Clothing
We had some important purchases while we’ve been here in Gueydan, not many, but really great ones. We’ve needed shirts really badly for our days on the bike, and the quality of the Columbia shirts we used so successfully went seriously downhill, so much so that we returned a new one with a note expressing our surprise and disappointment. I’ve had an Ex Officio shirt for 3 years now that I’ve loved. I’ve been wearing it for months for cycling, and I’ve been really been happy with it. We looked at the prices on the Ex Officio website, and realized we aren’t in the budget category yet to get them. Quite discouraged, I finally thought of checking eBay, and what a score we made!
Not only did we get three $80 (each) Ex Officio shirts for $25 each, brand new, but we got a $40 Patagonia Vitaliti polo shirt for $15, and we got a Patagonia Vitaliti Sole tank. We are thrilled with our purchases. The shirts are last season’s shirts, but we like the colors better, and the shirts are brand new. We can wash them in the sink and hang them to dry, and they dry in a matter of a few hours. They look great, they feel great, they are easy care, and we wear them constantly. We’re very happy about our new shirts.
Mugs and plates
Another big one for us was our titanium plates and mugs from REI. We’ve not had anything for the last two years, and it was getting really annoying. They were not inexpensive, but considering how much we require from our equipment and how long we will be using them, they felt like a real deal. We’ve already been using them exclusively the last few months, and they work really well. They are easy to clean, they are extremely lightweight and durable, and the plates stack into nothingness. The mugs are 24 oz and can be used to cook our meals in as well. They have a nifty lid that lets us drain pasta and rice, and keeps our drinks warm longer on cold days. They’ve also got measuring markings, which makes them even more useful. They don’t stack, which is a downside, but they do have folding handles, which we really like. They get a 5-star rating from us.
Business cards
For a few years we used the paper stock from Office Depot for business cards, but they look really tacky. We had already bought a new package of the card stock, but then we got an ad from www.VistaPrint.com for a special on business cards. It was a several day saga for us, but we had a wonderful time designing our new business cards. We got 500 cards made up in Spanish and 500 in English, with our own design. We have a cycling photo of us on the front, with the same photo on the back in a fade-out style with a quote superimposed on it, all in full color, all for slightly more than the cost of the card stock we had just bought! We were absolutely delighted. We love our new business cards…
Cycling capris
Our need for an improvement in our cycling pants/shorts is really acute. We are both getting severe heat rash right where the shorts end on our thighs, and we can’t figure out how to get rid of it, except to have looser fitting and longer pants. In really humid conditions (which are all summer long for us) the rashes spread. The shorts with their chamois look like we are wearing Depends, which isn’t too flattering, and the black color is horrendously hot in the hot sun. Our favorite blue ones are better in the heat, but we have sat anywhere and everywhere on our breaks and now we have stained spots on the sitting parts. Again, so attractive… The shorts are acutely uncomfortable after we’ve been riding for a few hours – they’re wet and clammy, and we aren’t personal fans of the tight spandex feeling. We’d like more airflow. We are always anxious to change out of our shorts immediately, but often we can’t, such as when we ride to a ferry, and have a 2-hour ferry ride before we can get to camp and change and shower. We’d also like to look pretty normal when we ride and have to stop in stores.
So, we’ve been looking forever for the perfect solution. The last 6 months we’ve done lots of online research on cycling capris. We found some through Ground Effect in New Zealand, but that’s a long way to order from without really knowing it’s what we want. We’ve found some in REI, but they didn’t look like they were durable enough. We actually picked up the phone and tried to place an order with Terry Bicycles, but when I explained our situation, the woman politely discouraged us from buying, saying it wouldn’t be what we were looking for. I really appreciated her honesty, and it makes me want to do business with them again.
What we specifically want are capris or better yet, long pants, that give us full sun coverage (no more icky sunscreen!), good airflow, and that are low profile – meaning, they aren’t baggy and won’t interfere while riding the bike. They need to be wind-proof, quick-dry and easily washable under difficult situations. We want the pants to be a color or pattern that looks normal for regular life, and doesn’t show stains and sweat. We also want really light, very breathable, detachable inner shorts with a chamois that is really comfortable and has good airflow too.
The biggest problem for us is that very few people are making clothing with expedition touring in mind. We are having to search other sports for clothing that we can adapt for our trip, and it doesn’t always work. We need things that are durable and reliable like they are for backpacking, but then we have to see people in “regular society” and we want to look normal and not like backpackers. It’s really been a challenge for us. I think we are going to write up our requirements and send it off to as many sports clothing companies as we can. As far as the cycling capris, our choices are a lot more limited, but we think there’s a good-sized market out there for what we want. People don’t have to be expedition cyclists to understand and appreciate what we are talking about.
SealLine dry bags
Another really exciting purchase is our new dry bags. We’ve needed rain protection for some time now, and we just received a donation to cover our two biggest dry bags. We’ve used plastic bags, especially in the early days, but they tend to rip after only a couple of uses, and they are awkward to use and store, not to mention quite heavy. We then got good at tarping our things – we have 3 tarps we bought at REI and they’ve been invaluable. At night we’d use one to cover the bikes and one for each of the trailers. We’ve survived one really big storm doing this, a couple of smaller ones, and many, many nights of very wet dew, with our goods staying very dry.
We aren’t protected out on the road though, so we’ve been looking for solutions. We came up with the idea of big dry bags that would also act as luggage. Since we are on a multi-year trip, we sometimes need to travel by bus or truck or boat, and we’ve had the difficulty of suddenly having lots and lots of small bags and pieces of equipment with nothing to put them in for transport. We can’t use our trailers to hold everything because we need to take them down for transport. We’ve had some horrible-funny stories (funny in the re-telling months later) of trying to carry our snorkel bags jammed full, a messenger bag, and a couple of small backpacks, pushing big boxes with our feet as we struggle to get between buses in crowded terminals, or struggle down a loooong terminal hallway at 3 am with no luggage carts and no help anywhere.
Our idea is to have all of our equipment inside the trailers fit into 2 dry bags (called wide mouth duffels) per trailer, and whatever goes on top of our trailers fit into one larger dry bag. The bags for the trailer contents could hold up to 25 lbs each, and would have shoulder straps (like duffle bags) and the large one on top would hold up 35 lbs. with backpack straps. By doing this, we’d be able to ship by boat, air, bus, or anything else and our gear would all be protected, as well as be rainproof. And right up there is the fact that we’d be able to carry everything. It would be heavy, but we’d at least be able to manage it.
We’ve tried having several smaller dry bags inside our trailers but it’s pretty awkward, too. We are still left with having a lot of little things to deal with, and it’s pretty annoying on a daily basis trying to get things out of long thin plastic cylinders. So we feel pretty good about our solution and we are thrilled about being able to try it. Now we are waiting to be able to purchase the 4 wide-mouth duffels, and we’ll be set!
Note: UPS just delivered our new backpack dry bags, and they look awesome. They’re huge! My one big question was whether they would be able to hold the floor pump for the bikes, and they do that with height to spare. We’re incredibly happy right now, and it’s requiring a tremendous self-discipline to sit here and write instead of doing some practice packing right now! 🙂