8 weeks to go -She Says

by Richelle Olsen - She Science Ambassador and slightly concerned about to be bike tourer.


This trip is like NOTHING I have ever done before.  Biggest thing I’ve ever done was a 12 day trek to Everest Base Camp.  This is like a whopping 4,840kms longer than that, and well that was massive for me at the time!

Whats the drive for me? 

• I want a chance to live life how it should be lived, in nature and under my own steam.  

• There has got to be more to life than working to pay the bills.  I want to escape the monotony of eat, sleep, work, pay bills and replace it with the monotony of eat, sleep, ride and dodge bears!    

• I want an adventure that I can do with Shane that we can both share, different to him doing something crazy, and me being support crew.
  

• And I dearly, dearly want to be that person who is capable of joining any physical adventure I put my mind to..I figure if i can ride this far, then i can do pretty much anything. 
  

Whats worrying me?

How long have you got?  Hahaha!

• Hills, no MOUNTAINS..there's a lot of them.  I think they might hurt...just sayin'!  I’m trying to train at home, and I’m riding way more than I have done before, but I'm rubbish at consistency, and I’m a bit lazy.  I’m sure I’ll pay for this on the trail......but nothing like the first few weeks on the trail to do some real life training right?

• My biggest concern is driving Shane nuts with my slowness on the bike.  I’m gonna whinge, and he can be very patient, but I’m gonna whinge a lot.  And I’ll probably cry, he’s not that great when I cry, least not the whingey crying.  I’m pretty sure he can handle “the bear ate my arm” crying though, which is a relief.  In all seriousness, this is over 70 days of me waaay out of my comfort zone, with a sore bum, sore legs and little sleep...  But hey, the upside is that through the baptism of fire my tolerance for pain and discomfort should increase exponentially – least that's the plan.  God we are in trouble if it doesn’t!  In all seriousness it will be a massive test on our relationship.....but wheres the fun without tests?  Right?  Right?
  

• Oh and I’m also going to drive him nuts with my lack of co-ordination.  He told me recently that I seem to do simple tasks the most difficult way imaginable.  Things like pouring water at odd angles, not being able to squat on my heels and trying to get on and off my bike.  These things will improve with practice yeah?  Its not like I haven’t had 36 years of practice already!
  

• Funny as it sounds, I'm getting really worried about packing and repacking every morning and night, and everything being kept in its rightful place...  Shane will laugh at this, as our recent bikepacking trip to Buller over Easter showed me using half the campground to organise all my stuff.....there was stuff everywhere.  This bothers me, we will have to nail this early on for both our sanity!
  

• Sleeping in a tent every night.  We all know how great a night sleep you get under the stars yeah?  Unlikely!  Air pillows and air mattresses, confined sleeping bags, freezing cold, unknown animals sniffing around outside all contribute to a less than ideal nights sleep.  And for those that know me, I LOVE my sleep, its my number 1 hobby, in fact most nights I get a minimum of 9hrs sleep.  Its something I'd better get used to, otherwise Shane will be feeding me to the bears due to my grumpiness!!  Our plan for 1 night a week in a motel should hopefully help too.
  

• Animals – now these are top of Shane’s list, particularly grizzly bears, closely followed by black bears, wolves, mountain lions and rattlesnakes.....I guess I'm a bit scared of them, but as you can see, I have plenty of concerns on my list before I make room for them...I’ll let Shane worry about us getting eaten!
  

What I’m excited about

• The adventure, the stuff we will see, the people we will meet, sharing it with each other every day (thats both good and bad!).
  

• Learning to budget.  I haven’t had to budget since I was 20 years old.  Shane picks on me for my saying whenever we go on holiday “doesn’t matter if we forgot something, we can just buy it when we get there”.  And its true, till now, if I want something I’ll buy it.  That steak dinner that costs $30 (our daily budget)?   Sure why not!!??  Nope - not on this trip, which will take a bit of getting used to!  I’m looking forward to living simply.  It also has the massive incentive that the less we spend, the longer we can travel for!
  

• For those who know me, I’ve always had issues with my weight, the main one being there’s too much of it on me!!  I am kinda ashamed to admit it, but Im excited about the fact that this trip will (hopefully) drop the kgs without even trying.  Unfortunately we won’t be getting good nutrition out there, cause we will eat what we can find at servo’s, but I’ll be eating less than I do at home, and doing waaaaay more excercise!  60kms a day more!
  

• I don’t want to be a business analyst any more.  I don’t want to be the minion that packs into a tin can train every morning and night, to go to a job where people are stressing out about deadline A, or risk B, all for what?!  All that effort that I put into other people’s projects, I want to put into something that is mine, that I own.  I want this trip to kickstart that dream for when I return home.  I don’t know what my own business will be (I have tons of ideas), but I have many months on the bike to work this out!!
  

But in the meantime, I now haveexactly 8 weeks to rent the house, sell the car, save money, close off finances, pack up the house, organise our kit we are taking, catch up with friends and family, organise a charity garage sale,  and ride my bike ALOT.   

In reality I have no time to worry about the actual ride till we get there anyway!!!!

Read about the whole trip