Its final! We are leaving Bay Area Bikes at 10am on Sunday August 7th. Lucas and I will be getting on the bike a bit earlier in order to ride down to the ocean to dip our tires in the Pacific, then head over to the shop. The send off party starts at 9am and there will be free breakfast provided by Farley's a local coffee shop. Then at 10am, we will begin our ride along with anyone who wants to join us on the first few mile ride along. If your in town come out to the shop and see us off. Below is a picture of where we will start at the ocean that I took yesterday on my ride around the city.

Yesterday I spent the day at Bay Area Bikes getting my bike outfitted with everything we will need for the trip, so when I got home I did some preliminary packing. Everything we are going to need fits really well, with plenty of room to spare. Today Ill head up to Oakland to learn a little bit from Clay about fixing the bike on the road. Im having a great time cruising around San Francisco, except for yesterday when I rode up California Street, with a fully loaded bike and about 40 pounds of extra gear (which Im shipping home). I had to stop once on the way up, fortunately there isn't going to be many climbs like that on our trip.
We also are starting to get donations for Simply Smiles, if you want to check out out donation page, check it out here. All donations go directly to Simply Smiles.



Got into San Francisco today and headed straight over to Bay Area Bikes in Oakland, where Clay and Glenda met me with a brand new Surly Long Haul Trucker. The bike looks great! And after a bit of tuning and gearing up we all went for the first ride to drop me off at the Bart. Great to finally meet Clay and see the shop, which was way bigger than expected.