GRAB AN ADVENTURE

I have become aware of how much everyone needs to be on an adventure in their life. For me, adventure is a one-way ticket to where the road ends at the top of the world with no way out but to pedal south 3700 miles.  But yours may be just as astoundingly profound and exhilerating as mine.  The real question is, what adventure are you on? 

This adventure I'm currently on is wild and unpredictable; I just don't know how it will all end.  But that's the nature of adventures--going places we've only dreamed of going to.  

Adventures take action, they launch us out into the deep in places and ways that scare us spitless.  Yet we still take the risk because we can, because we dare to. Listen to how Anne Lamott sizes up adventure . . .

"Oh my God, what if you wake up some day, and you're 65, or 75, and you never got your memoir or novel written; or didn't go swimming in the warm pools and oceans all those years because your thighs were jiggly and you had a nice, big comfortable tummy, or you were just so strung out on perfectionism and people-pleasing that you forgot to have a big juicy creative life of imagination and radical silliness and staring off into space like when you were a kid?  It's going to break your heart.  Don't let this happen" (Anne Lamott).

Adventures remind us to walk through life,to stir things, up, to cast big visions, to have fun, take risk, love, learn, and laugh a lot. But above all, to have adventures to such an extent that you exit life with no regrets.

WILDLIFE CHARM

So I'm scrunged next to the window in seat 17A when I come across some interesting figures about Alaska.  Did you know that there are in Alaska . . .

• 30,000 Grizzly Bears
• 100,000 Black Bears
• 200,000 Moose
• 900,000 Caribou
• 10,000 Gray Wolves

The article I was reading continued with some of the amazing natural facts of the land that we will spend much of our summer in. For example, "There are more than 100 mammals species in Alaska, and about 450 types of birds (30,000 bald eagles alone)."  

Did you know that moose top out at seven feet tall and weigh 1,400 pounds?  Yes, but can they outrun yellow-bellied cyclists?  And did you know that the Alaskan coastal bears (bigger than grizzlies due to the fact that they pig out on salmon along the southern Alaskan coasts) reach 1,400 pounds and when they stand at attention reach ten feet upright?  Or that, while grizzlies can't climb trees, the ubiquitous black bears can and will climb trees--if hungry enough and need cyclo-protein?  "Bears remind us ourselves . . . they're intelligent, adaptable, and versatile.  And they care deeply for their young."  Maybe too deeply.

But beyond the big, the bold, and the feared, God has placed many little things in the northern regions for our enjoyment, like the tiny black-capped chickadee, year round residents. They awake with rumpled feathers just like most of us do when we get out of bed.  Or consider the sandhill cranes that make Alaska their summer breeding ground each year near Fairbanks.  Or the playful sea otters that swim and gambol among the floating ice in Prince William Sound.

So next time you sing, "All Creatures of Our God and King," remember Alaska.  Behold the mighty grizzlies and the delicate chickadees--all creatures that give us pleasure and delight.  And somewhere between verse one and three, try to grasp the thought that such an amazing Love responsible for such natural beauty, looks on you with the same interest and love.  

And that gives us significance.

ENGINEERING SUCCESS

I'm not the engineering type.  Just throw stuff in a box and take off on an adventure.  But then Tuesday came--the day before we and our bikes were to leave for the Arctic--and with the new day came a fully assembled engineer. Rick, my co-adventurer for the Polar Cycling Expedition, walked into my garage, on that Tuesday and created  a process for getting our bikes ready for flight.  Rick found out the airline requirements for box sizes, then took approprieate measurements.  

Next came Project Dismemberment. We  dismantled our bikes (Seeing my bike in itty bitty pieces would have created panic, but then, I'm not an engineer).  We carefully placed our disassembled tubes, wheels, and nuts and bolts into the boxes we had fabricated for our flight to Prudhoe Bay, Alaska.  

Eight hours into Tuesday and I stood proudly beside our two big bike boxes that could actually serve the dual purpose of bike transsports or coffins and realized the importance of engineering minds.  

I'm still not the engineering type, but I have ramped up my appreciation and admiration of this amazing species of humanity.  So remember, if your pedals are between the two wheels on your bike and not somewhere on the handlebars, thank an engineer.  
I sure did.

PEDALING FOR A GRANDSON

A brief word about "H" aka Harrison.  Born while I was in South Africa last October, H is my cyclo-bud and future cyclo-partner.  

Isn't he a little young to be determining whether he yearns to be a crazy guy on a weird bike?   

O, skeptic, will you not discern in this tiny tot a cyclist-in-the-making?  Will you not notice how already he prepares for the big bike tour?

Do you not see how he bungy bounces in his bouncy chair that hangs from the door frame?  How his four limbs flail every which way with each squeaky bounce?   Or do you not note how he speeds around in his Fred Flinstone car, his tiny feet pushing as if on a tour across the United States? Clearly, H, as we converse, is checking recumbents out on the internet.

So dear grandson, fetch your bike and let us begin a new adventure.  

Ready, SHOOT! Aim . . .

A friend of mine once announced with unenvious wonder that I was like Moses as I led my burgeoning congregation in a new church-plant.  Like my ancient counterpart I would lift my staff, point to the cloud or fire (of opportunity) and yell, "Here, follow thou me!"  But then I'd see another cloud and point there, "No, wait, it's over there!"  

Humbly, I accept the comparison, knowing the challenges that on-the-edge ministries require--speedy shifts and swift shuffles.  

When it comes to long-distance cyclo-travel, each day requires that speedy-shift-swift-shuffle kind of decisions that can make a big difference: 

• do we wait the storm out and risk missing our campground or do we boldly blunder through it?  

• Do we wait 'til the moose gets off the road?  

• Rick, you wanna tell that grisly grizzle bear up ahead who's boss? 

• Do we camp here near the river or try to make it to the campground twenty miles further down the road?

Though we minimize risk, we never fully banish it from cycling or living.  You just try to do what you can to minimize risk, but in the end, you still have risk in virtually anything you do.  

Rick has done amazing research for this upcoming tour--he' reduced risk as much as he can, I think.  The danger/s that remain, we live with.  Here's the basic framework of our tour for those who will be following us as we journey . . . 

Part One: Billings to Missoula

June 16th -- (leave Billings) Lavina

June 17th -- Harlowton

June 18th -- White Sulphur Springs

June 19th -- Townsend

June 20th -- Avon

June 21st -- Ovando

June 22nd -- Missoula

Part Two: Transport Bikes/Bikers to the Arctic

June 23th -- Missoula / disassemble bikes

June 24th -- Missoula / box bikes for transport

June 25th -- fly to Deadhorse, Alaska

Part Three: Begin Tour Southward to US from Arctic

June 26th -- arrive Deadhorse / reassemble bikes

June 27th -- bus to Prudhoe Bay / return to Deadhorse

June 28th -- leave Deadhorse on bikes

Packing Our Bags, Getting Ready to Go


So what do you take on a long-distance tour pedaling a bike when you have no "sag" and you've got to carry everything?

Good question.  What do you take along and what gets discarded?  The answer varies with each rider, but generally you might want to lug and tug things like . . .   

• bike bags (I'm carrying 5 of them)
• lots of water (I've got 2-70 ounce platypus bladders)
• 2-changes of clothes (including rain gear)
• 1-4 ounce bear deterrent spray (worn on wrist)
• toiletries
• sleeping bag (I've got a goose down--light and warm)
• air mattress (Thermarest)
• stove (I'm using a Jetboil)
• a spork (plastic combination of fork & spoon)

• week's supply of breakfast, lunch, and supper foods
• a 12-ounce can of bear deterrent spray
• a bear barrel (placed 100 yards away from camp site)
• a tent (mine is "Bivy Advanced" by Outdoor Research)
• bear bells (for alerting bears when relieving oneself)
• satellite phone(allows user to send SOS if in trouble)
• emergency bike repair kit
• journal, prayer book, copy of the Psalms (especially the version that translates "enemies" as "grizzly bears")
• body identification bracelet (hey, guys, this arm over here has an ID bracelet on it)

So that's what I'll be hauling along with me--plus or minus a few other items.  What's nice about this part of the tour-planning is that we have to choose as much what NOT to take as what we will take.  

Not a bad idea in our normal day-to-day operations, I think.  Every once in a while, it's good to apply this long-distance tour to our daily life 

• determine what sustains you on your journey and what is simply unnecessary baggage  

• identify what moves you forward and what hinders you from living into the person you know you can become  

• what, from your own resources can you share with others that will nourish, sustain, and encourage them?

So practice Packing YOUR bags and get ready to go!