"Never look back unless you are planning to go that way" - HDT

In the Summer of 2008 in between my Junior and Senior years at Franklin and Marshall College I embarked on a 57-day bike trip that took me across the country from San Francisco, CA to Long Beach Island, NJ along with 3 of my friends.

Bike Trip - Summer of 2008 - Left to Right: Dan Pigott, Me, Kara Pigott, Jason Keil

The trip changed my life in so many different ways that it is still quite difficult to put into words this many years later.  One thing I realized while on that trip was that I wanted to be the one leading my life.  I decided that I would try my best in life to make decisions based on the dreams that I could come up with for myself knowing full well that those dreams would change over the years and that I would constantly be pushing myself towards new ends and new dreams and that at times it might make things harder rather than easier.  It's what brought me to Brooklyn in the Summer of 2011 to try and make it in this city and it's what's causing me to leave Brooklyn now after almost 3 great years here...

What I also decided on that first bike trip, as soon as it had finished actually, was that if I ever had the chance to get back out on the road to experience that feeling of absolute freedom again I would take it.  I remember finishing the last trip and staring out into the Atlantic Ocean in awe of what we had accomplished, but also extremely disappointed that it could not keep going.  We all had to go back to being "real people" again.....

And for one, I'd like to think I did a pretty good job at getting back into the real world.  I got a real person job in Brooklyn and moved down to the city and had real person responsibilities and a steady paycheck and a big set of keys to all of the doors that I could open and no one else could.  

Life was good and life was comfortable, but about 6-months ago I started getting the itch to get back out on the road again.  I wanted a new adventure so I decided that I would plan for another bike trip and so that is what I've been doing.  And so, as with many of my life decisions that normally are a bit grandiose and extreme and possibly a bit crazy at first, I have decided to get back on my bicycle and circumnavigate the country in a 5-6 Month adventure.

There have been many phases to this process as it has developed, namely saving up as much money as I can which tends to be pretty damn hard while living in NYC (but I did it) and training (probably not nearly enough).  However, this past Monday marked the first of the steps that I can not take back, hence speeding up the process, so I felt that it would be a good place to begin this blog.  This first step taken was my formal resignation from my job down here in Brooklyn.  The resignation is in and my final work date is set for January 30th, 2014.  So now everything else is working around that date.

From there I will be going back home to Upstate New York for the month of February and the beginning of March to do my final preparations and training before heading out.

As of right now the trip is set to embark on March 15th, 2014 in St. Augustine, FL (the oldest city in the United States) and I will be heading West along the Southern Tier, then up the Pacific Coast, across on the Norther Tier, and then down the Atlantic Coast hopefully ending in Key West sometime in August.  You can see on the map to get the gist of it....

So, for now this is all that I have.  As I get closer to the departure date I will continue to update with pictures and posts...  I will also be trying to get together a projection of dates of where I'll be along the way.  I hope to be hearing from a lot you and hopefully seeing a lot of you either before I leave or on the trip itself once I've begun.  (I definitely won't be saying no to anyone whether it be friends/family/friends of friends/friends of family/basically anyone that anyone knows that might be willing to host me along the way)

-BHG

Rocking sick threads and a bike since 1987.