Today is the 30th of September. 3 days ago was the 2nd anniversary of the day I completed my AT thru-hike by climbing Mount Katahdin in Maine. Jodi drove up to Maine to share that day with me.

And 3 days from now, on October 3, Jodi and I will be leaving for our trip to Israel. We have been so busy the last few weeks that we haven’t really had time to do much int he way of preparation, but finally we are winding up the work projects that need to be done before we leave, and we spent some time today getting our bikes in order and gathering panniers and clothing and travel documents, so now it really feels like we are about to go. So exciting!

We did quite a bit of cycling this summer and got ourselves into better cycling condition than most years, but as I said we have been furiously busy the last few weeks and have gotten almost no exercise. It is a cruel truth that it can take months to build fitness, but only days to lose it. As usual, it looks like I am going to start this trip under-trained and overweight.