Hi and Welcome to The Last Big Ride. This is my first blog post and I will do my best to keep the blog up to date, although slow/no connection and procrastination will take its toll I am sure!
I left home in Hot Springs Virginia on a beautiful Autumn morning. 100’s of people were there to see me off. No, no there were not actually. My only Bon Voyage committee were my wife and my dog. I left a few hours later than I wanted to due to some last minute packing/preparations to do, but that’s ok, it gave the chill in the air time to lose its edge.
I was filled with nervousness and excitement at the same time. Nervousness over the unknown challenges of the adventure ahead, as well as my medical condition and how it would affect me, and excitement as well over the adventure ahead of me. 15000 (approximately) miles and 5 months of riding lay ahead of me. Its a trip that many others have done before me, but, nevertheless, one in which every person who does it faces their own challenges and fears. Doing it solo, with a serious medical condition makes it that much more challenging for me.
One of the big challenges is the medication I have to take daily, and the medical appointments in the US that I have to make. It simply impossible to take enough of the pills that I have to take, some twice daily, for a 5 month trip. Space is at a premium, not to mention that the insurance company fill more than 2 months at a time. As some of the prescriptions are quite expensive, and I need them, I can’t trust the mail to get them to me somewhere, and I can’t ask my wife to fly down and meet me somewhere with a bunch of drugs that don’t have her name on the prescription. That would be a customs nightmare! I also have one self-injection that I have to take once every 8 weeks and it has to be kept refrigerated. What this all means is that I will have to fly home a few times during the trip to renew my prescriptions. I’ll combine that with needed doctors visits to check on the progress of the disease. It’s a bit complicated but I’ll make it work. Thankfully, even though I am on medical leave from the airline, I still have my flight benefits.
As the day was not that interesting, 500 miles of Interstate riding, I’ll keep the rest of this short. I rode down to the Atlanta area to visit my Dad and Stepmom for a day before continuing my trip. The Aprilia Tuareg did great, keeping up 75 mph effortlessly and comfortably. Its such a brilliant machine and, so far, I am very happy I chose it. I wanted to take my trusty BMW R1200GS, but its getting just a bit heavy for me, so this middleweight adventure bike is perfect for me.
Thanks for reading and Live Tough!
Brett
