After New Orleans we went to Asheville, North Carolina. The only reason I went there was because of Aloka, the guy I met in Sedona weeks before. After being on the road and traveling for many weeks, I was getting really tired being constantly on the move. When you’re tired you do stupid things… I drove under a parking garage forgetting that my bike was on top of my car. It totally ruined my bike rack. Instead of getting pissed off I thought, “I will go to a bike shop to get it fixed, you never know what experience might happen to me there.” I ended up getting referred to a place called Hern’s Cycling, which happened to be the oldest bike shop in the whole U.S. They also happened to hire deaf people and homeless people to work on fixing the bikes. It was quite the special place.

I am in this photo with a guy named Monroe, who was homeless. He was a great guy with such an upbeat attitude. He had a very rough life. His son recently passed away and he was stabbed three inches from his heart, but survived. This trip kept putting me in contact with survivors with such positive attitudes. I felt honored to have spent the time I did with Monroe. There is some great footage with him that I will be posting soon.

-Tim