Wednesday, May 06, 2015

The LaMiWa Epic -- Day #0

Tomorrow I will embark on a bike trip from Lansing, Michigan to Washington, DC (hence the name LaMiWa). I will start at the capitol building in Lansing and finish at the capitol building in Washington. The 600 mile journey, with over 25,000 feet of climbing, will take me through six states (MI, OH, WV, PA, MD, VA) and the District of Columbia. My plan is to complete the trip in six days of pedaling plus one rest day. The first half of my route will be relatively flat through Michigan and most of Ohio. Once I reach Eastern Ohio and Western Pennsylvania, the terrain will become more rough as I climb over the Appalachians. After crossing the Appalachians, the route will still be hilly, but it will be mostly downhill until I reach DC.

Why this trip? One day I was playing around on Google maps and tried looking at biking directions to various places. Since my wife, Tina, is from the Washington, DC area I thought I would see how long a bike trip to there would be. I thought it would be a difficult, but interesting thing to try. So my plan was that the next summer that we visited Tina's family I would leave a week early and bike out there. Then Tina can drive to Maryland, and I can put my bike on the car so I don't have to bike all the way back.

Today I am finishing up all my preparations for the trip. I've been combing over the Google maps directions to make sure that the roads are bikeable. Sometimes Google maps gives biking directions with part of the route on dirt roads, but that won't work with my road bike. My dad sent me his satellite phone so I will be posting updates on my position that way. He also sent some lights for extra visibility. I also have to sort out a few things with my rain gear and bike rack. There are some packages that I hope will come today with this equipment, but I may need to find an alternative.

In order to pack as lightly as possible I will be staying in motels along the way, and eating and whatever places happen to be around. I want to keep my plans flexible in case of unexpected delays. I don't need to be in DC until the 16th, so I have some breathing room in case conditions are more difficult than expected.

Tomorrow's Goal: Lansing, MI to Perrysburg, OH

2 comments:

  1. Good luck, Stephan! I hope you make it all the way to reach your goal!

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  2. Any update? You should be about there now, right?

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