Gear List and General Advice
Biking Across America
Gear List and General Advice
Biking Across America

Gear List and General Advice

The following material is what I carried with me on my bike trip on the Trans American Trail and things that I found useful. There is no one way to bike across the country and there is no one gear list that is going to work for everyone. Take the following for what it is, and understand it is not an end all guide, it is just what worked for myself. It can be helpful to see other narratives and personal stories but remember to bike your own bike and do what you must to make your personal trip a success!

Helpful Websites

Bike (Steal frame, heavy touring wheels (enough spokes), right frame size for your height)

  • Trek 520 what I had (90s)- jenny had a trek from the 80s
  • Surly long haul trucker
  • Surly cross check (both other good, sturdy options)

Tires

Racks- Some people take front and rear racks but if you use front racks you’ll be tempted to carry too many things- you really don’t need a lot and it can all fit on the back rack

Panniers- These bad boys can be quite costly if you buy a nice pair, but these kitty litter tubs are FREE and are so useful: other things you can do with them include: feet rest, back rest, arm weights, bike kick stand (wedge the tub under the rack-WABAM) sticker collectors, autograph collectors, water proof, mini table(s), weights on windy days…..)

Practice riding fully loaded once you have your bike and panniers!!!

Water

So, I carried a camel back (1.5/2L) as well as two water bottle holders, definitely useful having a water pouch for longer carries and if you want to sleep somewhere where there is not a water source. Water on the trans am or biking in general is so easy, you just go into gas stations or grocery stores or anywhere with running water and fill up your bottles and bags. No filtration system necessary, I carried a life straw but never even thought about using it

Sleeping stuff

  • Six Moons Design Lunar Solo tent
  • Sleeping Pad
  • Sleeping Bag

Clothing

  • Rain Jacket
  • Down Jacket
  • ex-officio underwear (2)
  • sports bra (1)
  • padded bike shorts(1) -I only brought one pair of shorts and it was fine but I would recommend bringing at least two- most people don’t wear underwear with bike shorts but as you can imagine that gets pretty gross quickly – jenny didn’t wear any and she just rinsed her shorts out every night- I wore my ex-officios which doubled as my bathing suit so I found those were a bit easier to clean daily
  • athletic shorts (1)
  • breathable bike shirt(1)
  • long sleeve breathable shirt (1)
  • socks
  • buff
  • Comfy t-shirt
  • gloves
  • bike t-shirt- bright color!!
  • synthetic pants/tights (under layer)
  • lightweight hiking shoes (as my bike shoes)
  • crocs

Cooking

  • jet boil/fuel
  • small towel
  • spork

*generally we only went to the grocery store every 3 days or so and just carried enough food to last but you pass a grocery store everyday, sometimes multiple times a day, I personally hated stopping at them and going in but many cyclists just buy food every day in order to carry less, or they buy food in towns at restaurants and fast food every day. Again this is personal preference as we were balling on budgets so mostly only ate poptars, oatmeal, ramen bombs, and whatever we bought a grocery stores. It is very easy to fall into the trap of eating out a lot cause every day is a town day and you can get ice cream ⅔ times a day! Self control is a must – or a proper budget- lol know how much money you have/you want to spend- make a budget and stick to it!!! You can do this as cheap or as expensive as you want

Bike Repair Tools (Minimalist repair set)

Keep it minimal and double check this list with other sources. If you don’t know how to use something, probably not much of a benefit bringing it with you. Worst case scenario you can always hitch to the nearest bike shop. This is what we carried- Jenny didn’t have a derailleur cable but I did so on day 2 when hers broke, it lucked out that I was carrying it. We ran into a stranger who biked the trans am the year before and happened to have all the bike tools just 7 miles away at his home. He noticed us “trying” to fix it upside down on the side of the road and offered to helped us fix it. It is not necessary to carry a whole tire, just tube patches and an extra tube- make sure you know how to change and patch a flat!! Thats the biggest area where something may go wrong, and chain issues. Half way through, in Colorado, you should rotate your tires (front to back, back to front) and get a new chain! We used pedal cages and they worked perfectly for our purposes. Some people will tell you you need bike shoes and bike pedals, YOU DON’T. I do hear that they are pretty life changing and that they are very helpful, but we got by just fine without them. If you have and use bike cleats and pedals now, awesome, use them! If you don’t, well, you’ll be alright and you won’t know what you are missing.

Bike Maps

There are countless resources out there for you to create your own route online and then download that to your phone and use an app that allows you to access that route and your actual location, even when your phone is on airplane mode. We used https://ridewithgps.com/ to make our routes, based on the Trans American bike route, and downloaded those KML files to Maps.me, an app. We were able to download sections of the map when we had wifi and then even if we didn’t have service we could see exactly where we were and exactly where we needed to be. By far the easiest way to do this is to just buy the ACA maps, either the online app or the paper version. https://www.adventurecycling.org/cyclosource-store/route-maps/ I think their online app works similarly to third party apps like we used, but I cannot be sure. The online/electronic versions are much cheaper than the paper counterpart. Personally, I don’t think the paper versions are necessary but its all about how to best opporate, some people swear by them. We didn’t buy any ACA maps, but came to realize how crucial the ACA information is that they put on those maps. It has stuff like bike shops in town, churches and hostels that let bikers stay for free, and just very useful information for touring cyclists. Luckily, we were able to take pictures of other peoples map and some east bounders even gave us their old ones.

I hope that this was helpful in some capacity, thanks for reading!

Happy Roads,

Lynne

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *