Kellie Bancalari

There is nothing more painful in the world than losing a loved one -- but this father is turning his pain into hope for the thousands of people waiting for an organ transplant.

Bill Conner lost his daughter last January in a freak drowning in Mexico. Abigail Mae Conner was only 20 and a junior at the University of Wisconsin-Whitewater.

And because Conner's daughter was a organ donor, her tissues were used to save the lives of four men between the ages of 20-60.

Her father got to meet one of those men -- the one who received his daughter's heart, to hear it beating again. On Father's Day, Conner arrived in Ventress, La., to meet Loumonth Jack, Jr., the heart recipient.

Jack, 21, had suffered a heart attack. Abbey Conner's heart saved his life.

And Conner didn't stop there. For six days a week and around 60 miles a day, Conner -- who started in Madison, Wisc. -- plans to ride his bike all the way to Ft. Lauderdale, Fla. The whole trip will last about two months, as he left on May 22 and hopes to arrive at his final destination July 10.

"In honor of my daughter and to help me deal with my own grief, I will be riding my Trek bicycle 2,000+ miles across the country," Conner wrote on his GoFundMe page. The trip, he wrote, would raise "awareness to the impact of organ donation."

When Conner takes a break from his ride or stops to re-charge, he asks people to register to become organ donors.

On Conner's GoFundMe page, he is raising money for Donate Life America, an organization that helps people register to be organ donors. As of Friday, June 23, Conner has already raised $16,160 of his $20,000 goal.

Related: Meet the UT-Austin student and cancer survivor who just did a 70-day charity bike ride

Kellie Bancalari is a student at George Washington University and a USA TODAY College digital producer.

This story originally appeared on the USA TODAY College blog, a news source produced for college students by student journalists. The blog closed in September of 2017.