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Hello everyone,

I know the trip is over, but I thought I would upload some of the videos from the trip that I couldn't do while I was out there. Instead of uploading them here and youtube, you can find them all on youtube at: http://www.youtube.com/user/SurlyHeadedEast. Thanks for checking it out.

P.S. I'll try to get some pictures up also

Game Over

I've been regretting writting this post because I have to announce that Surly Headed East is no more. After a little over two weeks and 950 miles Ryan and have decided to stop in Cedar City, UT. It was a hard decision to make but I am glad we did. The main reason for us to stop was inexperience. Inexperience led us to leave too late in the season, which made the trip dangerous. After bad weather in Nevada and more bad weather forcasted through the Rockies it did not make sense to continue. Another big part was gear. We packed completely wrong for this trip and the extra weight hindered our bikng.

Although we did not make our goal I'm glad we tried. We made it 950 miles, made it through over two states, climbed an 8600 ft pass from sea level and crossed a desert. I learned a lot over the past few weeks and I now know what it takes to continue. At this point I don't think that I had the proper gear or mental and physical strength to finish. Maybe in a year or two I will plan the trip again and do it the proper way.

For anyone considering touring there are many things to consider. Weight is the main thing. Do not take anything you do not need, and i mean that. On the bike you feel every ounce. If you are going during warm weather bring only your riding clothes and night clothes. Everything smells and is dirty, why carry the extra weight of more clothes. For most areas you don't need to carry more than two days worth of food with you. We had road shoes wit lh us, but i would recommend mountain bike shoes and then leaving the camp shoes at home. Buy a multi soap that works on your body, dishes etc instead of buying each thing.

When you are trying to outfit your bike try to make everything as slim and small as possible. We had front amd back panniers to start with and then sent home the front. The weight in the front makes the bike hard to control and is not necessary. I would recomend a small handle bar bag instead of front panniers. In the back you want to be streamlline also. I had huge bags in the back which were not needed at all. If I do this trip again I'm using my front panniers (axiom monsoons) for the back and getting a handle bar bag for thing like lunch and everyday needs. When it comes to camping gear quality over quantity is vital. It is better to have the best necessary products then a bunch of neat worthless gadgets.

One thing to remember is that mother nature is queen. I am sorry to everyone who has donated or helped us out in some way. We do not have the experience to brave the weather. I know I have not completed the ride, but if you are interested in touring I highly recommend talking to someone who has toured in the past to to understand how to prepare. It is much more than just riding a bike.

Deserts are not always hot...or dry

We are here in Austin, NV staying a little motel to avoid the impending snow. The last couple days we have been putting on some more miles. Yesterday we did 87 miles and today we put in 72 miles. One of the hardest part of the desert is the wind. In Carson City it was blowing over 50mph gusts which males it very tough to control the bike. Since Carson City we have been riding on hwy 50, "the loneliest highway in America.". It is a pretty tough go. My legs feel dead, my knees feel like they are about to explode, and my back aches. Driving in a car NV looks flat, but in reality it is hilly. Today alone we had close to 3,000 ft of elevation gain.

I've had some questions on our gear and how we have things set up. A couple days ago we sent home 36lbs of gear. A lot of that gear was clothing, duplicates of items such as a stove, front bags, and books. Having the front bags off the bikes gives us more control, especially with the wind. We have also limited the food we take. Instead of having a weeks worth we have a couple days worth. Mostly we are into bagels, peanut butter, fig newtons, beef jerky, and many many clif bars. On the water front, i have three 20oz bottles and a 70oz hydration pack. Ryan carries a little more water than that. On long stretches between stops i will usually carry an extra half gallon water jug on top of my pack. Camping has proven to be an interesting event each night. In California it was pretty hard to find places and i usually slept with my knife in case of whatever. Since we have been in NV we can pretty much camp anywhere, but we aren't protected from the elements, like 50mph winds and freezing rain.

The weather has been a little hard to cope with. A week a go it was over 100 degrees and now it is in the 20's at night. During the day it gets some where in the 50's. The freezing rain and wind are the hardest part, but they hopefully will both calm down in the next couple days.

Tired

Sorry its been a few days since the last post. We've been battling the Sierras and finally made it over Carsons Pass (8573 ft). It took way too long and we are exhausted. Tonight we are motelling it in Carsons City and unfortunately we are too tired to even go to the casino. Ryan and I have come to the realization that we have way to much gear and need to send some home. I've packed a bag with about 10-15 lbs of gear to go home and Ryan has just as much. Once we lighten up we will be heading to Dayton, which is only about 15 miles or so. We are going to use tomorrow as a regrouping and rest up day. Then back on the road heading for Utah.

Flats, canyons, and bible study

Well it seems we still are not back on route, which kind of sucks. Placerville was further away than we thought and we are still 20 miles out, but we were told it is all down hill. The morning was a long flat ride which tool us to Lincoln for lunch. After Lincoln the hills came, which I liked. The afternoon hills weren't bad at first, but post Auburn was the death of us. Between Auburn and Cool is a giant canyon which the American river runs through. Cruising down the canyon was probably the best ride we have done to date. It was unbelievable, the views were amazing! However, what goes down must come up. Three miles straight up no break. After killing our legs to pull way to much gear up this canyon wall we took a break at a mini-mart. Although Ryan and I planned to get more than 62 miles in today it wasn't much use after the long afternoon.

On our way out of town we passed by the Cool Community Church which let us set up shop on their field..for a price. The have been very hospitable, but strongly encouraged us to attend their Bible study. So after a long day where we only want to eat and sleep we headed down for some Luke. It wasn't too bad and we got out early enough, plus now we have Jesus on our side.

Ok, tomorrow we will definetly be through Placerville in the morning, back on track, and heading to Carson City where we can gamble away all of our money. As of right now i need to rest my legs and get some sleep.

Crazy headwinds

After a day and a half rest in Chico we got back on the road again. Unfortunately our departure was quite late. We didn't leave till close to 1:00 in the afternoon. That left us with a short hot day. Both of our legs were feeling good, but we lost distance due to the short day. We only bike about 43 miles. The road was all flat through open land and farms, but the head wind was nuts. With all the gear we have, every factor makes a big difference. Right now we are stealth camping on a walnut farm. We tried to find a farm house t ask permission, but tyere is nothing visible. Hopefully an angry farmer won't wake us in the middle of the night and cause problems.

For tomorrow we want to get down to Placerville as early as possible, which will then put us bqck on route with the maps we have. Placerville looks like it is at the foot of the mountains on our way towards Carson City, so we will probably have a flat ride in the morning with some hills in the afternoon. Our goal is to finally start putting on serious miles tomorrow. Get up early and ride all day.

A Couple Days In

By now we are on day three of our adventure and we are chilling in Chico, CA at Ryan's brothers house. It has been fun, hard, and a grear learning experience so far.

Day 1: we left the hotel around 6:30 am and took a longer route to the bridge. Big mistake, it was 20 miles of monster hills. Hills so steep they would be uncomfortable to drive up. After getting to the bridge we rode down to the ferry and headed out to Vallejo. Expecting to leave the hills behind we where sorely mistaken. The first day was all hills. We ended up riding 74 miles for the day and getting to camp a little late. We arrived at a camp site at about 7:30 and had to set up camp in the dark.

Day 2: Saturday was an easy day, only 35 miles to Sacramento. We woke up late because day 1 took a lot out of us and headed toward Davis, the bike capitol of th US. Davis is an amazing town. A bike show on every corner. There bike lanes were so developed that they even had round abouts for the bike lanes! Ryan and I grabbed sandwhiches and walked around Davis for a little then headed east. The ride to Sacramento was flat and hot. At Sacramento we hung around and waited for Ryans brother to pick us up and take us to Chico.

These first couple weeks have given us insight into how the trip will be. We've had large hills and flat hot roads. We both need to work on food choices, I'm constantly hungry. We have a couple videos from the start that hopefully I can get posted soon. One problem I am facing is that the solar charger does not charge as well as I hoped. That is one of the reasons I have not been posting.

Did you say MARYLAND!?

We are finally in San Francisco and getting close to the start. Tomorrow morning will be the official first day of Surly Headed East! At this moment everything is packed, nothing more we can do.

Well, the past couple days have been good and bad. The flight went well on Wed and everything arrived in one piece, but just because everything went well doesn't mean it wasn't stressful. Waking up at 3am to fly cross country, praying your bike arrives at a sketchy airport motel is never fun. Luckily, as I said, everything went well. After arriving at flee bag motel, we took out our bikes and started the assembly process. For the most part the bikes went back together easily (mine still isn't shifting very well). Once we unpacked and reassembled we took the bikes out for a short four mile test ride, trying to find dinner. In the end we ate prime rib like kings at the Hunter Palace (it was actually pretty good).

Day two of prep work was much better, but had its own little snags. We spent the day running errands, buying all the last minute gear and food for the trip. Our resort is located about ten miles south of the city so we cruised up into San Fran on the bikes, doing our first urban biking, which is so much fun! Having some trouble finding products at crappy REI or EMS type knock off sports store (Sports Basement), we finally found everything we needed on the otherside of town at the real REI. After getting the final camp gear and groceries we rode up to the Golden Gate bridge and checked out the start location. On the way back to our estate, Ryan and I went back along the Pacific, getting lost in the ghetto and eating stomach turning $30 pizza. By the time we reached the motel we clocked a nice 55.4 mile warm up ride, although we only had our rear panniers on all day.

Over all the trip has been fun so far. San Francisco is a great biking city. They have bike lanes every where and when there aren't bike lanes the cars have been great about bikers. Tomorrow we will be leaving the city and heading over to Vellejo towards Sacramento. Time for another sleepless night.

-Patrick

5 Minute Anxiety!

If you ever wondered how to scare yourself to the very core, decide you are going to climb on a bicycle strapped with everything you own to keep yourself alive and healthy and travel across the country as an amateur cyclist. Then once you bought everything you need, put it on your bike. Now try to pick it up...it is exactly 7 times heavier than you ever thought possible.

Once you've scared yourself silly and professed that you're never going to make it, throw on your cleats and ride it around the driveway. The gratification you will feel is unparalleled, the tears are unrestrained, and the bike glides across the road like, surprise, it was meant to carry your weight plus 40+ lbs of gear and supplies.

I've never felt a greater rush of satisfaction. Today is the first day I feel separate from the average.

Departure, One Week!

Ok, so we are coming to the final days, there is now less than one week till Ryan and I will be in California. Most of our preparation is done, my bike is on its way via fedex, and as of today I am now unemployed.

The game plan is that we will both fly out to San Francisco on Wed., September 23, spend September 24th preparing our gear and head out on September 25.

As of now I'm just in the excited state. I'm pretty sure that next week, probably either Monday or Tuesday, I'll start getting anxious and nervous. Until then, I'll just enjoy packing and preparing.

Thats it for now, check back often and I'll try to put in another update before we leave.

The Route

View Surly Headed East Route in a larger map

The Naked Bike

From Ryan:

Well, the essentials are finally on my bike. It took several weeks of ordering parts and riding 60 miles round trip to the bike shop to put on racks and fenders but my bike is ready for the road.

I figured I'd show you all that you will need many weeks to fix problems before you even leave. We've been talking about this trip now for months. I barely had the funds together a couple weeks ago and I started buying all the stuff I laid out. My shopping carts on 6 different websites remained open and my computer on for weeks while I saved up the cash I needed. I finally ordered it all but adjustments needed to be made. I ran into some issues. Immediately, I knew the saddle on the bike needed to go. It was uncomfortable beyond belief...$35 additional cash laid out. Then the front rack came in a week after the back rack and fenders due to an ordering problem. No big deal but I'm glad I got it this far away from our ship out date because it turns out it didn't quite fit with the hardware in the package. One trip to the hardware store and a small saw cured that issue. I'll show pics in my blog tomorrow. Long story short, the naked bike is ready to gear up. My gear arrives tomorrow and another blog will be up.

There are a couple things I should warn you not to skimp on! PEDALS!!!! Buy GOOD pedals. I bought economy pedals and both the pedals and cleats are awful. I'll be switching these out before I leave. A saddle is obviously important. It takes a couple rides to get accustomed to one...know if its going to be acceptable before the big ride. DO NOT skimp on clothing....I bought cheap jerseys and they itch and the seams are in terrible spots. I knew there was a reason they were $30... Shorts are the same thing. The difference between my pearl izumis and my falconis is huge...The pearls are fantastic...the falconis are not as fantastic.

So far, this trip has been an eye opener...I cant wait to actually get out there!

All Geared Up

As I said in previous posts, I would post a video showing the gear that I'll be taking and how I will have it packed.

Here is the gear:

And I want to give everyone an idea of what it is going to look like with all the gear packed up and on my bike:

Update: training and gear

Hello Everyone,

I just wanted to post a quick update about planning and training.

This past weekend I competed in the Timberman Half-Ironman and had a finishing time of 5:50:10. Now that Timberman is out of the way I can hang up my Trek and ride Olive, my Surly touring bike. Coming up I have the Annapolis 10 miler on sunday. On September 5th, I plan to do a 100 mile ride from Southern HS to Solomons Island and back. Finally, September 19th is the North Face endurance Challenge, a 50k trail run. Between training for all these events I should be in peak condition for biking.

Now to get on to gear. Pretty much everything is in and looking good. I have the front and back racks installed, along with fenders. My panniers are on and look good. The bike finally looks like a touring bike. All of my camp gear is in order and we are working on our plans for the first days in San Fransisco.

The last thing that needs careful consideration is nutrition, which I have been thinking about a lot and is the one thing that worries me. Anyone that knows me knows that I don't have much weight to lose, so it is going to be very important that I get enough calories to maintain weight.

In following posts, I'll put up a video showing my gear and how I plan to pack it all. Also I will keep you updated with my search for a good diet. Any suggestions on nutrition are welcome in the comment section below.

-Patrick

Philosophy of Giving

Anyone who knows Ryan and I know that we are Libertarians. We both believe deeply in the individual and the individual’s right to choose. It is important that every person makes up their own mind on every issue, which is why education is so important. One of the benefits of being a libertarian, or a member of a democracy for that matter, is that we are able to decide where our money and time goes. For this trip we are asking for donations, but it is completely your choice. We have decided to have Team in Training as our charity of choice, but there may be issues that are more important to you. That is why I would like to go through several charities that Surly Headed East finds important and hopefully there is one or two that interest you.

Team in Training (TNT): As an endurance athlete myself, I have seen the positive effects that Team in Training has had on its participants. The majority of the money raised for Team in Training goes directly towards research to find a cure for blood cancer.

Chesapeake Bay Foundation (CBF): Having grown up on the Chesapeake Bay, CBF has always been around, trying to clean up the mess that I’ve contributed to. Clean water is vital life and the Bay is quickly getting destroyed. If you are worried about the environment CBF is definitely worth checking out.

Kiva: Kiva is an organization that gives out micro-loans to poor entrepreneurs. Monetary capital and credit is very important for new businesses, which can often times be impossible to find. Kiva allows individual businesses to find credit all over the World to help fund their business, grow, and hopefully pull themselves out of poverty.

TOMS: Tomorrows Shoes is a store that donates one pair of shoes to a child in a third world country for every pair sold. I love the idea; this is the best side of capitalism. They work with the markets to help those in need.

Finally I would like to thank Laurie Schanken for being the first to donate to our cause! It was very generous of you and very much appreciated!

Thank you everyone for all of your support.

Ryan's Bio

Hello Readers!

This bio will be updated with a photo and more detail as I work on it, but I figured it was the right time to introduce myself now!

My name is Ryan Casna. I'm from Keene, New Hampshire. I've always enjoyed biking but most of my adventures up through high school have been with bmx and downhill mountain bikes. More recently I've been inclined to hop on the road bike since it poses less risk of injury and move value for getting in shape.

This trip will prove to be a real challenge for me; unlike Patrick, I am not in great shape and the training for this trip has proved to be daunting. This trip will be a true challenge for me both physically and mentally. I hate camping and bugs and life without a shower, but I need a change and an adventure and this is the first opportunity that both Patrick and I have had to capitalize on our free time!

Stay tune for some great tales from training and even better ones from the road.

Ryan

Patrick's Bio

Hey guys, I just want to take a little time to let you get to know me better. I've grown up in Pasadena, MD and went to high school at Severn School. After high school, I moved to NYC to attend Pace University, where I met Ryan. I had a blast in NYC, but never felt that great about being at Pace University. After about a year and a half I moved home and transfered to the University of Maryland, College Park where I graduated last December, with a B.A. in Political and Economic History. Since school has let out I've spent my days working at Woodfire Restaurant serving and managing.

In the sports arena I completed my first Marathon in April, the Big Sur International Marathon. I've also been training hard for the Timberman Half-Ironman which takes place August 23 and the North Face 50k trail running Challenge, which is on September 19.

I'm getting pumped to leave for California and begin the trek home. I've been wanting to do this trip for a couple years now, but the time has never been right, until now.

Although this adventure is mostly about self-discovery, I knew that it was larger than just Ryan and I. I knew that it had to be so much more, that is why we decided we had to raise awareness for a charity or non-profit. Over the years I've seen the work my mother and her friends have done with Team in Training and the results that they got, which made me want to be part of it. My hope is that Ryan and I can do our part to raise awareness for such an important organization.

After this trip is over I plan to refocus on school. It is my hope to go to graduate school in fall '10. Although I haven't decided on a school yet, I know that I want to study Public Policy, with a focus on Environmental Policy. The Environment is very important to me and I find that one of the most interesting topics of study is the Green Revolution. I'm not a complete hippy, but I do enjoy studying how businesses can gain competitive advantages over traditional businesses, by being "green."

Thanks for taking the time to check us out and come back regularly, because we will constantly be updating the site.

WELCOME!

Hello everyone and thank you for checking out our blog. Surly Headed East consists of Patrick DiGiulian and Ryan Casna, two friends on a mission of self-discovery. In September, we will be biking from coast to coast, for a trip of a life time. The planned route will start us in San Francisco, California and finish us up two months later in Ocean City, MD.

Having both recently graduated from college, we are using this trip as an opportunity to examine ourselves, before being thrown into the real world.

In addition to personal growth, we would also like to improve the world around us. To do this, we will be raising money and raising awareness of Team In Training.

"You have to leave the city of your comfort and go into the wilderness of your intuition. What you'll discover will be wonderful. What you'll discover is yourself." - Alan Alda