Why Trek bicycles? We ride Trek bicycles on our around-the-world trip. Despite two years of use and abuse, they hold up remarkably well. We are impressed. Then we arrive in India and spend three months riding through the Himalayan mountains in the northern part of the country. We leave Kashmir and pedal up the Zoji La pass on our way to Ladakh on the Tibetan plateau. The road is so narrow there is not enough room for two trucks to pass each other. So all the traffic goes one direction in the morning, and the opposite direction in the afternoon. As we pedal up this section of road a convoy of Indian army truck begins to pass us. One of the truck drives is not watching where he is going, and accidentally hits Tass.

Amazingly, Tass jumps off her bike at the last second! She is not hurt, but the truck completely crushes her bicycle. The rear wheel and the gears are ruined, the left crank arm is sheared off along with the pedal, her front wheel is bent in half, and there are huge cracks in the frame. We store her bike and my bike in a nearby village and hitchhike through Ladakh. Three weeks later we return and pick up the bikes. We try to fix her bike but it is beyond repair.

Bruce rides a Trek road bike through monsoon-flooded roads, Java, Indonesia, during our around-the-world trip.

In Israel we buy Tass a used bike (which is a real clunker with poor breaks and terrible shifting), and ride across Europe and the U.S. After 26 months we return home. We begin managing a bicycle shop, and the very first thing Tass buys is a new Trek bicycle. Although the store sells seven different brands of bicycles, we find ourselves most often recommending Trek bicycles to our customers. We like the people who work at Trek, the way they back their products, and the philosophy of the company.

Bruce rides the steep "streets" of Cuetzalan, Mexico.

Our next bicycle trip is through Central America and Mexico. Again choose to ride Trek bicycles. On this trip we use cross bikes, a hybrid bicycle that is a combination road bike and mountain bike.

During our three and a half months of riding from Costa Rica to Mexico our bikes performed flawlessly. Our only problem is a couple of flat tires. Our Trek 520's come stock with cantilever breaks, triple cranks, bar end shifters and a relaxed frame geometry which makes for comfortable riding even after long days in the saddle.

Riding in the Amazon Basin, the temperature is so hot the tar on the road melts. This is the tracks our bike tires leave in the pavement.

During our South America bike trip we ride Trek mountain bikes.

We share the road with huge trucks that roll past at high speed creating billowing clouds of dust.

A tarantula crawls across the frame of Bruce's bicycle. During our time in the Amazon Basin of Ecuador we spend a week traveling with Luis Garcia, who owns Emerald Forest Expeditions. Luis is the best guide we have during our time in the rainforest, and quickly becomes a good friend.

We bring our bikes with us as we canoe with Luis down the Rio Napo River. In the evenings Luis and his partner, David Chongo, ride our bikes along the rainforests paths. They are quick converts to cycling. After we finish biking through the rainforest we give Luis and David a super buddy deal and sell them our bikes cheap. We love knowing that our Trek mountain bikes are still being ridden today out in the rainforests of the Amazon Basin!

Luis Garcia has spent his life learning about the rainforest. He tells us the bark of this tree can be used to make a natural birth control.

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