Happy Thomas Stevens Day!... Who?... Read On...

Today I thought I would share some of my inspirations for the voyage which I will soon be making. Mostly they are in the form of solo adventurers, many of whom have written books detailing their travels. (If you're anxious to know about Thomas Stevens Day, skip to the end.)

The High Adventure of Eric Ryback: Canada to Mexico on Foot was the first book of its kind which I can remember reading, probably around the age of 12. It's about the 17-year-old student that became the first thru-hiker to complete the 2663 mile Pacific Crest Trail which follows the highest portions of the Sierra Nevada and Cascade mountain ranges. Afterwards I too wanted to hike through the mountains for months at a time, experiencing the highs and lows of such an incredible trek. I still have yet to do so...

Jack Kerouac came next. Yes it may be cliché, but I can't deny his influence on my life. As did many a teenager, I wanted to become both a writer and a full-time traveler after first reading On the Road early in my college career. Not many months later I had consumed the majority of his novels and some of his poetry.

Jack "Ti Jean" Kerouac

However it was really only Desolation Angels which truly grabbed me enough to re-read it several times. This book begins with Jack sitting atop a lonely mountain in Washington State as a fire lookout and follows him as he descends to travel around North America and parts of Europe.

Far from being the gifted writer I had once hoped to be, I still find myself wanting to see the country in the same casual, yet intent manner with which he described it to us.

The first book I read concerning the travels of a cyclist was Into The Remote Places by Ian Hibell. Inside its pages Hibell tells of three lengthy journeys which he completed in the 70's and early 80's. He crossed South America from west to east through the Amazon, spanned the length of Africa including the widest parts of the Sahara Desert and rode from the southern tip of South America to Alaska becoming the first to "cycle" through the Darien Gap between Panama and Colombia. Watch this short documentary footage of his crossing to see why I used quotation marks.

Two more modern cyclo-tourists have caught my attention over the last couple years. The first is Tilmann Waldthaler who I believe is currently riding his last tour, a two-year epic journey from Norway to New Zealand. This is just one of many multi-country tours he has ridden in his lifetime. His website: http://www.tilmann.com/

The other cyclist to inspire me recently is a man by the name of Heinz Stücke. Heinz has been riding his bike around the world for almost 50 years, covering over 365,000 miles and visiting 257 countries. And he's still going! His website: http://www.heinzstucke.com/

Mr. and Mrs. H. Darwin McIlrath

Finally I must recognize a few pioneers in the field of bicycle travel. In the years 1895-1898, Mr. and Mrs. H. Darwin McIlrath were sponsored by the Chicago newspaper Inter Ocean to travel around the world on bicycles. During their journey Mr. McIlrath sent letters back to the Chicago newspaper for publication. All of the letters were later compiled into a book titled Around the World on Wheels for the Inter Ocean. You can read the book in its entirety on the Internet Archive: http://goo.gl/7yFxS

Thomas Stevens w/ his penny-farthing

Saving perhaps the most important for last, I must tell you about Thomas Stevens, the first person to circumnavigate the globe on two wheels. Beginning in San Francisco on April 22, 1884 (thus today is Thomas Stevens Day, a holiday celebrated by the Adventure Cycling Association), Stevens made his way across the USA on his penny-farthing bicycle (big "penny" wheel in front, little "farthing" wheel in back). He then continued by steamer to England and then France, traveled across mainland Europe, through Turkey and the Middle East. He was turned away from Afghanistan, but found his way around by boat and train to India, crossing into China and finally over to Japan where he caught another steamer back to California.

Not long after Stevens returned home, he wrote a two volume book chronicling his expedition titled Around the World on a Bicycle which I have yet to read (you can find free versions of this scattered around online also). It was a remarkable journey by any account, but I can only imagine what he must have encountered in those years of 1884-1886. The world is a much different place today with many more roads (he walked one third of the way across America), many more multi-lingual inhabitants (he had great difficulty obtaining directions in China and other countries), and fewer murderous thieves (he always carried a pistol, yet sometimes had to wait for reports of bandits to subside before traveling down a road).

I wonder what Thomas Stevens would think of the world today with its multi-geared touring bicycles, paved roadways, sprawling suburbs and unending automobile traffic. Regardless, without his pioneering spirit and the spirit of many others that followed, I would not be embarking upon my own travels to see the world.

Thomas Wentworth Higginson, who heard Stevens speak at the Massachusetts Bicycle Club, summed it up best in the preface to Around the World on a Bicycle: "He seemed like Jules Verne, telling his own wonderful performances, or like a contemporary Sinbad the Sailor. We found that modern mechanical invention, instead of disenchanting the universe, had really afforded the means of exploring its marvels the more surely. Instead of going round the world with a rifle, for the purpose of killing something - or with a bundle of tracts, in order to convert somebody - this bold youth simply went round the globe to see the people who were on it; and since he always had something to show them as interesting as anything that they could show him, he made his way among all nations."