3,800 miles in 30 days of riding requires planning. A few percent of wind resistance can add days to the ride. Weight, equipment dependability, desert supplies – everything needs careful consideration or you spend more time dealing with hassles than riding.

As a “credit-card tourer”, I stay in hotels whenever possible. The extra couple of hours you save in setting up and taking down a camp, plus the extra refreshment of a bed and good meal, are well worth the extra dollars each day. However, when it’s 100 or 200 (or more) kilometers miles between accommodations, you need to be prepared for anything.

Trek 520 loaded touring bike with Airstryke aerobars, REI traverse panniers (Perth-Adelaide) or Cannondale (Adelaide-Sydney) (thin) panniers, a Jandd rack bag, cycling computer, air pump, two 20 oz water bottles, a headlight and two taillights. Also a Gyro helmet, sport-sun glasses, mirror, one folding tire, two tubes, a tire repair kit, air pump, and a Topeak Alien multi-function tool.

Bike This is my 4th Trek 520. You could spend a lot more money for not much more bike. It’s steel, and I get a big (23”) frame to stretch out and absorb shock. Standard components, easily fixable. “Go for a bike ride. Come back in a month.”
	Aerobars “The biggest advancement in streamlining as been aero bars that allow a downhill-skier cycling position. Using them lowers a typical rider’s frontal area from 4.2 square feet in the upright touring posture to about 3.6 sqare feet (versus 3.9 square feet when riding low in the drops). At typical long-distance riding speeds of 15 to 25 miles per hour, the improvement can mean a 1- to 2-miles-per-phour increase for the same power output.” Long Distance Cycling I use Profile Airstryke with retractable elbow pads for maximum flexibility.
Panniers I’ll actually use two pairs of panniers - some older but very aerodynamic Cannondale panniers for the Adelaide-Sydney part. (I can’t find anything like them on the market today.) For the Perth-Adelaide section I’ll be carrying more camping gear and selected these REI Traverse Panniers. They’re taller, but thinner than most. Well designed to hold the gear with minimal wind resistance. Great straps.

A Zoid 1 tent and a Cocoon mummy liner (in place of a sleeping bag), a pack towel, weatherproof matches, and a Platypus 2 liter water bag, toiletries, Muskol Insect Repellent (pure 100% Deet) and a head insect net.

“And the flies! As soon as I halted they swarmed all over me in nightmarish millions, humming in the hot, still air like some apocalyptic lost chord. … They crawled over my face and into my ears; they went for the moisture in my eyes and in the corners of my mouth. A dozen or so drowned in my water bottle as I opened it to drink. I had to strain their loathsome little bodies with my teeth.”
Smith, while he was crossing the Nullarbor.

Tent An MSR Zoid 1 (like all the camping gear) from REI. At only 3 lbs., this tent offers a super-lightweight, comfortable and surprisingly spacious solo shelter for serious backcountry enthusiasts. I’m not bringing a sleeping bag, just a mummy sack, and this tent needs to protect me from everything in the outback, mostly poisonous snakes and insects.

All this is specialized lightweight camping or cycling stuff: Two cycling jerseys, 2 cycling pants, arm and leg warmers, a wind breaker, a rain jacket, one long pair and one short pair of pants, one long and one short sleeve shirt, underwear, socks, cycling shoes and moccasins.

A Sony Vaio C-1 Picturebook and a Sony Cyber-Shot DSC-50 digital camera.

	Sony Vaio C-1 Picturebook This will be the second continent this handy thing has biked across. Remarkably small. Revolutionary power. The VAIO® C1 PictureBook™ notebook computer lets you travel extremely light. 2.2 lbs. Light Only 1" thin Built-in digital camera 12 GB hard drive 8.9" XGA-width TFT screen MagicGate Memory Stick media slot 128 MB RAM
Sony Cyber-Shot DSC-50 Alas, only a little more than a year old, but already technologically obsolete, like the computer, this is the second cross continent ride for this camera. A SONY DSC-50: Powerful and feature-filled, this camera captures crystal-clear still images with fabulous 2.1-megapixel resolution. You can also enliven your subjects with our high-quality MPEG movie mode. It's a fast, easy way to add moving pictures and sound to your e-mails, presentations, or Web site. And the MPEG file format plays in your Mac or PC.

Hopefully a good breakfast and a good dinner, and during the day lots of junk food and lots of liquid supplemented by little baggies of Thammer “Sustained Energy Ultra Endurance Fuel” and CytoSport “Cytomax Exercise and Recovery Drink”. Also, handfuls of Centrum “Performance Complete Multi-Vitamin Dietary Supplement” and Jarrow “Coenzyme-Q10 Cellular Energy Production and Cholesterol Antioxidant”.