I've camped before.

I started the book Quiet by Susan Cain.  So far I really like it!  It’s taking a look at the difference between introverts and extroverts.  Fascinating!  I am without a doubt an introvert, but there are some stronger introverts on this trip than I am and it’s fun to watch the group dynamics.   I think it's also the teacher in me that gets to observe our group and connect the dots of people's lives, habits, and behaviors.  It's a neat experience to jump into living life with 11 total strangers that have a common goal. It's sometimes high stress for some and not others, encouraging and discouraging at different times.  I'm the youngest on the trip and someone made a reference to someone else being 39.  I stepped in and said, "No, he's 49 because everyone is old enough to be my parent on this trip."  "How does that make  you feel?"  "It's actually quite comorting." These are some of the nicest and most helpful people ever.   And s...

Today we started out of camp and had to go backwards a mile to the grocery store.  T and I are cooking tonight and the grocery store on the way to the campsite burned down either last year or the year before and hasn’t been rebuilt.  So, as a team we have to carry our food for tonight and then tomorrow’s breakfast and lunch. Dinner is served!  We had some pretty great reviews on our chicken  pad  Thai .   We added in peas, mushrooms, and broccoli.   And then there was strawberry shortcake for dessert.   I have two more days that I’ll be cooking on the trip and have to come up with some more recipes.   As far as riding goes, today was a lot of miles with some rolling hills.  There is something very freeing about being on a bicycle.  I’m not wild about when we’re riding along busy highways.  But when there's a car every 5-10 minutes, and plenty of shoulder to ride in, life is pretty good.  There’s lots of farmland. ...

I tried yesterday and today to use an app on my phone to track the route and mileage.  It hasn’t worked well.  But I think from what other people said, we did 58 miles today.  Almost 2000 ft of it was vertical climbing.  Gross.  But I did it!  And used my lowest gear and huffed and puffed A LOT.  I had a chance to chat with this British biker who was going from Canada to Mexico.  I will say cyclists are cool people and for the most part really great story tellers. When we arrived at camp, another ACA tour was there, but they are a fully supported ride.  So there was a UHaul with all their stuff, a caterer to make meals, and a massage therapist. We had our first non-Costco night.  No complaints, but I'm up next with T tomorrow night. As we started to make a list of the things we were going to need from the grocery store, I mentioned that we had fruit snacks the last two days, do we want to do those again?  “Well, I don't really l...

Today was the first day of real riding.  WAHOO!!  The weather looked like it was going to rain on us and threatened with a little thunder.  However, we stayed dry and the sun didn't even peak out until mid morning, which made for some nice cool riding.   The people I’m with are super nice and lots of fun.  There’s a competition between many as to who is going to be the last one to make it to camp.  I hope to stay in the middle of the pack.  I’m not the fastest, but hopefully not the slowest either. We did this quaint loop out of Missoula and our destination was the Adventure Cycling Association (ACA) headquarters.  Now, as a side note, I didn’t really know what to expect fully of touring cyclist.  There's my wonderful husband who rode across the US with 1 pair of underwear and he’s pretty fantastic and then some.  We’ve had some really neat people stay at our house through warm showers, a network of touring cyclists that stay at each...

With the address of our campsite punched into the GPS on my phone, I was rolling out the entrance to the airport, exhilarated.  So many sights to take in- mountains and open space.  This is not a Connecticut landscape, not even close.  Plus the blast of heat- it was 96 degrees and I’ve packed a winter coat…. The GPS says I go for a little over a mile, turn right and I think then I had 4 miles to go.  I’ve got this. But now I’ve gone a ways, maybe even more than the 4 miles and the GPS isn’t telling me when to turn.  Time to pull over and investigate…. Thanks iPhone for letting me know that you’re nearly hot enough to fry an egg on from sitting in my map case and have to cool off before you can work. No big deal, I tell myself, just ask someone.  I see the first girl up at the next night.  “Excuse me, can you tell me where the KOA campground is?” “Oh, um, I’m not sure, I heard it was on the south side of town.”  “Thanks” is what I say to her wh...

There are two other people in my group documenting our trek.   Eric is keeping an  online journal . Tom has a cool  GPS tracker  to let you know where we are.  The password is Canada 2017. Tom Reitter can also be found on  Fb . In case you want to check in on those too!

For REAL this time! Again, I was stuck in that dreadful additional services line at the ticketing counter because the kiosk didn't like me.  Again, I had time, but not as much as I wanted because I thought it was going to be a quick and easy process.  My bike should already be in Missoula-it took the last flight out. But then they pulled my bag after it went through the X-ray.  "Ma'am, you have a large lotion."   "No, I don't. I did this all yesterday and I didn't buy anything."   "Can you tell me where it is without touching your bag?"  I had my backpack tucked in my pannier to be down to one carry on.  "I don't think I have anything."  Out comes the large purple tube of Butt Butter Chamois for Her.   "Oh, I had no idea that was in there- it went through the x-ray yesterday."  (I'll own that I looked like and felt like an idiot) Well, TSA, you are now the owners of a brand new tube of anti-chafe lotion...

I want to do a quick shout out to the super cool organization that is helping this adventure happen.   Fund for Teachers . #fft Their mission is to help teachers have unique experiences and bring the learning from them back into the classroom.  There were two teachers that I knew from my school district who participated last summer.  Lisa is a music/chorus teacher and she attended an A Cappella camp.  Ruth is an ESOL teacher and wanted to strengthen her science background.  She did some earth science type research and traveling in the northwest corner of the US.   When my grant proposal was accepted and funded, I became a FFT Fellow.  I was invited to a dinner with all of this years fellows back in the spring.  We met down in New Haven, about 150 of us, all from Connecticut.  At just my table, I was blown away by the creativity of these teachers.  Several were going to a Technology integration in Education conference in San Antonio....

The Original Plan:  Saturday Morning, Leave my grandparent's house in Marion and head to the airport   Check in the bike, preferably withou a hiccup Get through security, find the gate, board the plane Arrive to Missoula at 4:30 It was a solid plan.  We left my grandparents.  We made it to the airport.  I was super proud of myself for being self-sufficient and going in looking like the hulk. I started checking in at the kiosk.  One of the attendants came over and ask, "Is that a bike?  You're going to need to go over to the back counter for additional services."  Ok, I can do that. I will preface this with I don't wait well...  So 25+ minutes being stuck behind a family of 8 people with 9 bags, all over weight by a pound where they think their bags fly free to Ethiopia, passport names not matching tickets, a tantruming child and by the way English is not the first or proficient language...  I had enough time, but if I have to wait, I wan...

That's the question I've been asked the most.  Followed by, Why?  So here's the story... Mike rode his bike from Virginia to California.  I've always enjoyed riding my cute little bike.  (Especially when I was popping wheelies with streamers and a banana seat when my age was a single digit)  We talked about doing a bike trip together.  We thought with Mike's job that we were going to be moving this summer, in July to San Diego.  It was going to be great!  Mike was going to have a month for house hunting leave and moving.  We already had a place to live and the movers would take care of most of the moving, and I would have the month of August to figure out whatever else needed to be done.  Mike suggested we use the time off to ship our bikes to his college roommate in Vancouver and cycle our way down, pass the new homestead in San Diego, reach Tijuana and go back.  We also thought this would be fun to do with the dog in a trailer. ...

As I was dating my now husband, Mike, we would get lost in great conversations until all hours of the night.  On our 3rd or 4th date we were interrupted by the police, not for what you're probably thinking, when the beach had closed and they asked,"Do you know what time it is?" "Yeah, maybe 10:00."  "Try 2 am...". There were travel adventures to tell, loads of questions to ask and answer, storytelling and always laughing.  We always laugh, it's essentially a family rule. One chat went like this...  "We camped a lot growing up.  My mom had a pop up camper in grad school and used it all the time.  And I went on this great camping trip with my cousins and then one time with my Dad.  I love camping. I did it for most of the time I rode my bike across the country, Virginia to California. Did you camp as a kid?" "Well, sort of....  It depends how you define camping," I said with major hesitation and the inflection in my voice ro...