Sometimes, there always seems to be a reason to stick around somewhere longer than planned. Such is currently the case in Houston. Came to visit Sarah, go to visit Lydia in New Orleans when Sarah leaves, madre flies in to visit Lydia and me so I drive to Louisiana with her and eventually drive back to Houston to where I left the bike. Then the Lloyds are kind enough to invite me to stay for Christmas so I do that too. But that’s not even the end, since Facebook informs me that another good friend is in Houston for the holidays, so gee, might as well stay another day to see Fady. Why not?

Family time.

Friends time.

Someone asks if I consider driving/hitching/any other form of transportation cheating; I don’t, because the bike is merely the primary facilitator of this journey, and why close doors by being inflexible? It’s a nice goal, to stick with the bike 100% of the time and accept whatever comes, but sometimes other things take priority. In the end, the number of miles traveled off the bike will be negligible compared to on the bike, so that too puts the engineer’s mind to rest.

Chapter 1-USA/Canada-of this trip is almost over. Part of the reason I’m here is to travel through Latin America, and biking is the best way I know. The riding will be difficult, so will the language change, maybe water too, more? ok, so be it. Hopefully everything so far has been good preparation, but regardless, at this point the die have been cast, time now to ride out whatever comes. Forward, forever onward.

Time with the Lloyds on the beach. Back at the water!

Learning to pick prickly pears time with Hyang. Though contrary to the name, they actually taste more like apples.

NASA time.

So ends this portraits post.