Touring - Just laid off. Touring a bad idea?

So I was just laid off. No huge surprise, I've been working for a startup and that comes with an awful lot of risk. I've got some savings, I'll be okay for a couple months.

I've always wanted to do a coast to coast bike tour. The problem is my vacation is only 2 weeks a year and is always used for family obligations. I figured this was something that would happen when I retired. But now I find myself with quite a bit of free time.

But of course money is a HUGE concern right now. I've got a Trek 1000 with a rear rack (my daily commuter) but I imagine I'll need a bit more. Tent? Plus food. And a plane ticket to CA.

Anyone have any thoughts about this? I'd love to hear them.

Perhaps I could do a small tour instead, but honestly I've never researched anything except for a West > East coast to coast tour. I'm open to suggestions.

Also, semi-related... I may have a 1958 VW Deluxe (15 Window) Bus for sale to raise funds for this trip :)

There are many practical reasons why you shouldn't do this.
I think if you wanted to be talked out of C to C, you've come to the wrong place. :)
Go for it and be sure to post your travels on crazyguyonabike.
When you return, you'll be refreshed, focused, and your employability will on fire, with multiple job offers to consider.

No better time than now..........just make sure you have your unemployment insurance stuff in order.

For sure only you can decide if it's a good idea, long tour or short tour. A short round trip tour would let you avoid the high cost of transportation, but for most, not as much fun as a cross country.

Your Trek will be fine. A lower gear combo would make it much easier for tackling the mountains. You'll also need front and rear racks, panniers, and good tires. Goobs of info on here and at crazyguyonabike.com about gear.

Not counting transportation cost, I find that I can tour comfortably on about $25/day, mostly free camping. With discipline and ingenuity, it can be done for less.

My plans are to tour if I ever get laid-off.

I may have a 1958 VW Deluxe (15 Window) Bus for sale to raise funds for this trip :)


That's sweet. Post some pics?

Same boat! Well, sorta.

I'm quitting my job this week...am selling my 1969 C-10... and am going transam starting Aug 13.
Nix the flight to CA and just start in GA. Maybe I'll see you on the road.

We've had 2 layoffs this summer. If I had of been on either list, I was heading on a cross country tour. There was no doubt about it.

Same boat! Well, sorta.

I'm quitting my job this week...am selling my 1969 C-10... and am going transam starting Aug 13.
Nix the flight to CA and just start in GA. Maybe I'll see you on the road.

If you are leaving in mid August to mid Sept - you should DEFINITELY go West to East.
(Since you will have to take a plane or train on one end or the other.)

Why?
The Rockies start cooling off in Sept with early snows at higher elevations -
While the East is still pretty hot in Sept, but lovely in October.
And this year is looking to be an early/cold fall in the West.
It is already snowing in Wyoming and Montana in late July.
(Just a little at 10,000 feet, but it is bizarre.)

Since it can still be blisteringly hot in Nevada and Utah,
I would suggest starting in Oregon/Washington
Rather than doing the Western Express -
Then heading southeast across the country.

If you do a pretty straight shot, you can probably do it in 8 to 10 weeks.
And as for money - the more time you spend on public land - the more free camping.
There's free camping all over the West - but it's rare in the East.
Best Eastern free camping - the C&O Trail from Cumberland to Washington, DC.
(Plus the trail is usually pretty dry by autumn.)

If I were to do a cross-country trip starting in mid to late August -
(And I have done six of them)
I'd start in the San Juan Islands and ride the Northern Tier to Glacier.
Then I cut down to Yellowstone in Wyoming and head east into the Black Hills.
From there I'd cross Nebraska and Iowa -
Maybe swing close enough to Chicago to get a look at Lake Michigan -
Then ride across the Midwest and swing just south of Pittsburgh -
So that I could get on the ATA and C&O Trails.

Best weather. Best chance for tailwinds.
And a lovely time of year, too.
Good luck to y'all.

If you've got the money in the bank, then just after losing a job is a perfect time to tour. As someone said, you can come back refreshed and ready to return to the rat race, but it's also an opportunity that may not come again for a while. If you start a new job right away, it will take a while to build up the vacation time you need (unless you take off on unpaid leave, which is pretty much what you have right now).

Ha, well I'm definitely in the right forum. :)

MNBikeguy, thanks for the CrazyGuyOnABike site. TONS of info there. I had no idea you could camp for free!


That's sweet. Post some pics?

Here you go. The bus:

http://picasaweb.google.com/TBradleyDean/58BusPicsFromJustin

A few pics of the road trip down from Chicago when I bought her:

http://picasaweb.google.com/TBradleyDean/1958VWBus

That bus might raise a lot more money than you'll need for a cross country, if you can convince yourself to part with it.

Drive your VW to the west coast and sell it there. It's worth a lot more money out west than you could ever sell it for in Georgia.
Then do your cross country tour.

I would suggest a set of one week tours. This will give you plenty of touring exsperiance, while allowing you to job search every other week.

From Atlanta you could tour the Smokies, the Atlantic coast, the Tennesee river valley. You might use a rental car to travel to a location 350 to 500 miles out and ride back over 5 to 10 days.

I would spend half the time job searching and half touring.

Michael

Drive your VW to the west coast and sell it there. It's worth a lot more money out west than you could ever sell it for in Georgia.
Then do your cross country tour.

+1.

No, wait. On second thought, sell the bus on ebay, offering "free delivery," and start your tour wherever you deliver the bus.

Nice bus, by the way. Back when I wanted a car, that was the one I wanted.

Yes, sell the bus. Sell it on SF craigslist. Deliver it to SF, and there you go.

Do it now!

Wait a few months, another year, who knows, you might fall down a flight of stairs, splash hot oil in your eyes, contract a horrible disease, or fall madly-dependently in love with a couch potato--and forever shelve your coast to coast tour.

Do it while you still can :)

Good riding!

Yes, sell the bus. Sell it on SF craigslist. Deliver it to SF, and there you go.

Do it now!

Wait a few months, another year, who knows, you might fall down a flight of stairs, splash hot oil in your eyes, contract a horrible disease, or fall madly-dependently in love with a couch potato--and forever shelve your coast to coast tour.

Do it while you still can :)

Good riding!

My thoughts exactly. Do it now and don't regret it!

A Trek 1000 on tour. Put some 25 or 28mm tires on, go light, and have fun!

P.S. It is easy to put a lower range rear cassette and a mtn bike rear derailleur on it if you need lower gearing. If yours is an 8 speed, you might have to look a little harder for an 11/12-34 rear cassette, but they can be found. I have had a Shimano Deore RD on my bike for about 5 years and it is still doing fine (@$30).
http://sheldonbrown.com/harris/k7.html#8

The only other "problem" you might have is heelstrike, if you use rear panniers. You may aalready know this is not an issue, depending on how your commuting is configured.:roflmao2: I made the panniers in the picture which have more taper on the "drivers side". If you decide to go and heel strike is a problem, I'd be glad to loan them to you for the trip. If you have small feet (< 10) it may not be a problem. If possible, try the panniers on the bike and rack before you buy.

PSS. I'm not sure how that little green guy got in the post!

You have a chance to leave the rat race for awhile and go tour. What are you waiting for?

I was recently laid off as well. The idea proposed by Barrettscv is a good one, the one week tour alternated with job search. My job search experience this summer is that the market is extremely slow. There are not very many slots to compete for, so this is an excellent time to do touring.

My hope is that things pick back up in September, when people have returned from vacation, and when businesses finally decide that they need to make a decision on staying put or moving forward.

+1.

No, wait. On second thought, sell the bus on ebay, offering "free delivery," and start your tour wherever you deliver the bus.

Nice bus, by the way. Back when I wanted a car, that was the one I wanted.

I'd agree with that. Get max dollar and see what happens next. There's nothing inherently more adventurous about following a coast to coast route than a random ride. How about drawing a question mark on the map and follow that?

If you're serious about selling that 15-window (good choice, by the way) try http://www.thesamba.com. It's a VW specific classifieds website. I used to love spending time there just looking around (I hold a fondness for Type 3's).
-Gene-

If you could camp I might give this a go.Do what you can afford./Kenneth

OK, so let's say you loose your job, and have money worries, should you go out and purchase every high priced brand name alternative for a perfectly good, possibly even better generic product, at twice the cost. A coast to coast cycle is just a marketing idea where one eliminates about 99.99999% of the route ideas in order to travel from a well promoted departure point to a well promoted destination, while traveling along the same route as tens of thousands of other people while consuming routes, product lists etc... developed by other people. That may or may not be the best option right at this point.

If I was choosing such a route, I wonder whether a wilderness route like the Great Divide trail, with many more options for free camping would be cheaper and possibly more rewarding (negative of getting to and from that route might be costly). Other options would be to do a long hike like the Appalacian trail or Pacific Crest. Less gear, and lots of wild camping alternatives. Less crowds and dives to spend money I am guessing.

I like the idea of selling you truck in SF as a precursor. I might consider ebay since those deals normally involve pre-payment, where the local lists are more based on tire kicking prior to handing over the money. So you could find you don't really have a deal when you get out there.

OK, so let's say you loose your job, and have money worries, should you go out and purchase every high priced brand name alternative for a perfectly good, possibly even better generic product, at twice the cost. A coast to coast cycle is just a marketing idea where one eliminates about 99.99999% of the route ideas in order to travel from a well promoted departure point to a well promoted destination, while traveling along the same route as tens of thousands of other people while consuming routes, product lists etc... developed by other people. That may or may not be the best option right at this point.

I am not sure I understood any of that, but if you are saying that a coast to coast route like the AC routes is going to be more expensive I have my doubts. An AC route like the NT, TA, or ST has the advantage of listing many of the free places to stay. For someone just starting out this is a big plus. It helps develop some confidence and teaches you a bit about the possibilities for places to stay. Once some confidence is developed you learn to find free places to stay without the need for the maps, but even then the maps are a convenience.

As far as routes that "tens of thousands" have traveled, that can be a plus or a minus. In my relatively short touring career I have toured where I met no other riders and also did the Trans America where I met lots of other riders. Besides being fun to meet other riders it is also useful to get tips about the route ahead from riders going the other way. We would have missed some cool stuff if it wasn't for such tips. Both types of routes have their advantages, but for a months long tour, I'd give the edge to a route like the TA.

There are a few reasons NOT to use one of the published Adventure Cycling routes - and none have to do with marketing or cost. All have to do with length and/or weather. First, it will be far, far too hot to do the Southern Tier - physically possible, yes barely , but not pleasant. The TransAm and the Northern Tier will be too long (4300 miles) to complete before it gets cold - the Northern Tier either way, the TransAm east to west. It may be possible to do the TransAm west to east if you leave by August 15th and move along a a good clip, but even if you do it in 10 weeks you get into very short, cool days by late October. The Western Express (3800 miles) combined with the TransAm is possible west to east, but will be brutally hot in Nevada and Utah. East to west is risky because of early storms in the West.

An autumn cross country trip works best in the west to east direction and keeping it somewhat direct (3200-3400 miles). You can lengthen it a bit if you do a diagonal - for ex. Oregon to Georgia.

My first advice is, definitely NOW is the time to take the tour. My experience has shown thatmy attitude just isn't any good for a month or three after a lay off. I either came across as pissed off, desperate, or depressed. Take a nice long trip like a bike ride across the country, and you will just feel ready to start the daily job grind again. You will never regret taking the trip.
Also, being something of a VW freak, you will get the best money for your VW in California. From San Diego to San Francisco your bus is in demand! The VW bus does very well in auctions. You might plan to drive the car to an auction and start your ride from there. The Pebble Beach auction is the second or third week in August. You couldn't choose a better location to start from.

Take the long tour now or a bunch of short tours!!! I had 6 months of unemployement and I realize now (that I have a job) that I should have been touring!!!! It would have been the same amount of money. I really regret not touring when I had the chance. I could have used the long days in the saddle to refocus and reset my mind. I had just left a job and area that was killing me. Take the tour and don't have any regrets.

Take the long tour now or a bunch of short tours!!! I had 6 months of unemployement and I realize now (that I have a job) that I should have been touring!!!! It would have been the same amount of money. I really regret not touring when I had the chance. I could have used the long days in the saddle to refocus and reset my mind. I had just left a job and area that was killing me. Take the tour and don't have any regrets.

Ditto on this. I toured NE Australia (6 weeks to do 2100 km) 3 years ago without any previous "training" but as the first 2 weeks were on pavement I quickly got in shape for the gravel/dirt portion that faced me. IMHO, touring does really help refocus too. Came back to the job, and another one popped up so I "retired" and went off on a slightly different tangent.

Go for the tour NOW, while you still CAN :-)

So, here's a little update to my situation (I'm not the OP, but in the same boat).

I planned a hasty TransAm tour. I didn't train, knew I was leaving late, overpacked, etc. I started in Charleston, SC and am now 50 miles out of St. Louis MO. I'm going to a Cardinals game tomorrow night then ending my trip early and flying home to Charleston. I've been having a blast and really hate to cut the trip short, but while on the road I was offered a 3 month contract from a new employer to pay me 2.25 times more than my previous annual earnings within the next 3 months. That could pay for some serious touring next spring.

Things have a funny way of working out.

So, here's a little update to my situation (I'm not the OP, but in the same boat).

I planned a hasty TransAm tour. I didn't train, knew I was leaving late, overpacked, etc. I started in Charleston, SC and am now 50 miles out of St. Louis MO. I'm going to a Cardinals game tomorrow night then ending my trip early and flying home to Charleston. I've been having a blast and really hate to cut the trip short, but while on the road I was offered a 3 month contract from a new employer to pay me 2.25 times more than my previous annual earnings within the next 3 months. That could pay for some serious touring next spring.

Things have a funny way of working out.

Touring karma is a very powerful force indeed.....

If you can make the money work out, go for it!