Meet Betty & Norma

Norma and Betty are our beautiful Surly Long Haul Truckers, who we purchased in Vancouver and who are transporting us on our Pan-Am adventures.
The first cycle tour I ever went on I bought a dodgy mountain bike (Mabel) in Bangkok and had a rack added by a teeny old Thai lady on the border of Thailand and Laos.  However, even though she was nothing fancy Mabel was a champ and took me all through south-east Asia and then back home to Perth from Darwin.

This trip we started off a little more prepared, going for the Surly LHT on the recommendation on my first cycling buddy, Sonja, and so far we are completely stoked with them.  We also went for the Ortlieb panniers which have been brilliant as well.
When we ordered our bikes and our panniers we asked for different coloured bikes and different coloured panniers.  However, when the bikes turned up they were both black and all the panniers were bright yellow!  So now we are embarrassingly matching and kind of resemble giant, uncoordinated bumble-bees.  Oh well at least we are highly visible!

Betty is a little highly strung, busting a tube on our first day out of Anchorage and getting numerous flats along the journey.  We stopped once to fix Norma's first flat of the trip and as we started off again we realised that Betty had just blown a tube too, obviously a little jealous of all the attention Norma was getting.
Norma is more even-tempered but a little absent-minded, with a tendency to drop small parts along the way, a nut here, a bolt there.

So there you are.. consider yourself formerly introduced to Betty and Norma in fluoro yellow and proud!

Norma loaded up and waiting patiently..


Giving Betty an overhaul on a rest day in Oregon