A welcome return but not so welcome surprise

Taipei night skies

Taking the train the last couple hundred km back into Taipei was more like a homecoming than we ever could have imagined.  The familiar roads seemed so much less chaotic and our host, Mitchell, welcomed us back with cold Taiwan beer and an open ear eargerly awaiting the tale of our time circumnavigating the island.  Likewise, when we visited Tern the following day it felt like the victors returning from a great battle.  Handshakes, smiles and interested faces greeted us all around.  Taiwan has been too good to us.

Mitchell, Lynn, Bruce's arm, a huge bunch of pasta. Mmmm....

We expected to be in Taipei only for 2-3 days before flying out to our next destination.  However, our 'victory lap' quickly ended in 'pit row' when I nooticed that Chiara's bike frame was making some odd sounds when I carried it upstairs to the apartment at which we were staying.  Upon further inspection I found what could have been a catastrophic failure in the hinge that makes our 'folding bikes' fold.  At some point in the past few weeks, unbeknown to us, one of the bolts had broken and but the design was such that the bike had remained in one piece.  After a bit of hemming and hawing we came to the realization that we would not be leaving Taiwan as soon as we had anticipated.  So we settled in and enjoyed the place that we had grown to appreciate, knowing that we could have certainly been in worse places for this type of thing to have happened.

  At the tern offices.  Great folks work here. 

There's cool bikes too. 

We felt a bit strange entering the Tern offices on Monday morning after having aid our farewells the prior week.  The people at Tern, however, could not have treated us better.  We felt like family, apologies for the inconvenience and reassurance that the bike would be fixed ASAP.  And the following day when we returned we found that not only had Chiara's bike been repaired but both bikes had been given a complete tune-up and inspection for the coming legs of our journey.  

We had always been happy with our choice of bikes for this trip but now we felt as though we had done more than jut purchase a bike but that we had been welcomed into a VIP club where the only criteria for admission is a willingness to pedal your rear-end thousands of kilometers around some of the most beautiful landscape in the world.  We want to give a huge shout-out to all the employees at Tern that have helped us make this dream adventure a reality.  To Amanda, Josh, Galen, Rod, Eric, Kara and all those at Tern that we we didn't meet, thank you with all our hearts.  We hope you enjoyed the VooDoo Doughnuts and please let us know if there is anyway we can begin to pay back your hospitality.

--We are presently at around 3600km cycled for the trip.  Most of the gear is holding up well.  The Big Sky International tent has been everything we hoped and more.  Spacious, lightweight and easy to set-up/break-down.  The Luminaid inflatable solar lantern I bought in Japan has been very useful though there has been issues with it leaking air.  The company was very reponsive and sent us another one in the mail.  After a few afternoons of GI discomfort from filling our water bottles from "nonapproved sources" (ie. public bathrooms or outdoor spigots) we decided to start using our Steripen.  Though nothing is written regarding there being water quality concerns in Taiwan we have been told tales by locals of there being periodic episodes of the water causing problems for people and animals.  Though unsure whether the water was the culprit or we just were feeling the heat and new foods, we did not seem to have any problems after we started treating the water.  The MKS pedals we chose have not been our favorite thus far.   Though the quick-release function has been super helpful in breaking down the bikes for travel, they are quite heavy and we have not enjoyed spending the the better part of a km after every stop fiddling endlessly trying first to flip the pedal to the correct side and then engage the tiny cleat into the pedal.  I am not sure how every other pedal clipping mechanism we ever used coould be so much easier than this design?!

Now for a bit of housekeeping:

--We received the box sent by our great friend Scott and Jessica- Shout-out to them as they navigate their own challenging tour of the PCT from Canada to Mexico! Check out their progress on their blog: - filled with things that we decided would be nice going forward, including our front paneer bags, to help redistribute the weight of our gear, our ultralight running shoes, our rain jackets (the ponchos are good but we had a few times after day long rains that we felt the warmth of a jacket was needed, a few more wool items for Chiara and a little surprise of Trader Joes dark choco PB cups!  /or You guys rock!

--While talking with people we have come to realize a reoccuring question we get is, "What exactly is Warmshowers?"  I guess we made a leap when starting our trip and blog assuming that people all inhabit the same world as do we.  Therefore a long overdue acknowledgement in the thing that makes our journey easier, more enjoyable and gives it so much moore meaning than would be possible oitherwise.  Warmshowers, despite the suggetive and mildly ambivelent and maybe slightly ill-conceived nomenclature, is a hosting service like Couchsurfing but angled and meant to support cycle tourers around the world.  It is a completely free fraternity that aks nothing from it's member but to be honest, good people to others.  The hosts may offer anything from, well a shower to food, a shuttle, a night sleep, and/or anything/everything you might imagine.