century I've just used rolled-up clothing.

21) Leatherman multitool. Dont leave home without it.

22) Multitool for bikes.

23) Mosquito netting??? for head. One of those items I bought that is still lost somewhere in the shuffle. Intended for use with sleeping bag liner when sleeping out.

24) Mosquito Proof Sleeping Bag Liner. From REI. This thing was a revelation. A lightweight fabric sleeping sack bugs cant bite through yet cool enough to sleep outside here in summer in. I give it five stars.

25) Oatmeal. Old fashioned, see �granola�.

26) Pants. Four pair. Thin nylon from REI.

27) Pot. Fancy quart uberlight model from REI. Prob'ly redundant as I have the copper cup.

28) Pump. Two actually. A Lenzine mini floor pump with pressure gauge and a compact Lenzine so small and light it seems a shame not to bring it as a spare.

29) Rain coat. Rain pants. As I am not expecting cold rains this rain gear may never get used.

30) Rehydration powders. Various samples, from official bike stuff to plain ol'Poweraide. I expect powdered Gatoraide/Poweraide powder augmented with plain salt will become the go-to formula for this.

31) Road Atlas. Rand McNally, most of the paged torn out, just the ones I can use left in. Also used to hold the printed directions.

32) Shelter half/poncho. Classic army gear. Bulky by modern standards. About the best groundcloth for sleeping out on the ground as I intend to do a lot of.

33) Shirts. Magellan nylon fishing shirts, four, long sleeved, oversized, in bright colors not found in nature.

34) Sandals, slip on. 1 backup pair.

35) Shoes, Running. 1 pair.

36) Shorts. One pair, nylon, for casual wear around campground.

37) Shorts, 2pr padded cycling. In case I ain't as hard ass as I think.

38) Soap in soap dish and �rinseless� soap in tube.

39) Spokes? ? I swear, I've bought like 12 spares in the last few months. All have fallen into black hole.

40) Spoke wrench. I do have that, in underseat tool bag.

41) T-shirts, cotton. Two. Not sure why I'm bringing 'em exactly.

42) Tent. REI quarter dome. I have yet to unpack it from the bag.

43) Tent footprint?? Gotta be around here somewhere.

44) Tools, assorted hex wrenches, adjustable wrench, useful wrench sizes etc. Jammed into underseat tool box.

46) Tire, folding. Conti Gatorskin Hardshell 700x32.

47) Tire levers. Maybe seven or eight. They dont weigh hardly anything.

48) Tire pressure gauge??? Durned if I know where it got to. Most tour people just end up eyeballing/squeezing the tire to judge pressure anyway.

49) Toothbrush & toothpaste.

50) Tubes. Seven. Presta valves.

51) Tube patch kit, two.

52) Vest, reflective.

53) Water bottles. 24 oz, four, though I have room for only two on the bike frame.

That's most of it, might have omitted an item or two.

Birdwatcher

Murphy lost today.....nice to have a friend like that.

Birdie,

Vitamin I

When you get to our age sometimes Ibuprofin will help us through the tough spots. I carry it when I ride in case my knee starts up and then I can finish the ride with no swelling and pain free.

Lots of water of course and lite salt helps keep potassium levels up.

Enjoy the journey...

Thanks....


On my way out the door..... see y'all after a bit....

safe travels

This is gonna be fun to follow... safe travels, Mike!

Mike made it thru the first day safe!

Sitting in a McDonalds in Bastrop Texas 1pm. 125 miles from home. Been here an hour but the friggin' Fire has become so slow and glitch-ridden again its hard for me to make long posts (ads no doubt).

Gotta roll by two if I want to make Caldwell (50 miles) by dark so....

A brief update, more details to follow.

Day 1: Wed 6/18. 11 travel hours, 9 hours on the bike. 85 miles. About three gallons of water drunk. $8 for Convenience store pizza slice and fruit cup, ~$6 spent on iced tea (Uncle Si is right), $25 for State Park campsite. Total for day $39.

Overnight on a picnic table at Lockhart State Park.

Day 2: (Now) A work in progress, 30 miles/3 hrs to Bastrop so far. Hope to overnight in Caldwell, gonna be a tough stretch. Starts with a steep climb, then no shade and few public sources of water (ie convenience stores) the rest of the way.

Birdwatcher

I hope that you brought a camera. You'll want a ton of pictures to relive this adventure later. Even things that seem frustrating or insignificant will be things that you laugh about later. Like your first attempt at leaving town and needing to get that mechanic friend to help out. A picture of you, him, and the bike getting worked on will spark your memory months from now.

If you take pictures with your cell phone, you can upload them to drop box to store them. That way if anything happens to your phone along the way, you still have them. The same goes for notes and stuff. Using cloud storage like drop box or google drive or something like those two, will be a real boon to documenting this journey.

Be safe out there though, sir. I just saw a bicycler get hit by a car today on the way to my dentist.....

Mike,
The Hat Creek Cattle Company didn't have that much gear on their cattle drive to Montanny.

Birdwatcher, I probably should have mentioned this in my previous post about the two women cross country cyclists I talked with at our local P.O. a little while back.

Apparently, rather than trying to pack and carry everything they might need, they were using USPS to ship supplies they bought along the way addressed to themselves at P.O.'s in towns on their route ahead.

Sounds like a hell of an adventure. Have fun and good luck!

dang, I'd have driven over to Bastrop to buy you a burger!!!

Keep us updated. Be interesting for sure to follow this!

Day 2: Empty Arms Motel, Caldwell TX. Air conditioning and sweet God in Heaven they have a bathtub.

Jordana del Muerte (Bastrop to Caldwell on Hwy 21) completed

83 miles. Travel time 12 hours. Time on bike 9 hours. Food and drinks $25, lodging $51. $76 total.

Nothing broken on me so far, no unbearable aches and pains. Midday heat (low to mid nineties) surprisingly bearable. But this 80+ miles a day pace is probably unsustainable in the long term, that last 15 miles really kicks my mass. OTOH 70 miles a day sounds about right.

Got pics, narrative etc etc but the 'Fire is so slow for me today it is all but unusable, I had to type this on word and paste it in before it froze again.

Birdwatcher