Hey all sorry for not writing back sooner. Bikeforums seems to be a bit touch and go on slow Nepali connections. Thank you all for reading and for the words of encouragement. It means a lot to me that my trip has helped to inspire other people with their own endeavors.

To answer a few questions:

Shirley is wearing Marathon XRs in the 26x2.0 variety. These are good tires but overkill for what I have done so far. I have only had one flat after over 6,000k. However, they are slow. Their ruggedness is not overkill, I really need it where Im at, but their tread pattern and probably their width are. I think a set of Duremes would have been better since Tibet is almost entirely paved at this point. Nepal is another story and they are starting to make up for their slowness here.

I have not uploaded a complete route outline yet. Thank you for reminding me. You will see that I have a route outline for the first half of China and the rest is pretty obvious because there are few roads after that. I will get a complete one hammered out in the next few days for you.

Djb: Thank you inparticular for being my biggest fan and know all of my inside jokes. Readers like you are the reason I take so much time out of my trip to write the journal in the first place.