 There it is, Canada. Maybe they'll let us in another day. Not now. USA is that way. I'll go that way. Suited up. I'm ready to go. The bike is all packed. This bike is my dream bike and I developed it in conjunction with priority bicycles. If you want to learn more about it, click the link in the description of this video. I don't know if it's nervous energy or excited energy or a mix of both, but I I'm just kind of walking in circles making sure I have everything ready and everything set and I do and I should just be out of my Bike right now. I just called my mom to tell her I love her one last time. She's like you called me already This is a dream come true. I've wanted to do the divide ride for about 10 years now Just in case some of you don't know what the great divide is. It's the world's longest off-road bike route at 2700 miles. It starts in Banff, Canada and goes to the border of Mexico Right now Canada won't let us dirty Americans in their country. So I'm starting in northern Montana You might be thinking oh Ryan can just get up and go and it doesn't faze him He just rides and he sings Olay all the time and he's all good. Well, the truth is, you know, I get nervous like anybody else This is this is big. I think my jitters mean that my body is getting ready for something Amazing at least that's how I want to think about it And I look back on the first day of my Honduras ride my first ever bike packing adventure and how Excited and nervous I was I feel good. I've said my goodbyes I've shed at my tears. I got my goodbyes good my hugs everything. I'm ready to roll I'm ready to start the adventure and then the first day of my first cross-country ride across USA and I had the same feelings like oh my god. I'm here. This is happening. This is really what's gonna propel me Not my legs. It's this thing. It's gonna take me across America Whoo, I mean there's so many months that go into preparing and Thinking and buying gear and getting everything set and staring at maps and then boom here. I am Now it's go time. I'm not in the comfort of my home and speaking of my comfortable home You know, I've been in quarantine since early March Essentially quarantine was very comfortable. I eat good food and watch Netflix every night, but it's time to get Uncomfortable it's time to push it. It's time to explore. It's time to be on the edge of comfort And I like that that's when I feel most alive and that's I think why I'm feeling a little bit Nervous and scared and excited. You know, it's not gonna be easy. I'm not gonna be sitting at home watching Netflix You're gonna be riding my bike all day every day up and down big Mountains. I'm in grizzly country. There's bears out there. I have bear spray with me Just in case that's kind of scary, you know, I know that this is kind of a boring way to start a Video for a really big ride, but this is how it happens I sit in a hotel and I pace back and forth before I finally get the courage to walk out the door And I thank you all so much for your love and support in watching my channel And I'm so excited to share this with you It means the world to me that not only do I get to experience this But then I get to share it with you and hopefully Inspire you to challenge yourself with whatever adventure you choose in life All right, I think it's time to leave now Or I could just lay back and take a nap. No, I'm not gonna take a nap. Let's go All right, I've made progress. I am outside of the hotel About to get on my bike and I already feel a lot better. Oh It's gonna be a beautiful day, and you know how we start these things in dozer land. No crashes. No flaties No whammies, baby Right now I'm feeling awesome All it takes is a few miles of riding and then I'm like, oh, yeah This is why I do this. Look at this beautiful road No cars One of the reasons why I'm so attracted to this route is that it's mostly off-road Which means not many cars So I can breathe easy and just enjoy the riding and not worry about getting run over by a semi What a beautiful day. Whoo. Yes It's happening Feeling hard and making big miles But I also like stopping and reading these historical markers Just to get a sense of the history of the area and where I'm riding through and this one's pretty interesting It says three times a year the Kootenai Knutaksa Indians departed their Tobacco Valley homeland and Crossed into the drainage of the North Fork of the Flathead River The Native Americans rode and packed as many as 700 horses for the spring hunts when the whole village made the journey The meat and all supplies were carried on their backs for the return trips Here I am thinking I have a lot of stuff on my bike. I can't imagine Carrying all of that meat on the back of horses. Wow All right, I finally hit dirt about 20 miles south of Eureka. This is what I came for dirt roads solitude simplicity remote beauty It all starts now All I got to do is pedal And that's really all I have to do I have to wake up every day and pedal my bike And I'm incredibly Grateful for that Doesn't get much more simple than that I also have to find water and food And film all of this for you. But for the most part I am just pedaling every day That is a dream come true. Oh, and I get asked a lot about how I know where to go Well, it's quite simple really I've downloaded the gps file of the entire route Onto my wahoo computer and it tells me exactly where to go It's like using google maps on your phone If I go off-route by as little as 15 feet, it'll let me know Which is very nice piece of mine. This is this is some new technology for me I used to use maps like everybody else used to use But it's nice just Having this little computer tell me what to do as long as I keep it charged If it goes dead, then we're gonna have problems It is time to use my magic wand and filter some water You just dip it in there And it magically filters and kills all virus and bacteria actually not magically it shoots UV Light into it. It's how they filter water at big You know water filtration projects for cities It's also nice just to get off the bike and sit next to a river. The sound is very soothing It's not even noon yet and I'm having the time of my life Oh, I love it As I head further and further into the outback I'm starting to see signs that tell you to be beware of bears grizzly bears And black bears. I've only ridden my bike once through bear country in Wyoming for only a couple days But a lot of this route is going to be through bear country and that is why I have a canister Of bear spray right here pepper spray I hope I don't have to use it Um, but definitely it's nice to have it as peace of mind and at night time I'm gonna have to get my food up high. I know bears love refried beans Everybody does not just bears Yeah, here we go into the wilds of montana You know back in colorado the past few weeks. It's been High 90s almost 100 every single day Which is hot but out here It's perfect. It's like 75 It couldn't be better I found some of that uphill that this route is so famous for 200,000 feet of uphill during the entire route That also means there's probably 200,000 feet of downhill, which is awesome So yeah, you you know you put your head down and your pedal hard You go up And then you get to enjoy Screaming fast downhill. I say that's a fair deal. You know Really nice stretch of road right here I feel like the trees are hugging me Whoa, these mountains are different. We don't have these kind of mountains in colorado I think I'm looking at the southern end of the canadian rockies. They look Kind of european really tall and jagged and there's still snow way up there Oh, man You know what? I just realized I am very very clean right now It's like I'm wearing my first day of school clothes All spick and span. Look how white the shorts I'm not muddy and dusted up yet That'll happen And I think it's kind of a badge of honor when it does happen And by the end of this tour, I'll be looking A little rougher Which is cool Uh-oh, we've got one of those steep uphill swings And I've already gone up 5 000 feet today I got to the top of the hill Started looking at this mountain that was distracting me and didn't even notice there was this beautiful alpine lake Right here. Oh my god. It is It is a beautiful lake. Wow You want to know what one of the added bonuses to riding in the north is in the summertime? It stays light out really late. It's been a beautiful beautiful day Was to make it to a lake and camp and I've done it I didn't think I was going to get this far though. I'm in whitefish So I rode like 95 miles today and I got a pretty late start But I just kept cruising. I was extra inspired today Not only by it being the first day of the ride, but just by the landscapes and the surroundings and Just so beautiful. So if this first day is any sign of what's to come, I think I'm in good shape This is uh, this is going to be good. This is going to be really good Surprisingly, my legs are doing pretty good and I climbed like almost 6 000 feet total throughout the day But you know what hurts right here? It hurts because I've been smiling so much It was one of those days where I was just like, whoo, this is great