Ready to Go!

We're all packed up and ready to go!

Since my last day of work, I've been busy finalizing our bike setup and route plan and getting everything at home in order for our departure. Annalee is officially on sabbatical now and the kids have attended their final days of school and have the work they need to complete while we're gone.

We made a few changes to our plan in the past month. The first is a change of gear. After a 50km solo test ride to Stearns Wharf in Santa Barbara and back, I weighed all of my gear that was on the rear rack and while it was still (just) within the specs for the rack, it did not include any food or other items we will pick up along the way. We had been trying to limit ourselves to just rear racks and panniers for simplicity sake but the weight has forced the issue.  Annalee and I and now have front racks and panniers so the load can be distributed more sensibly and we even have some spare capacity now.

The second change is to our route. We ended up eliminating a 5-day section in Portugal between the Algarve in the far south and Lisbon. This section is more remote and rugged and has some longer distances between campgrounds so rather than take that on in our second week of the trip, we felt that it would be better to cover this ground by train. I'm sure we'll do sections even more adventurous later on in the trip, but for now, skipping it feels like the right thing to do to ensure we have a smooth start. 

We're all packed up and ready to catch our bus to LAX on Saturday morning. It will be a hellish 36-hour trip via bus, plane, subway, train, and bike to get to our rental place in Sevilla so we can't wait to be on the other side of that.  Next update will be from Spain!

In case you're bored, this is me disassembling and packing one of our bikes.