My Previous Tours

The bike has remained very much the same over the years regarding the touring set-up. For all of my earlier trips through the year 2000, I used my original Kirkland front and rear panniers. I did no long bike trips from 2001 through 2014 primarily because my interests were divided between hiking the entire Appalachian Trail several weeks at a time over about eleven years. That endeavor and maintenance of our country property unfortunately allowed a significant amount of dust to accumulate on the Avatars.

In 2014 I dusted them off and planned to try a couple more trips. New panniers were called for so I decided on all new Arkel bags all the way around. They are excellent bags; well thought-out and are made with quality materials and workmanship. For my front bags, I decided to purchase two of their largest conventional bike handlebar bags and figured out how to adapt to my front pannier support bracket.

2014 thru 2022

Over the years I have made 14 cross-country type trips. The first three were on a conventional Fuji 18-speed bike. All the rest were done on my Avatar 0136. A 15th trip was aborted in September 2018 due to old-man prostate issues just three days after leaving Billings, MT at Sheridan, WY. That issue was fixed and I recently did a trip in 2019 from Billings to West Yellowstone, MT over Beartooth Pass.

Santa Ana, CA to Colorado Springs, CO – 1980 (conventional bike)

Jasper, Alberta, Canada to Colorado Springs, CO – 1981 (conventional bike)

New Zealand (both islands) – 1982-3 (conventional bike)

Portland, OR to Big Horn Mtns, WY – 1985 (maiden voyage for my Avatar)

Colorado Springs, CO to Yorktown, VA – 1986

Tucson, AZ to Big Horn Mtns, WY – 1987

Reno, NV to Missoula, MT – 1988

Flagstaff, AZ to Flagstaff, AZ (Loop thru Nevada) 1989

Minot, ND to Galion, OH – 1990

Visalia, CA to Crete, NE – 1998

Fleetwood, PA to Deer Isle, ME – 2000

Madison, WI to Knoxville, TN – 2015