Preparing for the trip

For those of you who are unaware of the undertaking I have planned, I thought I'd try to give you an idea of how I went about preparing for my trip. Travelling 10000 km through desert, jungle and mountains requires a very particular type of bike specifically set up to deal with the strain of daily use over tough and varied terrain. The only way to prepare a bike for this sort of task, is to custom build it yourself.

So, I started out with a basic kit for a road bike....

Then I went about putting it together. I selected custom-weighted bearings to endure daily use and the rough tracks I'd be riding on. I decided to use a carbon-fibre frame and composite aluminium wheels  to keep the weight of the bike as low as possible.

After about six weeks of work the bike was ready with only a couple of days before it had to be shipped out to the US in preparation for the trip. Please see the finished article below. I'm truly pleased with the result. I think you'll agree it's a beautiful looking piece of kit. 

I've added a waterproof gore-tex pannier on the front to carry my gear on the road. There's also a pink bear horn to alert other road-users of my presence. You can really see the detail of the strengthened aluminium composite wheels in this photo and the hi-spec road bike chassis I chose. I had to leave the stabilisers on because I ran out of time to finish my course before I was due to fly. 

I only hope it works as well as it looks when I get out there...