…to Delaware.
Have you ever seen Wayne’s World? It’s been years since I last watched that movie, but any time I think of it, one line comes to mind:
Hi… I’m in… Delaware.
Delaware is the little spit of a state that we pass through en route to Baltimore or DC. It’s where Philadelphians go for tax-free shopping and cheap alcohol.
I have no problems with Delaware – I just never think of it as a place people actually stay for any real length of time.
Until today.
Today, Brent and I spent a whopping five hours in Delaware, learning the art of the bike box.
With Costa Rica less than two months away, we’ve been hard at work dealing with logistics and gear.
The biggest issue? How to fly with our bikes.
We contemplated shipping them, but it was cost prohibitive. Boxing them up and bringing them on the plane seemed like the best option (though even this is far more expensive than I anticipated), but then we had to decide which type of box to go with – a “real” hard plastic bike box or an old cardboard box discarded by a bike shop.
We were making plans to go with the latter, until we learned that the race directors would be transporting our bikes in boxes throughout the race – meaning that not only would we have to go with the hard plastic shells, but we’d have to be proficient in breaking down our bikes and putting them back together again. All on no sleep in the middle of the Costa Rican wilderness.
Enter, Delaware.
Rob Garrison of Garrison’s Cyclery had two old rental bike boxes that he was willing to sell us – about half the price of new ones – and he offered to throw in a quick lesson as well.
We showed up around 1:30 pm today expecting a cursory run through of bike breakdown (something new to me and something Brent knows a bit about but wanted to learn more to be able to do it in the mid-race frenzy). Instead, we spent the entire afternoon learning the intricacies of wheel placement, component storage, and chain cinching.
We learned how to go from this:
To this…
Apologies for the photo quality... I took these after we got home tonight, in a room with only a desk lamp.
Looks pretty simple, right?
Um, yeah.
