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Sunday 28 July 2013

Less than a Month to Go

Our departure time is getting closer, less than a month and counting. The waiting is killing me, and as the time draws nearer it only gets worst. I can't stop thinking about the trip, and I don't know what to do with myself. Work has been keeping me busy.....too busy, I have been flying my arse off through too many time zones in too many days, and my body feels tired and screwed up. 

I don't know if it is this trip, or a mid-life crisis that I'm going through, or my fustration with the way the world as a whole is headed, but I feel very restless, and in need of a change. A simpler way of life, and a new career. Most pilots would give their arm or leg for this job, well paid, flying really nice airplanes. I have become very fustrated with the job as of late, working for someone else on their schedule is growing old. I know working for yourself has it's ups and downs too, but maybe there's more satisfaction when it's your business. Shit I am rambling again. Sorry.

I spoke with Hemmings yesterday and he is getting fired up about our trip, and trying to think of the best way to go about producing it. Daily video blogs or vlogs as they say. Vlog??? That's just a weird word, I don't want to be known as a vlogger, shit, blogger is bad enough. Whatever is done, I am sure Hemmings is going to edit up something really nice.

Speaking of video, Pete bought himself a new camera this week, so now we can have dualing HD cameras. He picked up this nice little Sony

We also decided to get communication headsets for our helmets. On our Mount Carleton trip we found that everytime one of us, meaning me, would stop for some pictures, the other,  meaning Pete, wouldn't notice and continue on down the road. This leads to the "oh shit" moment when you finally notice that the other rider is no longer in your rearview mirror. Being on a two wheeled death machine, you automatically think, "did they make that last corner, did they get hit by a ......insert animal of your choice". No the asshole stopped for another picture and I didn't notice again.

So to alleviate these concerns we decided to pick up two of these 
Sena headsets with Bluetooth. Not only can we talk to each other, but listen to music on our ipads, and use our cellphones, if we desire. The only person I plan on calling with my phone is my wife and kids. Other than that I am going dark for 2 weeks. My Sena should be here next week, and I'm looking forward to trying it out.

My other concern is charging up all the camera, ipad, comm batteries while we are on the road. Not going to be easy staying at campsites. The ones with DC adapters I can plug into the bike one at a time while we are riding, hopefully some of the campsites will have power and an outlet.

What else......my skidplate is on order, won't be here for 2 weeks. Pete has his crashbars and skid plate installed, he's waiting on sideracks and saddlebags.
Oh ya, Pete's musician friend is composing an instrumental soundtrack for our video/s. How friggin' cool is that, can't wait to hear it.

It's funny, I have been following the adventure riding world for a number of years now, reading just about every cool ride report there is on AdvRider.com, and I think I have become a little "desensitized" to what an adventure is. I have read so many ride reports on the TLH, that I think what Pete and I are doing is really no big deal. Especially after reading about people going to South America and around the world. Pete on the other hand is new to all this, and the reaction from his other friends, and people he works with is quite something. They are all excited about it, like it's a trip of a lifetime, the proverbial mid-life crisis ride. I guess it is to a certain extent.

I figure this trip will do one of two things for me, either calm the the restless emotions I having as of late, or stur them even more. The so called "mid-life crisis" has taken hold of me in a bad way. My friend Scotty and I discussed this one day, and he pointed out that I kind of screwed myself in the "mid-life crisis" department. He said, you already did an Ironman triathlon, two marathons, etc, it's hard to top that. Shit.




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