December 13, 2014
What Worked and What Didn't
We seem to have done enough tours now that the number of new things being tried out is tapering off. So a number of possibly doubtful things - Bike Fridays, Schwalbe Tires, tire liners, Android tablet, smart phone used as GPS in waterproof handlebar mount, etc. etc. have now become known quantities.
There were, however, a few things to be tried and learned on this trip:
Da Brim Visors
Our early thoughts on Da Brim are described in the page A Little More (or less) on Da Brim. Mainly we were worried that they would be too big to just deal with on a daily basis. It turned out that the Sporty model was manageable, but we do think the Classic would have been too much. In the wind, they never blew off, though in the really high wind around South Point we did feel nervous about it and rigged up some extra hold down straps.
Our main conclusion was that Da Brim was a lifesaver. In the broiling sun we felt like we were riding in the shade. And in the pouring rain we did not need our hoods, and no water could run down our backs.
Finally, in a place where somehow riding around on toy bikes with giant packs did not attract that much attention, we still fielded lots of questions about the Da Brims.
Having a Reservation for Every Night of the Trip
This was imposed on us by Hawaii - both the policies of the County and State about camping and the scarcity of vacancies at B&B's in some areas. Anyway, it totally sucked. First off, especially on a bike, you can not guarantee that you will always arrive at a planned place on the planned day. Then, if you get out of sync by even one, you have trouble for all the rest of the reservations. For example, we had a reservation for Kolekole beach park. We knew we could reach it easily from Hilo, but we wanted to allow time for the 5 km side trip steep climb to Akaka Falls. But when we got to Kolekole we knew Dodie's knees did not want to go to Akaka. So we carried on, to Laupahoehoe, where we had no reservation. Perversely, this turned out to be no problem, because Hawaii has no problem demanding high fees from visitors for camping, they seem unable to afford to actually show up to check on you.
This was an impulse purchase from when we went in to Sports Authority to buy camping gaz in Kona. On past trips in hot weather we had found a plant sprayer bottle to be very helpful in staying cool. So the Mist n Sip seemed like a good idea, combining, obviously, a water bottle and a mister. In practice, though, the mist seemed too fine to actually produce much cooling effect on the skin. Maybe it was also the very humid Hawaiian climate, that could have hindered evaporation. In the end we just carried the bottle along empty, using up space in a pack. It would have hurt too much to admit that we had thrown away its $13 purchase cost. Oh well, maybe on another trip, to someplace hot and dry. How about West Texas again??
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