I’m getting excited. And nervous. And anxious. But mostly excited. 2017 is going to be BIG. And with the Holidays now in full swing and my ugly Christmas sweater just waiting to be worn, it’s less than a month until the big ball drops and I fly from a cold winter snow-scape to beaches lined with gently swaying palm trees.
There’s been a lot of planning going on and re-planning and schedule re-adjustments. I decided a few weeks ago that I’m going to add another 1,600 miles to the ride and cycle north once I get to San Diego. I wanted to cycle for at least 3 months, to the end of March, and according to my calculations 3,000 miles just wasn’t going to get me there.
I’ll follow the Adventure Cycling Association’s Pacific Coast Route to eventually end my solo ride in Portland, OR. By the time I reach the hopefully not-too-rainy Pacific Northwest, Carolyn will be wrapping up a work-trade assignment she is doing during the winter at a Yoga retreat center in mid-Michigan, and we will resume traveling together again at that time.
The internet is a strange place. At one moment you can be searching for recipes on how to make eggplant Parmesan and the next thing you know an hour has passed and your watching a top ten video on YouTube about funny cats in hats. In a similar fashion I stumbled upon something called the 4 Rivers Bike Path in South Korea after initially searching for things to do in Japan during the month April. Not as bad as baked vegetables to furry felines…but still impressive. Before I knew it, I was researching a 600 km bike path that meanders across the entirety of South Korea from Seoul to Busan after an initial Google search for “Tokyo internet cafe sleep pods.”
We both instantly thought, ‘Yes, this is it. This is what we will do in April for a month before going back to the States to celebrate my beloved sisters marriage.
And it just snowballed from there. One thing led to another and before we knew it we were members of the Cycling Seoul to Busan Facebook group, researching plane tickets, firming up dates, trying to learn Hangul (not too successfully), trying to find maps of the bike path from obscure Korean websites, contacting my old college roommate who now actually lives in South Korea for some tips, and so on and so forth. It’s been a whirlwind of a month planning things to make this South Korea trip happen and I am now comfortable with where we are at. Plane tickets have been bought. Maps printed. GPS Tracks loaded. Hotels reserved. And a general plan has been put down on paper. It was no small feat.
The goal is to cycle 600 km from Seoul to Busan where we will then rendezvous with my old college buddy who lives there. This should take about 10-12 days at a relaxed pace. No need to rush through this one. We then decided that we are going to leave our bikes in Busan and hop on a ferry and visit Japan for a few weeks, doing some European style backpacking (taking public transportation and sleeping in hostels or sleep pods in Tokyo or perhaps public parks…that kind of thing). Carolyn has been busy planning that stage of the trip and a general guide for the city’s we want to visit in Japan are now firmed up. The Japan tourist association has an incredible deal for international travelers for their extensive train network, and offer a 14 day unlimited riding pass at a very decent price. So we are going to buy that pass and hope that we don’t get lost too badly.
After that it will be back to California for my sisters wedding…and then?
Off to Spain to walk the Camino del Norte. Maybe to find God or find ourselves, or at the very least find some good tapas.
But first I’ll have to find my way to Portland, the City of Roses. Ride that desert sun and coastal rain. Battle those intense headwinds. Climb those hills. Fight that traffic. Keep searching for that thing that can’t be found. I’m excited to get going. There’s much adventure to look forward to.
