believe that no matter the obstacles we may face in life, their are opportunities to get out there and be involved in life. I often met many folks facing much greater challenges than I was and I felt grateful for my opportunities.
How long were your trips/tours?
The tours, these cycling adventures varied in length for me. My early adventures overseas, were usually 2-3 weeks, usually around the length of my vacation from work at the engineering firm where I worked as a design/engineer. My longest adventure was the around the world cycling adventure which took us through 17 countries, over 13,200 miles, and was about eight months in length (247 days).
I should add here, that I have done many cycling trips/tours which have been just 2-3 days long. Many here in Maine. These are often shorter journeys of 100-180 miles long. They have often been for fund-raising for a non-profit organizations, like the American Lung Association, like Northeast Passage, and also for World T.E.A.M. Sports.
I also did another cross country trip a few years back. This was 3600 miles across the U.S. with returning injured service men and women. We began in San Francisco in May and finished in Virginia Beach in July. This was an amazing trip because of the experience it gave me to gain an understanding of what life has been for some of these brave men and women, some who were seriously injured in Iraq and Afghanistan. I have some very fond memories from this trip and friends I am in contact on a regular basis.
Were there any setbacks/struggles during your tours?
No, there were no struggles or setbacks during any of my tours. Of course, I am just kidding here. Good question Matthew because, the struggles and setbacks presented themselves in a variety of ways, and places, and with people, and under different conditions, weather for example.
Struggles and setbacks could involve an accident, a fall off the bike/handcycle. I had a crash, while our group was leaving Paris, heading towards Brussels in Belguim. While cycling down hill, fairly fast for the handcycle, we came upon some broken up pavement with grooves which caught my tires and slammed my handcycle onto it’s side and rolled me over a couple of times and eventually I was on the side of the road with the handcycle on top of me. My helmut, it’s a must-have for cycling, was split in half. It saved my life that time. I had just smashed my shoulder into the pavement as well and destroyed a beautiful, colorful cycling jersey I had just traded for with a French cyclist for one of our Team jerseys. It’s funny, I was banged up, my handcycle required some work, a wheel needed fixing, the doctor patched up a bunch of road rash I acquired on my shoulder and leg from the crash, yet my first concern was that the beautiful new jersey was now trashed!
Other struggles involved people on these journeys, you are not always drawn to enjoy all the other members of some of the groups we were with. As in everyday life, you can encounter people who are a part of the struggle you encounter on a trip. Sometimes I found that some teammates were not as open and interesting in learning about the world and were only interested in their own needs and desires.
I have cycled through all kinds of weather, hours of rain, snow storm in which we got over a foot and half of snow over 24 hours; a day in China when it took us 13 hours just to travel 35 miles on a dirt road, which had turned to 35 miles of MUD, after raining the previous night. We have cycled in temperatures as high as 108 and as long as 12 below zero degF with the windchill. Also our group experienced a tornado one morning before we were to leave our motel in Nebraska, they required we go into the shelter under the motel, under it passed and we began out day of cycling. I know that most days I have been fortunate to have the sun on our faces and the wind at our backs.
Have you ever felt you couldn't succeed during your tours?
On the shorter trips, I usually always felt I could succeed and do the mileage; make it up all the hills, or alongside the long stretches of corn, or the hours of rain.