It is 9:00 pm Wednesday night and we have our bicycles in the trailer tied down well, with all our food, cloths, sleeping bags etc packed in the Motorhome. Tomorrow morning at 6:00 am five of us are taking off on a one month adventure, with a sixth person joining us in one week. Tomorrow we will drive to a campground just a few miles from the Canadian border, sleep there overnight and then Friday morning, bright and early, we will hop on our bicycles and pedal South. Our destination is the Mexican border and we will ride most of the trip on Highway 101 and Highway 1 in California. The total trip is approximately 2000 miles and we will average about 70 miles per day and be home on May 23rd just in time for me to preach on the 24th and 25th at JBC.

In the past years of doing these trips we have mostly camped in tents, but this year we are going to stay in the Motorhome every night. We have every day mapped out, with each days map on our cell phones with verbal instructions at all of the turns. The mapping program also shows us a silhouette of each days ride with expected elevation climbs and descents. The campsights are all reserved, and they all have hot showers! We usually average 10 to 14 mph and take a butt break every five miles.

Breakfast for me will be a bowl of granola ceral with oat milk on it with two cups of coffee. We snack along the way on dried fruit, nuts, energy bars, and cookies. Sometimes we will stop for lunch, usually at a “Sub Sandwich” place that happens to be at the right place at the right time. Dinner for me is usually a can of stew, pork and beans, or something similar with a can of vegetables, usually beans, and then for a bedtime snack we will eat some microwave popcorn. I drink a lot of water and some sort of electrolyte sports drink all day long.

This is our tenth long distance bicycle trip. We have done two trips to Fairbanks, Alaska, three coast to coast trips, the northern route, Southern, and one through the middle of the United States, each of those was about 4,000 miles. We did a trip to the Grand Canyon, then up to Yellowston, and then home which was close to 4,000 miles. We did one around the State of Oregon and a number of others that started at home and went out to Montana and around and back home. At the beginning of everyone of the last five trips I have assumed that this is probably the last one of these that I have in my old body. We will see how I feel at the end of one month, usually I feel 20 years younger, that is why I keep doing these darn torture trips.

How do we bless another person if we want to choose to do that? The best Biblical definition of bless is to give joy to them, make them happy, make their day. How would or could you do that? Most often it is with words that we speak to another person. The book of Proverbs says that our words can “build up” or “tear down,” “give joy,” or “make sad.” Another method of blessing is to do something kind or considered that communicates thoughtfulness or meets a need. One of my favorites is with a gift, I like to give gifts and I like to receive gifts. There is something about gifts that just brings a smile to your face, especially if it is a nice gift.

I appreciate people who bless me, but even more I appreciate people who bless, my wife Patty, or my kids, or grandkids, and obviously some of my least favorite people are those who hurt or make one of my family members sad. Historically some of the worst of feuds have been started not on the basis of what someone did to another person, but what someone did to a family member or friend of another person.

I was tremendously blessed today by a family, the family is a member of our extended family, giving a very special gift to all of our kids, the gift was a fairly large sum of money to each one of them. It was totally unexpected and for most of them was very timely with current needs that they had.

I was filled with joy because my kids were filled with joy, as well as their spouses, and their kids. They say that warmed-up pizza is better than the fresh stuff, and I believe that secondhand joy is actually stronger the the original.

Like most good things in life, gifts was God’s idea, He gave the greatest gift, the most expensive gift, and the gift that will ultimately bring the greatest joy to those who accept His gift, the gift of His Son, Jesus Christ.

We head home from Alaska in a couple of days. Patty will be at home cleaning house and playing with grandkids, and I will head off on my 2,000 mile bicycle trip. I am hoping it is going to be fun, exciting, and that my Parkinson’s will get much better from all the exercise that I will be getting. It is funny how I look forward to everything on my calendar for the next year. During the summer I have fishing trips planned, hunting trips, and family events. But of the things on the calendar for the next year the thing I am most excited about is the start of my “Leadership Classes” the first weekend in October. Teaching those classes, men’s, ladies, and leadership II are the most fulfilling activities in my life. I am spending a lot of time now going over my lecture notes and trying to think of information and teaching techniques that will make the classes better. Not everybody grows spiritually while in the class but many do, and it is so rewarding to know that God has used me to make a difference in someone’s life that will last forever. The most rewarding part is when many plug into ministry and start making a major difference with their own life. Several guys who went through leadership class, then moved away and coasted for 20 years, not doing much for the Lord have now jumped into ministry in their churches and are having a huge impact in their respective churches. It doesn’t get any better than that!!

I built a drift boat two years ago when I came to Soldotna, Alaska and I left it at “Tim’s Place” to use in subsequent years. Last year I built a trailer for it. What I have wanted to do is take it out in the ocean halibut fishing and today we did just that. It was a bit precarious driving on the sand, but we got the boat in the water and out again and caught 5 halibut, the biggest one was 60 lbs. I considered the maiden voyage for my boat in the ocean a great success. Guys come up to “Tim’s Place” to fish for sockeye salmon, but there are slow days and it would be cool if we could take them Halibut fishing. The charters charge $400 per person and you can only keep one fish. So “Duke’s Halibut Fishing” is free and way more fun, what a deal! Those on the maiden voyage was my grandson Wyatt, his dad, my son-in-law Philip, and me. We only went out 1/4 mile and fished in 20 feet of water but we caught five fish in one hour, amazing.

Lots of moose in Alaska. These were in the yard at the house where we are staying. When I get up in the morning to go to the room where the bathroom is I scare a moose or he scares me most mornings. We see them almost every day as we drive into town and around. You don’t want to hit one while driving! This last two picture is the way I like to see moose.

In our surf fishing in Alaska trying to catch Halibut, we caught this thing called a “skate”. We didn’t keep it, but it is kind of exciting reeling it in.

My son- in-law and his brother are building a shop in Soldotna and I am getting ready to fish. I got everything pretty much all ready to go so tomorrow they will finish the shop and I will get everything ready to go and then we will fish for halibut out of my drift boat Friday and Saturday. In the meantime am having a good time doing a lot of studying and reading and writing and some fishing stuff.

I went into a store today to buy a couple of cans of spray paint for my boat and as I was waiting for the clerk to finish ringing everything up I saw a box of “Rollows” on the desk. Rollows are a chocolate candy with caramel centers that are amazingly good tasting. I have not eaten any sugar for almost a month and I have been feeling better and better for this past month, but seeing that candy I couldn’t resist and I got one and ate it on the drive back to the fish camp. When I got back my legs started hurting so bad I could hardly walk.

I was reinforced in my belief that sugar is a major cause and reason for my Parkinson’s acting up do much of late. I know what it does to me but I still have trouble resisting the urge to eat just a little bit! Sometimes I can’t believe what a wimp I am when it comes to self-control!

Yesterday we drove from Fairbanks to the Kenai Peninsula in about 9 hours. Philip my son-in-law has a building job and I am going to fish. The drive was amazingly beautiful as we drove by Denali and lots of other mountains. I couldn’t help but think of one of my memory verses, Romans 1:18-20, “ for since the creation of the world God’s invisible attributes, His eternal power, and His divine nature are clearly seen being understood through what has been made so that they are without excuse.”

Proverbs 17:6 Grandchildren are the crown of old men,

This is one of my favorite verses in the Bible now. It is kind of funny but I don’t really say much to my grandkids. I mostly just watch them as they talk to others and do their thing. I pray for them a lot all during the day when I am watching them, imagining what they are going to become and accomplish with their life. With my six Alaska grandkids I don’t see them enough to have a relationship where I would feel comfortable teaching them anything, so I mostly just joke with them. But I do write in the evening my observations and what I need to pray about so that they will grow up to be champions for Jesus. I believe that God has given me a special jurisdiction in praying for my family, I have a power and influence with God on their behalf that nobody else has so I don’t want to neglect that. One of my life verses is James 5:16 “ The fervent prayer of a righteous man accomplishes much.” I remember when Patty and I would go to the boy’s basketball games and the girl’s volleyball games through High School and College I would sit in the stands and pray with so much fervency for them to do well that I would get a chest ache. The day after a game I would be so wrung out emotionally that I would sleep an extra four hours to recuperate. My grandkids are indeed a crown and I have 28 of them.

Every kid who fishes a lot while growing up eventually gets a hook in the flesh somewhere. The best place is the hand as opposed to any place on the head, arms or back, though places covered with cloths are usually safe. We went fishing today with the grandkids for Artic Grayling and the youngest of the boys got a hook in the hand by standing to close to his brother who was casting. We cut the line off and left it in until we got home, and then Philip pushed the hook through, cut off the barb, and then pulled it out, quick, clean, and simple, but not without a little pain and tears. But soon it was just a story and all was good.

In the book of Job in the Bible it says that, “man was born for troubles as sparks fly upwards.” One of our goals in raising our kids was that they would be tough. A tough person expects that trials, troubles, and problems are coming on a regular basis because that is just the way it is. When they do come, they deal with it, solve it, fix it, overcome it, and live with it. They don’t fuss much, feel sorry for themselves, or blame others. They almost always get tougher and grow in character, and enjoy the stories that come from it. It was good to see my grandkids are being raised to be tough as well. It made my grandpa heart proud.