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Alan Scholz, Kilroy (minus fingers) and Richard Gregg at BF
See a movie of Richard and Alan Scholz nattering here (1.3 Mb) You'll need something like Quicktime (free download) to see it.
May 6, 2003: UPdate from Richard Gregg:
Dear Lynette, Many thanks for putting my story and links on your Bike Friday site. It's cool. And very helpful. You have been way too kind and generous to me. I don't deserve it. I hope one day I can be of assistance to you or your kids or grandkids, or something. [Kids? Grandkids? Does he not know I am 41 this year and never been kissed? - LC] Now I have hit Seattle successfully, and am holing up, resting, drying out, and getting some admin work done, for the next few days. Gotta plan my assault on Vancouver. It's easy to get complacent, arriving here; feeling that I have near enough made it to Canada. But there is some hard riding still to do, I'm sure. But some of the way to V will be by ferry, to see the islands in the sound, and maybe even all of it if things go too slowly in Seattle. I'm going to visit a marketing guy at MSR, to get my stove refurbished, and possibly my thermarest replaced with one that's more furry and less slippery on one side, if you know what I mean. But I hope I don't have to give up my old one. I've become quite attached to it, and it only has one bicycle puncture repair patch on it after all these years. I've looked after it well. How are you with equipment? Do you trash it quickly, or are you very careful with it? Some people I know just throw their tents and mats down any old place and just do things in a hurry. They don't necessarily seem to wreck their equipment more quickly, but if I did that, then I'd just destroy it in no time. Anyway, I've got to get off and make a few phone calls. My first day in Seattle is rapidly disappearing. Please take your Portland friends off Orange Alert, and say thanks and sorry but I've passed there now. I stayed with the son of a friend I met in NZ, in Beaverton, on the outskirts of Portland. I did take an extra day there, to recover from the cat allergy I got in Eugene, and which caused me to have virtually no voice when I was in Portland. That and a little too little sleep. I've been going hard lately. OK. Have fun and keep on enjoying Eugene life. Please say Hi to Dave and Alan and Walter etc, and let them know that I've made it to Seattle without disolving. I got VERY wet, though. Now the sun is shining, ironically enough. Live Hard!! Warmest regards, Richard
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ April 30, 2003 There I was, loitering back from a liquid lunch at the Liquid Bean, when I spotted the unmistakable blob of a serious touring cyclist slowly making his way along the cacophonous 5-lane lane thruway of West 11th. I nodded, he nodded, I mused about how touring cyclists recognise fellow species even sans bike, and he spoke.
"Where's CAT?" he asked. CAT, as any Eugenian knows, stands for Center for Appropriate Transport and is a bicycle building mecca unto itself.
His name: Richard Gregg, a 39-year old Brit, in his 12.5th year cycling around the world, traveling by only bicycle and sea transport. So, 38 countries later, he'd rolled into Eugene Oregon, home of Bike Friday.
I took him back to Bike Friday and paraded him around. He leaned his impossibly laden touring bike against the lockers. Those who had traveled or dreamed of traveling picked up on his nomadic aura and gravitated towards this Traveling Wheelberry (thanks to members of the Australian Bike Friday Club for that new phrase). Those that had not, went back to their ramen and spoke twiddling.
Richard gave a riveting slideshow at CAT for the young bike building interns, which was like leafing through a giant National Geographic with a flood light trained on it and someone turning the pages for you. He showed us a slide of when he first set out 12 years ago, with bright red panniers and matching everything. He still had the panniers - but they'd turned a certain shade of dishwater grey.
As at April 29, 2003 Richard was seen pedaling off to Scio about 60 miles north of Eugene, where Bike Friday owners Roger and May Gaither of the Santiam SlowSpokes Cycle Club opened their doors (and fridge and hot water faucet) to him. Now he's heading off to Seattle, Vancouver BC, turning right, heading to Boston, turning right again, heading down to Florida, then taking a ship to the Caribbean, then South America, then back to his waiting wife.
Prodded to reveal his personal life, he admitted that his new Japanese wife of less than a year was waiting patiently for him to return after all this avoiding doing the dishes. I remember the quote from Chris Crane's book "Clear Waters Rising", about the adventurer's 18-month solo walk across the mountain ranges (read: passes and plummeting ravines)of Western Europe just after he got married: t was the security of the relationship that gave me the strength to do the walk in the first place,he said. Ah, to meet a man like that.
Richard's website is http://www.worldcycle.org, where fab photos and witty tales abound.
He's taking sea transport through the bits where you have to float, rather than flying.
If anyone would like to contact Richard and put him up for the night, even clear a patch of terra firma for his tent, he'd appreciate it.
And so will you, when you hear his stories...
For more information, follow this link http://www.worldcycle.org.