Day 40 – 44 Forced break in Grand Forks (14.-18.6.24)

Well my friends, here I am again. I racked my brains with my owner about how to proceed. My current bike is no longer rideable, at least not on the long journeys I plan to take. The new bike that Aventon promised me is supposedly on the way to Florida (where I would have to pick it up and exchange it for my broken one, which means a total distance of 7300km), but they still haven’t been able to send me a tracking number…what should we keep it that way? The dealer in Florida says it might come at the end of next week, which means I’ll lose another entire week. So the planned 10,000 miles might turn into 5,000, if that. It is also questionable whether the new bike is better than the current one or whether it starts spinning again on the first small mountain. Therefore, with a very heavy heart, I decided to take a different path. I’m going to store my current bike in Grand Forks for a few days and fly to Florida to pick up a rental car. I’m going to drive here again with this, pack my bike in the car and do the rest of the tour by car and whenever there’s something nice to see, I’ll take a bike tour and document it accordingly. Why am I flying to Florida for the rental car? Because there is no rental car company within hundreds of kilometers that offers one-way rentals at normal prices. I could rent a small car in Fargo and return it in Florida – cost $8,500. It would be easier to buy one, but as a non-resident alien I can’t get insurance. The car in Florida now costs $1,300 and I can keep it until my owner comes by on the plane and picks her up with it. My heart bleeds over this decision, but maybe it should be that way…who knows…