Good morning, friend humans. Lucas Levy Keell here, and I am so excited to begin another adventure today. The adventure is eventually going to take me from Washington DC to Pittsburgh along the CNO and GAP trails. But before I make it all the way out to DC from Oklahoma, I need to do a little bit of a shakeddown run on all the equipment I'm going to be bringing. Make sure it all works and I
don't have to find that out somewhere down the trail. It's a little different from what I've done in the past, but I'm kind of excited to try something a little different. So, I'm out here at beautiful uh Lake Garnett in Garnett, Kansas, about midway on the Prairie Spirit Trail. The Prairie Spirit Trail
is mostly crushed rock, which is what the CNO uh trail is supposed to be like. So, it'll be a good test to make sure that everything stays on the bike, doesn't fall off. And a good test of all the camera equipment, too, if I'm going to be honest. And to test the camera equipment to make sure, you know, it doesn't blow over in the wind and it stays securely on me and I'm not kicking it. Any of
those things. It's important to do these shakedown tours. I tried a first trip a little while ago to to test out all the equipment and and did a local trip in Tulsa and that ended up with a flat tire uh which ended up changing me to a tubeless setup. So, this is also a test of the tubeless setup. Does it carry all
the gear? Will I be okay? I've got my spare pump along just in case. But come along with me. Let's uh go find out how this is. And we're going to start by taking a little lap on what used to be a racetrack here around Lake Garnett. All right, here we go. [Music] Part of my reasoning for heading around the racetrack like this is because I've still got my track pump in the car and I want to make sure that the tires have enough pressure. I'm still very much not used
to riding with tubeless tires. It feels low and squishy in a way that I'm not really happy with, but that squishiness is supposed to be good on gravel. And well, it's carried me pretty well on a couple commuting trips. This is definitely more of a test for it than what we've done before.
And hey, this racetrack that was uh active in the 60s and 70s for cars makes a pretty good first test. Make sure everything's okay on the smooth pavement. So, let me tell you, this is really nice pavement. It's about a threemile uh around track and uh near where we started is actually the entrance to the Prairie Spirit Trail where we're going to get [Music] going. [Music] Here we are at the trail head or at least as much of one as there is here at uh Garnett Lake State Park and the Prairie Spirit Trail Spa State Park.
Um goes north behind me and south in front of me. And so we're going to head south first. Uh three hours down to Iola. We'll have some lunch down there and head back on up here. Anyway, let's head south to Iola. I know I made that sound like I was going to be going very fast off the starting line, but when bike packing, you want to take it slow. There's
nothing that uh says you have to be out of zone 2, zone 3 for most of the trip. So, we get to enjoy the world at 9 to 10 miles an [Music] hour. [Music] Here's the old uh railway station for Garnett and the Aerson Topeka and Santa Fe. Railway information. [Music] [Music] [Music] Heat. [Music] Heat. Morning.
[Music] [Music] So, I'm here at the first trail stop along the way, the trail head in Welda. And I just wanted to take a moment to talk to you about why I'm doing this trip. My purpose on this is to help um raise funds for the World Bicycle Relief Organization. They're a charity that provides bicycles um that they have designed specifically for impoverished donations. Uh they're very sturdy and
not only do they provide the bicycle itself, but they provide the training and knowhow. So for some people it becomes a career of being a bike mechanic and I think that's wonderful. um especially in places like Malawi, which my church has a a sister church in Malawi and so we have an ongoing relationship there. Malawi is one of the most impoverished nations in the world, if not the most impoverished nation in the world. And having reliable
transportation is not something people can take for granted. Having a bike that can carry over 150 pounds of weight on it u makes a huge difference. People can use it for carrying cargo to market, uh, for taking their crops in, um, any any sort of these things, taking their kids to school. And so, I hope that you will take a moment to click the link in the description below. Um, and think about donating to World Bicycle Relief through the the link that's there. My goal is to raise enough for 10 bikes on this trip.
So, if you can contribute, anything would do. One bike in itself is $160. Um, I feel like that's very doable for some people, but if it's not for you, hey, $5, $10, together we can make a huge difference in the lives of people in the world. So, I hope that you'll click that link in the description and that you'll donate. And, um, I know that there will be more to say on the trip in DC to Pittsburgh, but I did at least want to mention it here to see if you wanted to get a jump on donating to the World Bicycle Relief. [Music] [Music] [Music] 2. There's a tunnel coming up.
[Music] Olay, Olay, Olay, Olay, Olay, [Music] Olay. [Music] Here we go. [Music] Easy. Heat. Heat. [Music] [Applause] N. Heat. Heat. N.
[Music] [Music] [Applause] [Music] Hey, hey, hey. [Music] Hey, heat. Hey. [Music] Thomas in the water. Fer
[Music] [Music] Finally getting close to Biola. What I thought would take three hours has taken four. It's been a tough ride, but it's been interesting to see all these little towns in Kansas passing through all the trail heads. Now, the town of Iola, they're known for having the largest town square in the country. I have no idea what that means, but I'm intrigued enough to take a look, but I think lunch comes first. I
need to get some food in me. had some snacks along the way, but I need a meal. [Music] [Music] Downtown. Oh. [Music] So, I think this is the town square. I just had a wonderful meal, although it was very strange. I felt like I was the only person eating in the restaurant ever. They took me in
and there was not a single other person in the restaurant. Food was great, though. And by the time I'd finished, others showed up. So, I must be a trends setter. Here we go. Excuse me. But having been to Iola, it's now time to head back up to Garnett. And given my level of soreness already, I am thinking that uh sorry navigating given my level of soreness already. I'm
thinking I'm probably not going to make the other 40 mile uh trip up to Ottawa today. But that will be a thing on the agenda for tomorrow morning. Um be nice have something to look forward to assuming I get up early enough. Couple things I need to do, but
that's always the way of it, isn't it? There's the trail head. the information sign. Anyway, all right, I got to go to it. So, while we've got a moment, let's actually talk about what to do on a shakedown cruise, what you want to look for. We're at about the halfway point in Iola, so it's a pretty good time to go over the bike. Now, there's lots of different ways to check the bike to make sure everything's working, but the one that I like to use most is the Mshape wheel, handlebars, and and uh stem, pedals, and bottom bracket, seat, and then back down to the wheels there. That's my little
maintenance once over. Like I said, there's lots of ways of doing maintenance on a bike. That's the one that works best for me, just to keep track of where I am in the process. Now, let's head back out on the trail and head back to camp for the night.
[Music] [Music] [Music] As I've been cycling along, I've been noticing a number of these uh old uh I guess telegraph posts or electrical wire posts. This whole area along the railway corridor would once have been clear of brush. And so that's all the height that these uh lines would have needed. Think it's kind of neat that
they have left the posts up even if they're not in use anymore. [Music] Hey, hey, hey. Hey friend humans, Lucas Levy Keell here and I'm at the colony trail head and I got to say I am exhausted. But that's a lot of what this shakedown is about. It's about finding out my own limits and taking care of myself when I need to, knowing that I'll get stronger as time goes on.
I'm about 45 miles into the day, so you know, halfway back to to Garnett for the night. Everything has taken longer than expected. But you know what, the uh World Bicycle Relief, their motto is one pedal stroke at a time, changing the world one pedal stroke at a time. And each pedal that I take gets me a little closer to the goal of helping people. But it's important not to ignore what your body is telling you. When I
got to the Colony trail head, the first thing I did was collapse on a bench. And I started getting the little danger floaties in front of my eyes that lets me know I was fairly close to passing out. So I drank some water. I had some hydrating material and I'm gonna have a snack when I hop back on the bike so that it's associated with keeping on going and then we're going to keep going at least to Welda.
Hopefully we'll make it back to Garnett before the the sun falls. This is what this is about. Challenging moments, important moments, and keeping going. [Music] [Music] [Applause] [Music] Oh, the sun sets.
[Music] It's become something of a race against time. Am I going to make it back to Garnett in time? Technically, the trail closes at sundown. I hope that there would be some grace extended for someone who's coming into camp. It's been a full day of bike riding, my friends. Seem to have caught my second wind on this last little stretch. I'm showing about nine miles to go.
[Music] All right. Hello, friend humans. Ah, as you can probably tell, it's dark, but I'm back to Garnett. I made it. It was a long, long trip to get here, but I succeeded. Good morning, friend humans.
Lucas Levy Keell here. I survived the night, although I got into camp a little too late to set up a hammock, so I just kind of crawled into the back of the car and fell asleep. Let me say this morning as I've been getting ready and moving around in the day, having heated seats in the car has been really nice on sore muscles. Not every trip goes according to plan. And though I had hoped to ride the 40 miles up to Ottawa and back, I don't think it's a good idea for me to try to do that today. On a shakedown trip, it's as much about shaking down yourself as the gear. And
speaking of it, let's talk about what worked and what didn't. The camera gear setup with the uh uh trekking pole kind of set up to hang out the back of the bike. And that didn't work. It was too floppy. And I couldn't get it to to stay in place with only a single mounting point. What else did I change? I changed the um I I took along the uh mountain bike guard, which would allow me to do POV shots. I'm not sure if I'm going to bring that along. It's big. It's heavy.
Um I mean, it's plastic. It's not super heavy, but it's it's heavy enough, and it's really awkward to carry with. It also was very warm wearing it when I was doing the POV shot. We'll see how it turns out. I I might still bring it. The bike worked well. No complaints there. I'm going to rewax the chain before heading out so that it's fresh and I can do the the 300 miles uh as it is intended. And you know, I didn't face
any rain this trip, but I did take the the new rain gear, and I'm hoping to get a chance to use that and try it out before I go out. In any case, morning has come and I think it's about time for me to head back to Tulsa. But thanks for coming along for the trip. I appreciate you here. I hope
that you'll check out the the link to the uh World Bicycle Relief Project and that you'll think about donating something. And definitely subscribe to the channel if you haven't already. I'm such an irregular uploader. You never
know when the next video is coming. And since I'm heading out to DC to Pittsburgh in a few weeks, you'll definitely want to be a ride along for that ride as well. Take care. Ride safe. [Music]
2025-04-29 07:40