Miles from Nowhere by Barbara Savage

I took a break from Battle of the Books books to finish reading a book I had started back in August or September. Miles from Nowhere is the story of a couple from California who bicycled around the world in 1978 and 79. They encountered brutal headwinds all the way across South Dakota, were routinely forced off the road by rude drivers in Florida, and then faced dirt and rats in Egypt, dysentery in India, heat, humidity and bandits in Thailand... wow! I could never have survived the trip! And this was back in the late '70s when there wasn't all kinds of fancy, lightweight equipment available. They had chosen to do the trip because they didn't want to look back on their lives when they were older and find that they had never done any of the things they'd wanted to do. Despite all the discomforts, they saw all kinds of amazing things on their trip and made friends all over the world. What an experience! I wondered how different things would be if someone did the same trip today (but I'm not volunteering!). My mother-in-law gave me this book as a birthday gift. I really enjoyed reading it.