Sometime during the Easter celebrations, Joel Fiedler and Steve Larson pedaled into Lakeside with an invitation to break their journey at the home of Moonyeen and Perry King.
The cyclists are on their way to South America. They hope to be in Rio de Janeiro in time for the World Soccer Cup (taking place in Brazil in the summer of 2014) and then go all the way to Tierra del Fuego.
They reckon their journey could take up to two years to complete.
“We’ll probably have to stop here and there along the way to garner some cash,” acknowledged Larson, who graduated from Kent State University with degrees in Spanish and geography just before starting the trip. “We have a tendency to get distracted and to meander rather than go in a straight line.”
The pair met in Missoula, Montana when Larson was traveling from Ohio to Seattle and Fiedler – a musician – was on his way from Portland, Oregon to Colorado.
They headed down to Baja California and decided to extend their journey further south.
Before arriving in Guadalajara, the pair sent out emails about possible places to stay and “connected with a friend of a friend of a friend who told us about Perry and Moonie King.”
Their parents have been very supportive about the trip but Larson admits, “I get the feeling that my mother would be happier if I weren’t doing it.”
Their journey may have started out as a simple adventure, but Larson says it has become “more spiritual after seeing different manifests of the divine.”
“The more I see of creation from a bicycle, the more I worship God,” Fiedler adds.