Spring Training (or lack thereof)

We have been so busy. It has felt like we haven't had nearly enough time for all of the things going on in our life in the past few weeks. We did manage to ride the tandem once this past week, to see the Wailing Jenny's at the Calvin Theater in Northampton. We also got groceries after the show and used our new panniers to carry them all home on the bike!

Though we haven't had the time to take another long ride since our trek to Greenfield and back, it feels good every time we DO get on the tandem, even if we only go the few miles to town and back. We're not too worried about training for the trip. We may end up going much slower in the beginning than we are anticipating, but that will be okay. On the other hand, we'll be full of fresh excitement and that will give us a boost at the start.

The lilacs are in full bloom these days and everything is green and growing. On a walk through the neighborhood, it's easy to pick a beautiful bouquet. It's hard to imagine that in a little over a month (!!) we will be starting our cross country ride.

Here are a few things to do before we leave:

Tune up the bike (hopefully we'll do this tomorrow at the Pedal People bike workshop!)
Take the bike for a "fully loaded" ride up and down some big hills
Buy new sleeping pads, 2 more panniers and extra tubes for the bike
Buy bike maps from the Adventure Cycling Association
Buy a netbook computer to take on the trip (and set it up with Ubuntu before we go)
...Not to mention getting our house cleaned and ready for renters and tying up all the loose ends so that things go smoothly here while we are away!

We really do have a lot going on, but when a few more big pieces get taken care of, we think we'll really start to feel the excitement (as opposed to feeling overwhelmed).