Messages

1

Gear Talk / Re: Gear cable breakage

« on: November 08, 2025, 09:47:09 pm »

In all my worldwide touring on a fully loaded bicycle, there was only one instance in which a cable broke and that was a brake cable. There was something wrong with the housing which cut into the cable. As far as a cable breaking no never. They will stretch and wear to the point that they can break, yes, but you should always change all cables when you start a new tour of any long distance. I got my cables at Walmart. No problem with carrying loads over the Alps, over the Rockies, over many different mountains and hills. Never had a problem with a brake cable breaking or a derailleur cable.

2

General Discussion / Re: How much water to carry?

« on: November 05, 2025, 03:31:33 am »

Many people seem to be interested in bicycling gravel roads and single tracks and mountain paths. That kind of cycling has never held an interest for me. I never considered doing it that way. All my touring, bicycle travel, stealth camping, moteling was over the road. Highways and byways. Interstates. The only time I took a dirt path was to walk the bike back into the woods to find a place to sleep for the night. Keeping in close proximity to food and water is a comfort zone. I intended to always stay in it.

3

General Discussion / Re: Why did you go coast-to-coast? Research for a book.

« on: November 02, 2025, 07:37:23 pm »

I answer it saying this. The impulses set forth in my life that led me to that particular course of action came very early in life. The story is real. I think it is too deep a subject to discuss on a forum such as this one and others. It is a deep personal issue with me. The original impulse came from where, I have no way of knowing. I remember some events. The boy my age who taught me that sometimes limitations are only in your mind. He taught me how to ride a bicycle. His name was Johnny Mann. That was in Stuart Florida in the 1950s. That was the first one I could remember.

Pedaling a bicycle, to me, at times seemed almost like a surreal fantasy.  It was wonderful until I started getting punctured tires. Getting patch kids and pumps and a new tubes was a big problem. The cycling dropped off. When I was very young, maybe eight or nine possibly, our Father drove the family to Mexico for the summer. We were there a while and returned it to Florida over the road. You've been there. Motels, gas stations, restaurants. After returning to Florida, for some odd reason, I had this compelling drive to ride a bicycle back to the west. The east was bad news. Government were as crooked as a corkscrew. The judge or the sheriff might have done something about it if you could catch them sober, which some of them often were not. I sensed this place, Stuart Florida, at a very early age.

Right across the street from our house, just off the shore of the St Lucie River, they found a woman drowned and dead. She was the mother of four children. I'm not sure they found her in that particular location. I did see the body there in that location. I was maybe 5 or 6 or 7. The tide might possibly have carried her farther down the river. I can say only from what I saw. There was underhanded treachery no doubt whatsoever. I thought it would be really cool even at a very early age to ride a bicycle back toward the west and to Texas. I really I thought Texas was great. Of course you have to consider those days, 1956-57-58, I had the cognitive development of a child 8 years old. Any compulsion or action in your life is the culmination of what they call multiple causation. There is no one simple explanation for why people behave the way they do.

The first transcontinental was from Key West, FL to San Diego, CA. I wanted to do it but was not motivated to do it alone.
Then, a woman I had met while bicycling through the U.K. in the summer of 1984 agreed to come here and do the journey with me. She flew here from England. We did the trip in 66 days in the winter of 1985-85. It was about 3600 miles.

4

Gear Talk / Re: Upgrade for my touring packing set up

« on: October 29, 2025, 01:25:44 am »

You can make your own panniers which are much lighter than some that I have seen on the market. You can take those dry bags they sell in Walmart in the camping section. The tough thick plastic ones that are reinforced.  Roll it down three times tight. Connect hooks securely below that you can connect to the rack. You need backing in there and stiffening and all that. But it is much lighter than your average pannier and it is just as watertight as an Ortlieb pannier. Much less expensive.

5

General Discussion / Re: How much water to carry?

« on: October 24, 2025, 12:00:06 am »

A steady sure unlimited supply of clean drinking water is taken for granted in the United States. A salubrious level of water in the body charges the internal organs for efficiency. It is very important to stay properly hydrated when bicycling all day for days and weeks. It is possible when traveling over the road long distance, even in the United States, to find yourself dehydrated with no immediate source of what is absolutely essential for life, water. It is not as though anyone will die from it. In an emergency you can always flag motorists and seek aid. The thing is you can be caught short on water with a significant distance between yourself and the next Oasis.

6

General Discussion / Re: Court rules license plate readers illegal.

« on: October 21, 2025, 12:43:01 pm »

In all of my extensive bicycle touring, police pulled me over only twice. The first time I was cycling on an interstate where another road I did not know existed ran next to it and parallel with it. It was at night. I had to dismount, lift all my stuff over a barbed wire fence, and use the other road. The second time was in North Florida. There was a 4-ft side lane. It was all chewed up for the laying in of more asphalt. It was jiggly and it sent vibrations through the bike and through my body. So I was bicycling to the left of the white line. They pulled up in back at me and asked me to stop. I explained to them that I could not use the roughened part of the road with a bicycle. Besides that, I had a legal right to be cycling where I was and the way I was doing it.

7

General Discussion / Re: How much water to carry?

« on: October 21, 2025, 12:30:33 pm »

The above-link is spam posted in several threads.

0

Why did somebody post spam here?

8

General Discussion / Re: Costs per day?

« on: October 02, 2025, 12:37:35 am »

In 2007 I did Oregon to Indiana 2226 miles in 22 days. I spent $8 per day. This consisted of one galon of milk one box of cereal per day and coffee at every McDonalds on the route. I lost between 22 and 33 pounds on the trip. It took about 3 months to regain the weight. I have found if I average 55 miles a day I do not lose any weight. I did not spend any money on parts.

What kind of cereal?  Where did you buy it?  Was this boxed wal mart cereal?

9

General Discussion / Friday August 12, 1994. Bicycle Touring West to East in Germany.

« on: October 01, 2025, 03:54:41 am »

FRIDAY  August 12, 1994: Breakfast was canned apricots and a hazella sandwich and it tasted good. I scraped the sticky brown clay off the tent stakes for packing. The rainfly was folded wet. Some bicycle touring books advise you to hang wet tents and rain flies to air dry before packing. That can be impractical. Drying can take a long time under wet cloudy skies. Cyclists often do not want to wait that long. However, if the articles are damp, and there is sunshine and a breeze, you can spread them out before breakfast, and start the day with dry gear. Another way is to spread out the wet articles when stopped for breaks during the day. I carried all the gear to the base of a large oak tree near the road. After loading, I knocked the dried clay off the cycling shoes, mounted my heavenly loaded touring bicycle and entered the highway headed east.

A slight following wind push me along. There were the usual stops for food and drink during the day. At one stop, in a small parking lot next to a large field of sunflowers, I had just made two sandwiches, and eaten one, and was just beginning to devour the other, when it started raining again. I put on a raincoat and I spinned down the road. The rain stopped in a few miles. There were two stops at bicycle shops. One was at Metz and the other at Saint Avold. Neither sold 27 by 1 and 1/4 inch tires which was a cause for concern.

A small flyer in the shop at Saint Avold advertised a campground near Felsberg. The owner of the shop gave directions for getting there. The flyer said that campground was only 12 francs or about $2. That seemed much more than reasonable. Getting there required cycling quite some distance through heavy City traffic, and up steep hills. In the office at the campground they wanted 29 francs which was more like $6. I decided to move on. It was not that the place was not worth it. It most certainly was. Out front was a large, clean, modern A-Frame restaurant. It had clean hot water showers. The international youth hostel federation managed the place. But Americans dislike being quoted a lower price to lure us in, only to be charged more than twice the quoted amount. Some people do not realize how used to standardized prices they are. When prices are switched on us at the last minute we get miffed. We feel we have been tricked, and almost invariably, the second price is higher than the first. That was my take on it after being penurious most of my life. Highway N3 running East out of town was excellent. Traffic was heavy. Pollution was minimal.

An elevated railroad track pointing east and west crossed the highway at one of its many bends. Immediately passed the tracks to the right, a rough dirt road wended west off the highway, juxtaposed to the base of the earthen berm supporting the track. The track was 10 ft above the dirt road. On the other side of the road began a moderately steep Hill that peaked about 300 ft to the north. The hill looked smooth enough for sleeping. Hand pushing the bike 100 ft up the hill at an elevation still below the level of the tracks, I strung the nylon rain fly between two trees. Dinner was fish sandwiches and canned pineapple. It was a rough night of sleep because of the lumpy uneven ground, and the din of trains rattling by in the dark. 43 miles.

10

General Discussion / Re: Cyclist's Syndrome/Pudendal nerve problem

« on: September 23, 2025, 09:17:13 pm »

It might be only temporary.

11

General Discussion / Re: How much water to carry?

« on: August 30, 2025, 10:51:19 pm »

There was a case on television in Florida years ago. It was the lesson taught in ancient Greece thousands of years ago. All things in moderation. Take all things in moderation. There was this young fellow. I think he was in junior high school or high School. He played on the school football team. He decided for some reason to supply his body with all the water he would need during the game. That way he would not have to stop and drink more. The volume of water they said he drank at once was unbelievable. He died. I know they have a word for that. There is a technical or medical word for death caused by over consumption of water. It was in all the news. I had put a story on a forum about my experiences bicycling across the United States in the summer. I mentioned drinking 2 gallons and 3 gallons of water a day. I did not say I had drunk that much in one sitting. I stated clearly that I had various drinks throughout the day and I gave information about the volumes of those drinks. I cannot imagine anyone drinking a gallon of water or any other liquid at once say in 5 minutes or 10 minutes or even 30 minutes. I think this poor young man was going for two gallons. Unbelievable. Everything in moderation. As for some things, nothing at all.

12

General Discussion / Why did you decide to ride a bicycle transcontinentally?

« on: August 30, 2025, 09:49:34 pm »

There was a topic on this forum. It was a person who claimed to write a book about why people became long distance bicycle tourists. I was looking for it. Not such good eyesight anymore. I did not see it.

I answer it saying this. The impulses set forth in my life that led me to that particular course of action came very early in life. The story is real. I think it is too deep a subject to discuss on a forum such as this one and others. It is a deep personal issue with me. The original impulse came from where, I have no way of knowing. I remember some events. The boy my age who told me that sometimes limitations are really only in your mind. He taught me how to ride a bicycle. He was known as Johnny Mann. That was in Stuart Florida in the 1950s. That was the first one I could remember. Pedaling a bicycle, to me, at times seemed almost like a surreal fantasy.  It was wonderful until I started getting punctured tires. Getting patch kids and pumps and a new tubes was a big problem. The cycling dropped off. When I was very young, maybe eight or nine possibly, our Father drove the family to Mexico for the summer. We were there a while and returned it to Florida over the road. You've been there. Motels, gas stations, restaurants. After returning to Florida for some odd reason I have this compelling drive to ride a bicycle back to the West. The East was bad news. Government were as crooked as a corkscrew. The judge or the sheriff might have done something about it if you could catch them sober, which some of them seldom were. I sensed this place, Stuart Florida, at a very early age. Right across the street from our house, just off the shore of the St Lucie River, they found a woman drowned and dead. She was the mother of four children. I'm not sure they found her in that particular location. I did see the body there in that location. The tide might possibly have carried her farther down the river. I can only speak from what I saw. There was all kinds of underhanded treachery. Well I will not say all kinds but there was underhanded treachery no doubt whatsoever. I thought it would be really cool even at a very early age to ride a bicycle back toward the west and to Texas. I really I thought Texas was great. Of course you have to consider I had the cognitive development of a child 8 years old. Any compulsion or action in your life is the culmination of what they call multiple causation. There is no one simple explanation for why people behave the way they do.

13

General Discussion / Bicycle route---southern tier---Perry, FL to Santa Rosa Beach, FL.

« on: August 22, 2025, 10:05:16 pm »

You are at the corner intersection of highway 19 / South Byron Butler parkway. Looking west go straight across 19. You are on West Hampton Springs avenue / 98. Follow the northwestern bend on 98 for some distance and then it goes around to the left. Pack some water and food because there is a lot of green here.

This is a long distance. You will go over the Saint Mark's river and in a short distance turn right on to highway 267 / Bloxham Cutoff road. Right on 267 just passed OutzToo oyster bar and grill. Continue 267 across 363 and across the St Mark's bike path straight across on 267. Go through Bethel and Hilliardville. Continue on 267 through a lot of green until you intersect with highway 20 and go left on 20.

20 goes through many small towns for a very long distance. Once you get to 331 that is east of Miramar beach and Sandestin and Santa Rosa beach, you can turn left on 331 before you get to Freeport. It will take you to highway 98 which is where you want to be next. If you do not turn left at highways 331, you can continue through Freeport to Choctaw beach and across a bridge to Bluewater Bay and turn left on 293 to get to 98. I think I would take 331. And here you are at highway 98 where you have to turn right. Keep going on other roads to the ferry boat at Fort Morgan, Alabama.

14

Routes / Bicycling from Perry FL to Santa Rosa Beach, FL.

« on: August 21, 2025, 07:52:50 pm »

You're at the corner intersection of highway 19 / South Byron Butler parkway. Looking West go straight across 19. You are on West Hampton springs avenue / 98. Follow the northwestern band on 98 for some distance and then it goes around to the left. Pack some water and food because there's a lot of green here.

This is a long distance. You will go over the Saint Mark's River and in a short distance turn right on to highway 267 / Bloxham cutoff Road. Right on 267 just passed OutzToo oyster bar and grill. Continue 267 across 363 and across the St Mark's bike path straight across on 267. Go through bethel and hilliardville. Continue on 267 through a lot of green until you intersect with highway 20 and go left on 20.

20 goes through many small towns for a very long distance. Once you get to 331 that is east of Miramar Beach and sandestin and Santa Rosa Beach, you can turn left on 331 before you get to Freeport and it will take you to highway 98 which is where you want to be next. If you do not turn left at 3:31 you can continue through Freeport to Choctaw Beach and across a bridge over to bluewater Bay and turn left on 293 to get to 98. I think I would take 331. And here you are at highway 98 where you have to turn right.

15

General Discussion / Re: My next adventure - 2026 East Coast to Arctic Ocean -- Initial Planning

« on: August 21, 2025, 06:58:48 pm »

You need better luck than I ever had following extensive directions perfectly. A number of times I spent fairly long periods of time planning bicycle routes east to west across the United States. I had it all written on paper. Just follow the directions. I never did that. I did part of it sometimes. Once a tour began I simply chose whichever roads there were according to the way I felt about it at the time. I spent all that time plotting safe efficient bicycling routes, and ignored them pretty much on the road.