It has been a busy busy week, and we are finally packed and ready! It is hard to believe that we leave tomorrow.

We have accomplished more than expected in the past week. We made fender extensions for both bicycles, crafted waterproof hand covers out of a shower curtain, got our bicycles tuned and kickstands installed. Both of our commuter bikes found new owners, as did a very large amount of our other belongings. We had an interview for the university newspaper, wrote and recorded a ‘This I believe’ essay, and did another interview with the local outdoor store. Oh, and of course, we had a full week of work wrapping up our various projects.

For the next four days we will be riding through Pennsylvania and Maryland, passing through many small towns and spending a night in Gettysburg. I am very excited for this, because we will take all afternoon to poke around the park and the historical site. The weather looks to be perfect, and this 4 day ride will be a good opportunity to find out what works with our gear set-up and what doesn’t. Finding the right pannier for each item is going to be an ongoing challenge, especially once we are in Alaska and have 3 bear canisters that must fit all our food and toiletry items. Yikes!

From here on out, you will get real stories about the real bicycle trip! No more of this ‘in preparation’ stuff – we are starting! Feel free to subscribe if you want to get emails when we update, otherwise you may want to bookmark the site so that you can find it again next time you wonder where we are.

Finally, a time-lapse video of us taming our belongings and packing them up:

