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Day -x: Preparations: making a mess and saying goodbye

We are now several days on the road and have some time to write some proper reports. Frankly I am amazed I can type this, as I was sure that the constant bumping of our bikes and bags over the very rough roads would have destroyed Lenny (Our Lenovo laptop), but surprisingly it still works as always, long live the solid state harddisks. If you can actually read this, then it means it has survived all 2 weeks of Dalton Highway, one of the most infamous pieces of dirt road in the world…

But let’s go back a few weeks, back to the lowlands and share our journey with you in words and images.

I am not sure if it is me (us) or is there just no way to properly prepare for a 2.5 year trip? We had been planning since a year ago and still many things had to be done in literally the last minute. At least you can get a lot more done if you use the 8 hours we normally waste on sleeping on working and preparing :)

As our house was already rented out, we moved back and forth between my mom’s house and Romke & Anouks place. R&A have two wonderful kids and they were happy to assist in sorting out all the we received from our wonderful , this is Kira, checking out the Ortlieb and that Jacobsons sent us.

and this is how part of their livingroom looked during their vacation:

Thanks again, Romke & Anouk & Kira & Jelte, we would not have made it without you.

We took the train up North to say goodbye to my Mother and Sister. By the way, in The Netherlands we have a great railway system, which will get you everywhere in no time. of course people like to complain about the train service, but i think it is perfect, there are even a lot of special spaces for bicycles in every carriage, very useful to do some last minute fine-tuning:

My Mum helped us with some last things and we even managed to make a mess in her place. She was very sad; even though I have been away for many months at a time in the past, this will be the longest period away so far.

My sister lives close and we also visited her to say goodbye. We had a nice dinner at a organic Indonesian restaurant in Assen, with great food and service and we could even park our bikes inside. As with my mom, she was in tears when we waved goodbye from the train, but again somehow I was not sad, maybe we will see each other soon again.

had already said goodbye to her family in March, when she came to Amsterdam. But thanks to the wonders of skype and broadband Internet, she had been talking/videoconferencing with her mum and sister (that almost have the same names as mine) every evening for hours, while packing and sorting stuff.

Going on all these adventures is selfish in a way as we are worrying our friends and family. But I think we can repay their concerns and affection with stories and images and knowledge that we are following our hearts.

ps: we also had a nice going away slash b-day party, but i will post the images in a separate post once we find the images again :)

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Jacobsons & Ortlieb

July 8, 2008 by  
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www.jacobsons.nl

Debby, Harry, Mario & Ivana with our new panniers is a daughter of AGU. imports great cycling brands like Nalini, GripGrab, and many more, see below for an overview. When they heard about our plans they worked hard to get us all the we needed. Debby van Stiphout and former manager Mario Dominicus moved mountains and set us up with the perfect .

  • For cyclists there is only one brand of panniers: (www.ortlieb.com). These are proven time after time and are the strongest and most durable panniers around.
  • Carrera supplies beautiful and still fucntional eyewear and helmets
  • Of course our bikes already came with the only real racks available: Tubus
  • I love good gloves and GripGrab delivers.
  • For the first cold months, we are being kept warm by Brynje underwear
naar Nalini naar GripGrab naar Ortlieb naar Diadora
naar Tubus naar Brynje naar Sportsbalm naar HAD
naar Racktime naar Bianchi Milano naar Carrera naar Smith
naar Moa

Sponsors

July 3, 2008 by  
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A trip like ours needs a few basic things: first of all determination, but close second is good gear. It is no use trying to make do, for a good trip, you need good material.

Without the help of the following people and companies the trip would not have been possible. They have not only supplied us with the best gear available, but also have kept us focused on our first goal: to get started! Most if not all of the people are cyclists or sportsmen and -women and they have not just donated their products but also their time and enthusiasm, which is priceless .

We are still looking for financial support as our trip is very costly, not just our daily cost of living, but also internet access, server hosting etc. any donations are welcome, or if you want us to give special attention to our products (of course only if they are useful for cyclists!) contact us using the form above.

If you are interested in related products and links, check out the Google advertisements that appear on every page as you will help us at the same time :)

Ivana cycling through the Dutch heather