Riding. It’s in the Blood.

Bicycling has always had a special place in my heart going back to my early days as a kid in Forest Lake, MN.  As a one car family it was my major form of transportation, even going back to my early red tricycle excursions, at the age of five, to the Bay View Inn bar/store a half mile from home for a ten cent Bubs Daddy bubble gum and throughout my early teens riding to summer baseball games and practices on the other side of town.  I became enamored with the road bike when both of my older brothers bought new ten-speeds road bike back in the 70’s; a white Follis from France and a baby blue Schwinn Le Tour with rear racks for carrying gear.  Around this time, I was fortunate to be the beneficiary of a new ten speed right out of the box from my dad’s cousin Howie.  My brother Tim made a couple overnight trips with his buddies to Duluth and Taylors Falls and that set my wheels in motion.  

It was the summer of 1976, the US Bicentennial, when my brother Tom (age 17) and I (age 13), decided that we would ride to Brainerd, MN for our first Motschenbacher family reunion and Fourth of July celebration.  Tom was riding his baby blue Schwinn Le Tour and I on my off-brand orange road bike loaded with a tent, sleeping bag, transistor radio and a few clothes.  We traveled the 125-mile two-lane highways with no shoulders as semi-trucks whizzed past our shoulders while we rode the white line.  Half way through the trip we pitched our tent at a campground near Milaca.  Reaching our destination felt like a real accomplishment.  

Since then, Kim and I have biked many miles together with our longest adventure away from home being the 2019 MS150 from Duluth to White Bear Lake, with an overnight of camping about 75-miles in at Hinckley.  We were invited by my nephew Andrew to be part of their road gang, including my brother Tim and the greater Cargill team and 3,500 other bicyclists.  We were the newbies, but it was a great opportunity to get in touch with the finer points of riding long distances, traffic, routes, hydration, gear and packing.  With any trip, you try to anticipate your needs and preparedness can make for a more joyful experience.

Five years ago, Kim and I were running a few errands in downtown Chaska, MN on a sunny August Saturday morning and we ran into a young couple, maybe 25 years of age, as they we standing next to their fully loaded touring bicycles, we couldn’t help but be drawn to them and inquire further.  They proceeded to tell us they were riding across America, East to West.  Chaska would put them at roughly the halfway mark.  We both walked away thinking that is really cool, wouldn’t that be fun and thinking someday we’re going to do that.

Well, that someday is quickly upon us as we’ve purchased our plan ticket for Portland, OR on May 25, for our Motch Across America adventure and fundraiser for the Lobular Breast Cancer Alliance.  2021 will mark Kim’s 10-year cancer free anniversary and also the end of her drug regimen that keeps lobular cancer from returning and we felt this would be a great opportunity to raise awareness and funds so that others might not have to go through what Kim did.  It’s been quite an experience up to this point, with all the planning, logistics, fundraising efforts and figuring out how to put what one might consider our normal lives on hold for three-to-four months.  With that said it’s been an exciting experience thus far to plan to step outside the box and do the unconventional.   

Like everything throughout our lives, we feel the support and care from our family and friends who have been by our sides through thick and thin. Thank you!  Special thanks to Andrew for picking up the pieces and creating our blog site.