Long Distance Cycling: Taking on a New Challenge

Since I live the life as an ESL teacher in South Korea, it seems focuses have narrowed rather than expanded.  I do not work a 40 hour job and the job is in many ways fun. However, living in the wildness of the world still alludes me. What I have found in the meanwhile are the things to make this human zoo I live in more habitable for the wild human within. One of these things have been long distance cycling. Long Distance Cycling is one of the best activities in modern society since it is a eco-friendly way to travel, is mentally and physically challenging to do, and is accessible to do on a low budget if you learn to fix the bike yourself and spend little money on food or accomodation (cooking, and camping anyone?). While it is in no way horsebacking riding or hunting, it touches the nomad in me. Approximately, closer to a hunter-gather-nomad. Is that a stretch? I think not.

This February, I went on four day trip and didn't accomplish what I expected. I was slower than I intended and I never reached my destination initial destination. It was a blast and I learned what to do in the future. My partner is this venture was L, the sort of person who can just hang and take things as they come.

We left late on a Saturday and we did half the pace we wanted to do. We stopped a lot to adjust our bikes but mostly that meant my bike and the seatwhich was leaning back due to a stress bent on the tube which required a lot of stopping until I figured out a makeshift way to fix it the next day. Or the rack which was not properly secured by ziplines and needed more solid rope. So the next day we got another late start by  my friend oversleeping and adding an hour  from retying my rack with better cord than the poor ziplines I used earlier Saturday morning. On that Sunday we arrived at Yangpyeong in the city, doing a quarter of a distance of the past two days I imagined we would do. Since L needed to be back on Wednesday we decided to head back from where we were but to wake up earlier and quicken the pace. I figured that if we got back home on the same day early, we could push past it and stay someone that night. Then the next day we could come back to our home city on the last day of the trip with the same pace.  So on Monday we woke up early and we reached Uijeongbu the same day from the city it took us two days to get to.

"Cash, Money, Drike," Day 1

NamYangju on Day 1

Yangpyeong City, the furthest we got from Uijeongbu, Day 2

My Old Bike pictured on Day 1

L and I got a feel for each other's rythym of the trip and by the end it felt more efficient and insync.  The fasted person no longer stopped for the slowest person but simply went their pace and the slowest person caught up when the fatest person stopped. That quickened the pace and we stopped way less. It also kept us from gabbing to each, which in itself is a good reason for our friendship.

And then 10km from Uijeongbu my bike rim broke. I had found the wheel to the wobly and so I waved L ahead and got down to business adjusting the wheel. I concluded that the rim was bent. It was almost a half hour after trying to re-adjust the tire that I realized that the rim was bent but split.

The bike is old and already needed parts replaced. Having it was an exercise in what I could get away with and what I could learn to fix and mend myself. Since some parts are hard to replace, it became clear that I would buy a new moderately priced bike after the trip and use the old bike to learn how to fix and repair bikes.

So that was it for the bike trip. 4 days shortened to 3 days. L rode back to me and we walked the rest of the distance back to Uijeongbu.

The next day we went hiking in Yeoncheon but that is another story.

I had so much cycling that I caught the bug and I'm looking forward to more cycling in my life, albeit in the vagabonding kind of way.