Three weeks to go

 Hi Friends,

I'm learning to blog so that I can share my trip with you as I create a daily memory of my bicycle trip across the USA.

Three weeks to go...

About 1 year ago I responded to a post on the Adventure Cycling Assoc Website for companions wanted to transverse the country via bicycle. At first about 15 people expressed interest but over time our group became 6.  We've only met from time to time on Zoom and chatted via email and phone.    I'm sure that we will become fast friends.  A large amount of prep has gone into this trip, for some people maybe more and for some less. For me It's been a lot of work.

I haven't been on a tour for six years, my last trip was an 850 mile circumnavigation of lake Huron, a trip I took with my husband, now ex-husband.  I've upgraded much of my 15 year old gear. My first challenge was to find, a hard to find Touring bike made much more difficult during COVID. The touring bike market is a niche market since there isn't much demand and now they are even more scarce with the popularity of the Gravel bike or a Back Packing bike. After much stress I found a barely used high end Co-Motion Cascadia touring bike. While touring bikes look much like road bikes, they are very sturdy and heavy. Mine is steel and weighs in at 30lbs. I expect that it will weigh 60lbs with my four panniers attached.  My bike has heavy duty rims with 36 spokes and 35mm tires.  Another necessity of a touring bike is very low gears for climbing mountains and steep inclines.  An unusual feature of this bike is there is no chain, instead their is a carbon fiber belt that engages with an internal Rolhoff hub system for changing gears. This is a no maintenance system, no chain to clean just change the oil every 10,000. Below is my bike at 30lbs. I hope there will be no need for maintenence!

I've been on many three week "fully loaded" bike trips over the years.  We expect this trip to be 8-10 weeks.  It's 3500+ miles. I'm looking forward to the adventure.  Here is our itinerary.  Likely we won't stick to it precisely, as we may double up some days and take time off due to weather.

I'm almost packed up for the trip. In a couple of days a friend and I are going to put Schwalbe Marathon 700 x 35C touring tires on my bike. This is a rugged tire and one of the nice features is a reflective strip near the bead. I think of it as another level of safety during a rainstorm.
Speaking about safety I can't say enough about my Garmin Varia Radar RTL515.

It sports a solid five star review on Amazon.  This unit interfaces with my GPS, audibly and visually of traffic behind me showing up to 8 vehicles and approximately how far behind me they are. My tail light will warn the drivers as they approach by blinking more frequently.