This is an essay I wrote over on Adventure Journal, which also includes a list of tips for meal planning and cooking for a bikepacking trip, along with a few links for recipes. 

This is all the email said:

Riding bikes in the backcountry, camping, making food on the trail…June 17-19. Interested in details?

Like any sane person, I responded with an “um…okay!”

It was a proposal to join a bikepacking trip with Komorebi, the Portland-based women’s bikepacking team. The fact that I had never been bikepacking didn’t deter me, and after all, that was the whole point of Komorebi: to get more women adventuring on two wheels. Okay, actually it did freak me out a little bit, and as soon as I said yes the thoughts started swarming in my head:

Will I be able to keep up with women who bikepack all the time?

Will they judge me if I am not fast enough?

I don’t really ride mountain bikes, what if I fail?

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