Terri and Bruce Brown are finishing up a more than 3,000-mile, three-month bicycle trip from Oregon to the Iwo Jima Memorial in Arlington, Virginia, not with two bikes, but one.
“I call ourselves double-butted adventures,” Terri said.
They’ve even kept up a blog throughout their entire journey by that name, clocking every hour and mile. Her husband said it’s made things fun.
“To make the trip even more interesting and challenging, we’re riding on a tandem bicycle,” Bruce said. “We kind of look like a traveling circus with mini elephants in the trailer,” he said, while they both laughed.
Terri, 56, said she lost 80 pounds for the trip to get in shape. Bruce, 69, a retired Marine, athlete and cancer survivor who has had two hip replacements, said he’s always wanted to ride across the U.S.
So, he planned the trip to raise money for Toys for Tots.
“We never get enough bicycles donated for the requests that we get,” Bruce said.
The couple is from North Carolina, but Bruce said that he has lived in D.C. on three different occasions.
They started their trip on June 29 at DeLaura Beach in Oregon. By the end of their trip, they traveled through 12 states including Oregon, Washington state, Idaho, Montana, North Dakota, Minnesota, Wisconsin, Michigan, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Maryland and Virginia.
This trip was to raise funds and awareness, while fulfilling a dream for both of them.
“I think it’s changed both of us, both in the way that we think about ourselves and the way we think about this country,” Terri said.
They’re finishing their trip by meeting friends and family at the Iwo Jima Memorial around 3 p.m. on Saturday.
Donations to their Toys for Tots campaign can be made online.
