The Atlantic Coast!

Like Katie said, we went on our final training ride today, loaded up with everything we will be carrying with us for the next three months (which is REALLY not that much …). We looked like quite the characters biking through the middle of Boston with sleeping bags and tents strapped on our bikes.

Here we are about to set off from Katie’s house – don’t worry, we didn’t forget our helmets!

On our ride we went out to the coast – our official startpoint at one end of the country! It wasn’t quite as warm out there, as you can see from our spiffy fleeces:

We made it back from the Atlantic Coast in one piece – next stop, the Pacific…

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X-Day minus 36 hours

Today was our last training ride, this time hilariously fully loaded with our gear. We look like pack mules and tip over with absurd ease, which became a problem at various points. It was gorgeous out, in the sense that it was foggy and frigid. As Rhiannon says, we inhaled salt water for the last time for another three months. We contemplated dipping our wheels into the ocean, because apparently it is a thing in the not-insignificant subculture of people who ride bicycles across continents. But it was too hard to get our bikes to the water and we had real fear that we would not be able to get them back up the stairs with all the gear. So instead we just took a picture near the water, which would be enclosed, but it isn’t. Maybe Rhiannon will post it later.

It was the first time I used my new clipless pedals:

which are one of the most gadgety-biker items in my repertoire at the moment. There are these special shoes that snap into them kind of like ski boots, and you get a ton of extra power. Basically the effect of the shoes is to make me feel like a centaur: part machine, part flesh. Maybe that is more like an android. Anyway it is great except I did a few of those narcoleptic style body slams to the ground. It is all good though I am not broken.

So: we are leaving Monday in a blaze of glory from my house, heading to stay with some extended family about 35 miles away. Planning on taking it pretty slow for the first week and a half as we get our “bicycle legs,” which will take us to about Niagara Falls before we kick it into high gear, by which I actually mean low gear because we will be getting ready for hills.

Leave us comments, we want to hear from you! Or link us to your own blogs. We will read them whenever we hit up a public library with non-excruciating internet access (i.e. rarely). We are trying to escape but we do not want to escape from you guys!

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ROUTE PLANNING

This trip is starting to feel more and more real – in the last four days we have been to two bike shops, two outdoor stores, three optometrists, one hardware store, and three ice cream shops. We have bought (almost) everything we need to start our trip, and we have officially planned the first TEN DAYS of our route (from Boston to Buffalo via NIAGARA FALLS), complete with couch surfing and camping plans.

This is our most exciting purchase, which was made with the assistance of two adorable slash really awkward EMS employees who may or may not have given us an unauthorized $25 discount on an $80 product for no reason as far as we could see. Hopefully this trend of free stuff will continue.

We are so excited to make dinner with it tomorrow in Katie’s backyard. We might even sleep in the tent. We also had to buy an accompanying massive tin of white gas to fuel it, which for some reason made us both oddly giddy (not the fumes even).

In other news, due to Katie’s inability to navigate the streets of her hometown (3+ hours spent driving in circles and counting…), we have determined that Rhiannon will navigate the trip (this is also because of her totally SWEET handlebar bag with a clear plastic cover perfect for holding maps). Today also saw that first rush of mechanical glee, as we attached a rearview mirror and an odometer to Rhiannon’s bike, which involved the use of SEVERAL tools.

Tomorrow we will saddle up both bikes for the first time and hopefully attempt to wobble down Katie’s street at 2 mph.

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