I'm not going to lie... the first ride on our bikes was a tough one, as in, not a spec of flat ground. I'm expecting some cycling-induced muscle soreness later today, but that doesn't dissuade me. In fact, I knew it would happen. While we may have done some hiking here and there, and of course we all know that Rebecca is a workout animal, we haven't done any cycling since our trip up the mountain in the Galapagos, and that was…
Rebecca and I are now the proud parents of two brand-new baby bikes. Well, babies only in that they've had no experiences yet, certainly not in size. Here's the final buildout for our babies: Build List Part Description Frame Tumbleweed Fork Steel Unicrown Crankset XT M780 Black Chainring Surly Stainless 32 tooth Bottom Bracket BB93 Shimano XTR Front Hub Schmidt SON 28 135 Black, 32 hole, Dynamo hub Rear Hub Rohloff SPEEDHUB Black, 32 hole, quick release 16t cog Quick release…
In no way do I consider myself to be technologically inept. Quite the opposite actually, at least when it comes to computers. I do, however, seem to have a bit of a mental roadblock, no pun intended, when it comes to electronic navigation. I remember our friend Jason describing all that he and Gail had done to prepare for their San Blas to Australia trip, but when he tried to explain it to me, it just didn't sink in. Sorry Jason, it's…
Aside from reconnecting with our family, and trying to reset our internal clocks to California time (afternoon siestas rock!), we didn't accomplish a ton yesterday, at least not on the new adventure front. We did start unboxing some of the presents that we had waiting for us, the largest of which was the collection of custom bikepacking bags that we had made by Rogue Panda. These look as good as we had hoped. We also made contact with Daniel from…
When it comes to an entire day airline travel, I don't know if our trek from Martinique to LA could have been too much better. We started off the journey by being ferried to the Fort de France airport by our friend Steve, which was much better than taking the taxi as we had initially planned. Our connections worked out perfectly, our flights were on time, and in fact, I think we may have even arrived in LA ahead of…
For years after we left Canada, whenever the subject of our pre-cruising life was brought up, we'd have friends and acquaintances ask us if we missed running our gym. Even though we accumulated countless positive memories from the years and years that we did so, and most certainly do miss the martial arts training itself, we do not miss operating the business. Nor do we miss running charters, in spite of the positive memories that we took from that too.…