(Please note: we wrote most of this FAQ while we were still on our trip. Now that it's over, perhaps because we can't believe it's over, we've decided to keep those parts of the FAQ in the present tense, which may make it sound like we are still on the road. Sorry for any confusion.)

             FAQ

Who are we?
Eric is a 35-year-old bike nut who makes his living by writing control systems software for computer chip manufacturers, steel mills and subways, etc. He was born in Maryville, Tenn., and grew up in Bettendorf, Iowa and Pittsburgh, Penn. He has quit jobs several times to go on long bike tours in Europe, Australia and the U.S. When we left on this trip, Eric was 31. He still can't walk by a parked bike on the street without stopping to sniff out the intricacies of its gears and brakes.

I (Joan) am a 35-year-old journalist. I grew up in San Francisco and spent my 20s working as a journalist (for the Wall Street Journal) while the rest of my friends went gallavanting around the globe. I'm now an editor at a magazine.

How long have you been travelling?

A: We left our jobs in May, 1997. We returned home for Christmas in 1998, stayed one month, then started again in Europe. The trip ended on July 31, 1999 in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.
Here's a rough breakdown of where we were when:
 
 


How much does a world trip cost?
We spent about $63 a day on average, which is a mix of Asia (quite cheap), Europe (horrifically expensive) and the US (cheap for us since we mostly stay with relatives). That figure included all our on-the-ground expenses, including buying and repairing camera, computer and bike equipment while on the road, and regional airline/train/ferry tix. The price did not include intercontinental airline tickets, our phone and internet accounts back home, health insurance, or the approximate $5,000 we invested in computer/camping/bike gear before we left. Our total costs for 26 months were about $56k?

Did you have sponsors?

No. We didn't have any sponsors and we didn't look for any, because we wanted the freedom to travel on our own schedule, with as few obligations as possible. We paid for this trip and with our own savings, plus money that we both occasionally earned by writing about our trip.

Where are you now? Where does the trip end?

After arriving in Pittsburgh in time for Eric's dad's 70th birthday, we drove across the country to San Francisco, where Eric promptly broke both of his arms during a Sunday bike ride to the Golden Gate bridge. A car cut him off and offered to stop, but Eric didn't think he was hurt. He had no insurance. So now we're both living in San Francisco, paying off Eric's medical bills. We've been here since Aug. 99. Can't believe the whole trip is over.

What kind of bikes did you ride?

Answered by Eric:
I am riding a Trek 520 touring bike with 700c wheels and Joan has a Trek 820 mountain bike. Both bikes have performed well on all the terrain we've crossed, including 600 miles of rock/gravel road in Tibet.

However, Joan's low-end Shimano components (her whole bike cost only US$300 new in 1994) wore out after about 4,000 miles. In Bangkok, we replaced both derailleurs, hubs, chain, freewheel, front crank, swapped grip shifts for index shifters, had both wheels rebuilt with new spokes, etc. The total cost of all replacements and labor for her bike was US$300.

My bike cost US$700 new in 1991, and has mid-range components that have held up for over 15,000 miles now (including previous tours), though I have replaced the chain a few times. The problem with my touring bike is that 700c tires and tubes (especially Presta) are very hard to find in Asia. I could not find spare tires in any towns, large or small, except Manila, Chengdu (China) and Kathmandu. I did find one in Bangkok but we were slow to buy it, and it sold out--and the store couldn't lay its hands on new stock for the next two weeks, so we were stuck. Meanwhile, Joan could have replaced her 26-inch mountain bike tires in just about any small town we rode through.

Whether to ride a Mountain or a Touring bike comes down to preference. Joan likes to sit in a more upright position. She has the bar ends almost vertical. (Just one problem: those bar ends make the bike a wee bit wider, which nearly resulted in Joan's death one day on Eastern Java, when she had to shimmy between a pile of bricks on her left and a speeding, oncoming bus on her right). Also, the handlebars give her more leverage to turn the heavy front wheel. I'm used to a touring bike.

What equipment did we use and like the most?

(Please note: we do not ask for or receive any money, gifts, favors or sponsorship from any companies, including the ones listed below. What follows is just our honest opinion).

  • Brule Mountain Gear panpacks (panniers that convert to backpacks) - wonderful!!
  • Gerber Tool. Use it for everything from bike repair to cutting baugettes
  • Olympus Camera - all-weather, very compact clam shell style. Apparently unbreakable. We've tried.
  • Thin, cotton long-sleeve shirts. Cooler than Tshirts, keeps the tropical sun off.
  • Fleece jackets and shirts. I don't care what anyone says, rain eventually gets through a Gortex raincoat but fleece always kept us warm.
  • Newton MessagePad 2000 (w/ keyboard and solar panel). Discontinued now, but we rode 11,000 miles with it and wrote over 200,000 words on it. It has survived everything.
  • Rubbermaid. We keep the Newton in a Rubbermaid sandwich container and some spare electronics in another taller and deeper container we call "the bucket." If the lid stays on, everything stays dry no matter what.

    • What equipment FAILED?

    (Please note: we do not ask for or receive any money, gifts, favors or sponsorship from any companies, including the ones listed below. What follows is just our honest opinion).

    The following have failed during this trip:

  • Timberland Boots. Two pairs we bought in Christchurch, NZ failed after minimal use. Awful. Makes me mad thinking about it. We first noticed that the soles were falling off about two months after we bought them. We were in Singapore. We tried to bring them to a Timberland store in Singapore for repairs (Timberland guarantees its products for life, and brags about having stores all over the world that can help you out), but the Singapore store said we had to go back to the NZ store! or mail the products back. We didn't have time to do either. Instead, we hung onto the boots, thinking they'd survive the hike we bought them for: 23 days around the Annapurna in Nepal. Well, just a few days into the hike, Eric's soles separated almost entirely from his boot. Then mine started. The other hikers had no problems with their boots; we were the only idiots on the trail to have bought Timberland. In Jan. 1999, we mailed. When we reached Pennsylvania in August of 1999, some new Timberland boots were waiting for us. But Timberland sucks! Based on past experience, and everything we've heard from other travelers, Timberland is your worst boot choice. Tell your friends. DON'T buy Timberland.
  • Coleman Peak 1 multi-fuel stove. Multi-fuel does not include Chinese gasoline I guess.
  • PUR water purifier. Worked great for about 14 months, and then failed us at a critical time (Tibet). Okay for shorter trips. If you want a heavy-duty water filter, buy a Katahdin. We met people who used them happily for years.
  • Nokia Celluar Phone 2110e (for internet access from our Newton). The Newton survived, the phone didn't.
  • 10% of our zippers! (6 of 55)
  • The built-in flash on our Canon EOS 500 SLR camera (otherwise the camera has been pretty good but it's hard to keep the lenses clean).
  • Gerber "Cool Tool" (combination bike tool) Fell to pieces very early.
  • Olympus compact camera (weather-proof). These camaras are great, but they can only take so much. Our first on being dropped at 30 mph on a wet, bumpy road in Costa Rica. Then three months later, after no new trauma, it up and died.
  • Pentax IQ zoom compact camera. When we bought it in 1997, no other camera its size had as much zoom. It lasted about one year (we liked it a lot) then refused to load film.

    • What kind of cameras did you use?

    We carry two cameras. One is a compact Olympus all-weather camera and the other a large Canon EOS 500 SLR camera. We keep the small camera in an outside pocket on the right-hand side of Eric's handlebar bag so that he can snap photos quickly without even stopping the bike. This is very important to us and we get a lot of good photos that way. Since we often take photos while moving, we never use film slower than 200 speed. The little camera is just as good as the big camera for landscapes.

    We use the Canon anytime we stop to take a photo and especially for photographs of people or close-ups. We love it. It takes wonderful pictures and we can do a lot more with it than we could with just compact camera.

    But it is not without its difficulties. Eric keeps it in the main compartment of his handbar bag at the exclusion of just about everything else. We lost a couple lens caps and it's a bit difficult keeping the lenses clean. Also the built-in flash stopped working which has been a real pain since the compact camera always gives people red-eye. We didn't buy an external flash because carrying it would be too much trouble.

    Did you have health insurance, and how did you find it?

    We had some trouble finding insurance for our trip. We priced a lot, but it just cost way too much. In the end we went with a fly-by-nite cheapie company that we got through Council Travel Insurance (a big insurance co. for students, which sells even to non-students like us). We paid only $250?? each for one year of coverage, up to $3,000 per incident, plus $25k in evacuation insurance. Well, they really were fly by nite. We had to get some hospital tests in Bangkok, and when we tried to get reimbursed, it took us three months to find out their new address! First we called them from Thailand (eep!), and they answered and promised to send a claim form pronto.

    They didn´t. With help from several relatives in the U.S. we finally tracked them down and got reimbursed. The cost for all those tests, which would have really been high in the U.S., was only $370 at the best expat hospital in Bangkok. So my advice is, if you don´t have lots of cash and you´re going to be traveling in Asia, wing it, and just count on paying as you go. Even if you do have insurance, you´ll have to pay all those costs up front anyway, most likely. If you want real ace insurance, try Lloyds of London, etc. We know someone whose parents did that for them. In Europe, we took a risk--we let our insurance expire. We figure it's not like we have a house to lose.

    One mistake: we didn't renew as soon as we got back to the U.S. After 12,000 miles with no serious accidents, Eric was taking a joyride in San Francisco when a car cut him off. He hit the brakes, went over the handlebars and caught himself with his arms. Broke both of them. But he didn't think he was hurt so he let the driver go. He is now paying cash for all his medical treatments. Which is a real drag. We talked to friends in the Netherlands and they said that we would have also had to pay all cash if the same accident had happened in their country--no free benefits for foreigners. So if we had to do it again we'd probably make a point of carrying insurance in all expensive countries.


    Did you get sick a lot?

    No! All that exercise is good for you. We generally felt great, and suffered through only one or two colds during the whole 26 months. BUT ... here's the worst that happened to us:

    1. bronchitis and flu--made us nearly immobile for 2 weeks in Chengdu, China. We picked it up on a train in China, even though we were traveling first class. Luckily you can buy penicillin over the counter there.
    2. one high, brief fever--Philippines
    3. gastro problems that lingered for 2 weeks, then went away--Bangkok
    4. brief, violent bout with bad food--a fancy Chinese restaurant on Bali (surprising since it's so well developed)


    last updated April 2000