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Published: April 6th 2016
time to stop biking?!
After the loss of 25 pounds in bodyweight and the greater part of his sense of humour, Ken was more than happy to put the bike in a box and travel by bus!Hi everyone! I know we promised that you wouldn't have to endure any more travel blogs from us, but we've realized that many of you have no idea where we are these days, so we wanted to fill you in on what we've been up to since early December. And we may keep these blogs going after all, if only for our own enjoyment! Well, our last entry found us in La Paz, Bolivia, where we decided to end the bike ride after clocking up just over 4,100 miles since we started out in Montana last July. We then spent a great few weeks travelling in Bolivia without our 'appendages', as we had affectionately named our trusty steeds by that point. We enjoyed being able to travel around on Bolivian buses (never thought I would use 'enjoy' in the same sentence as 'Bolivian bus'!) and discover some more places that we hadn't seen in the country, particularly the historic capital, Sucre. We also had a lovely time catching up with friends from my days working for Gravity Assisted Mountain Biking in La Paz, and generally made the most of eating as much as we possibly could and not having to worry
Casita
Our new home on wheels - this would be a monster in Europe, but in the US it's one of the smaller motorhomes on the road. about where to ride our bikes to. Ken had lost a lot of weight by that point, especially after his illness in Salta, and the Andean wet season was fast approaching, so as we hadn't really found our dream place to settle in in Argentina or Bolivia, we finally decided to come back to the States for a while to re-evaluate.
Ken's folks and sister live in Greenville, South Carolina, so we spent a very enjoyable Christmas with them, and then made a somewhat hasty purchase of a small motorhome, with the idea that we would travel around the US for a while and keep the adventure going. So we bought the vehicle just before the New Year; spent a lovely New Year's Eve with Paul and Susan (our friends from the Great Divide part of our bike trip) in North Carolina; collected Goldie from our friends Ron and Marion in Virginia (thanks again, guys!); and have been touring the country ever since! We've really had some great fun, and have been to many beautiful places, as the photos will show. We generally stayed as far south as possible, following the warm weather as much as we could. Our
The best part of Ken's day!
This was the first time emptying the sewage tank...luckily no accidents to report! route took us down to Florida, where we met up with our old friends John and Jess, then across the Florida panhandle, with some long driving days through Alabama, Mississippi and Louisiana, then on to Texas. Texas is a pretty huge state, and we ended up spending a lot of time in the beautiful south-west part of it, around the Davis Mountains and Big Bend National Park. After that we carried on into New Mexico, meeting up with Ken's friend Brian in Las Cruces, and then to Arizona, where we found plenty of great mountain biking around the towns of Prescott and Cottonwood. Being new to the whole campervan/motorhome world, it took us a while to adapt to the different lifestyle, and we certainly missed the simplicity of the cycle touring (and still do!). But now that we have a few months under our belts, we've figured out how to do things and are really enjoying all the experiences. We spend a lot of time seeking out National Forest campgrounds and trails, so we can do plenty of biking and take Goldie for lots of long hikes, which she loves!
After Arizona we headed into California, and
Our co-pilot
Sometimes Goldie likes to take a turn at the wheel! explored some areas on the central coast around Big Sur, Morro Bay and Santa Barbara - very beautiful and a lot greener than the arid southern California region that we know so well. At the moment we're in San Diego and will be catching up with some friends here, before we head out towards Colorado. We have some ideas about opening up some kind of seasonal business in Colorado, catering to cyclists and outdoor nutcases like ourselves; and perhaps find somewhere down in Central or South America to escape for the winters. Everything is still wide open at the moment, and we just want to take the time to enjoy this travelling experience before making any big decisions. For now, each day holds something new and we're pretty content to live like this for a while!
I'm attaching some photos so you can see some of the places I've mentioned, and we hope you enjoy keeping tabs on us. If you prefer not to keep receiving these updates, just let us know and we'll take you off the subscriber list. We hope you are well and look forward to hearing your news whenever possible. Bye for now and thanks
Fort De Soto, Florida
One of our first campgrounds, near St Pete, Florida. for following our adventures!
Fi and Ken
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Steve
non-member comment
Great to see you
Had a Wounderful time see you guys, Keep the Adventure Alive good Luck in Colorado Steve & Melanie