Frequently Asked Questions
Questions people love to ask us along the road....
if you have any questions we would love to hear from you, you can write to us – click on the “About” page.
Q Are you from New Zealand?
For some reason this is a question we get asked a lot on the road. No we are not from New Zealand, we are from that bigger island a little further west, which has a healthier relationship towards sheep :)and for the record the correct response when we reply with "No, we are Australian", is not "oh Australia.... we've always wanted to go to New Zealand.”
Q What are you doing?
Cycling! Jules and I both quit our jobs in Australia, packed up the house, sold most of our things and stored others, and headed overseas. We lived in Vancouver for a few months, where we bought our bikes and gear and then headed off on the road with only our bicycles and whatever fits in our panniers.
Q Where are you going?
Umm not sure. This started as a quick jaunt through the US and Canada but has quickly turned into something a lot bigger. My dream has always been to cycle from Alaska to the bottom of South America so if the money lasts and we are still loving it we will keep going...
Q How far do you cycle per day?
Depends how many beautiful views there are to sit and enjoy or how many cafes there are to eat pastries and drink coffee in or how many hills there are!... Up in Alaska and Canada we were doing long days, just because of the greater distances there, and with the endless hours of daylight we could just keep riding as long as we had the enthusiasm! So to start with we were probably averaging 100kms per day. Down in the continental USA, Mexico and Central America we averaged a lot less, there is much to see and many bakeries/panaderias to visit!
I think my favourite distance would be around 70-80kms per day, this way we have heaps of time for checking stuff out but we still do a good distance.
Q Are you crazy?
A little - but there are a lot of us crazy cyclists out here!
Q Where do you stay?
Up until mainland Mexico we camped almost every night.. we were lucky to be in some stunning areas, and had some amazing campsites.
Occasionally we stay with people (when someone feels sorry for us) especially when we are in a city with no campsites or when it has been raining for days on end. We have met some amazing people that we had stayed with and this has definitely been the highlight of the trip! We utilize the Warm Showers website – hospitality for touring cyclists (similar to couch-surfing), which is a fantastic idea, and we can't wait to repay the favours when we get home (http://www.warmshowers.org/)
In mainland Mexico and Central America we more often that not hav.e stayed in cheap hotels – we can usually find some dodgy and inexpensive place along the route. They may not always have a toilet with a seat, and they may sometimes be a 'charge by the hour' kind of place, with a mirror on the roof but they are always interesting! However, we have also found some great camping spots – especially in Belize.
Q What do you eat
We always cook up our own breakfast before we start cycling for the day and we (almost) always picnic for lunch, on the side of the road somewhere. We cook dinner more often than not, lots of pasta and rice meals, but sometimes I get a little experimental with some curries, vegie stews, risottos etc. Its amazing what you can make with just a couple of small pots!
In Mexico we ate out a lot more than we used to further north. Yummy streetfood and tacquerias..
We also eat a lot of snacks throughout the day. Especially pastries. Cinnamon rolls. Pan dulce. In fact anything buttery and sugary.. mmmmm
but that's one of the best things about cycling – you can (in fact you have to) eat as much as you want!
Q How Heavy Are Your Bikes? How much gear do you have?
Too heavy. I just can't do without a collection of books! However, cycling with two people helps keep the weight down as we can share tools, camping stuff, stove etc.
Things we could not live without:
Jules: sunglasses, binoculars, instant coffee, cinnamon rolls, her daily Snickers bar
Megs: books, podcasts, lots of chocolate, cinnamon rolls, a reading light
Random things currently in the bottom of our bags: a baseball (Jules), a whole bag of the toys that you collect from chip packets (Jules), a small bottle of rum (Jules), three flowers made out of beer cans (mine), a large collection of large Spanish learning books (mine) a phone that doesn't work (Jules), a fluorescent orange whistle (Jules)..as you can see our gear is not always completely practical!
Q What are your favourite websites, blogs etc?
http://www.crazyguyonabike.com/ for a great selection of cycling blogs, often some helpful information or just funny stories
http://groups.google.com/group/panam-riders this is a forum just for riders doing the Alaska to Argentina route (or a fair amount of it), a really helpful resource
And some fun/interesting blogs we like to read, people that have done our route or are doing it now:
