How she looks now...
How she looked new...
When things get this rusty it's time for some love...
We've had a lot of fun, but a price has been paid!
Crunchy?
Steel is real, but rust never sleeps!
Ouch...=-(
Yup...flatness....
Stripped down and cleaned a bit...
Apparently just in time...
Loaded up for the trip to the powder coaters...
The Lazy Rando Blog... 
What color are you going to go with?
I am full of anticipation. . .
Did you have to do any prep work on the rust before taking it to the powder coaters? Or do they do that for you?
@AC – the colour will be a surprise in 2 weeks, but I can tell you it won’t be one of my usual colours!
@Birddog – I just wiped the majority of the mud and dirt off. I didn’t try to remove the rust as it would have been a big job and they do it better with the sand blaster!
Vik,
As the Pugs is the center of attention right now, I have a quick question for you. If you were going to do the GDR with it again bikepacking-style, what would you do about toting the bear canister?
Looking forward to seeing what color you choose. When I had my new Cross Check powder coated orange last year it was way outside my normal comfort zone for color. Now I’m glad I did it. I love the look of the orange.
Hard to believe all the rust on your Pugs. Is that mainly from snow/salt, or baja ocean salt?
@Doug – I think the rust is due to the evil trinity:
1 – saltwater/beach life
2 – corrosive playa dust from burning man
3 – road salt from Canadian winters
Although my Pugs has escaped the evils of Canadian winter road salt by moving to Victoria it now lives in a 90% humidity environment 2 long blocks from saltwater…so I’m not sure it’s any better off!
@Val – The primary goal of traveling in bear country as it relates to food is to be safe at night in camp. That’s achieved by not sleeping near your food. The second goal is to protect your food which is important, but a distant second to being safe.
The bear can works great, but it’s heavy. I wouldn’t carry it again if I felt I could get away without it.
For the CDN GDR trip I’d use my Pugs with frame bag and seat and bar bags. I’d carry my food in a large scent-proof zip lock [as is advised even if you use a bear can] and carry a mesh bag and enough accessory cord to hang my food in a tree if one is available.
I would also use the significantly lighter weight of my rig and the resulting increased mobility to travel to locations that would be best suited to my needs. For example a campground that has a bear-proof garbage can. The can can be opened from the rear [the way you would empty it] and your food can be placed inside next to the plastic garbage bag which is relatively clean!
It may transpire that I don’t find a good location and bear gets my food. That will suck, but it shouldn’t be fatal. I’ll just have to suffer until I can resupply. If there are two of us we can hide/hang out food separately in a poor situation in the hopes that one cache is unmolested.
also interested in seeing what color you decide on. i have always loved the gray. i’ve read a few comments that it was ‘boring’, but to me it’s an ‘understated menacing’. though, i think i also ruin that with the rasta colored headset!
Vik,
Excellent points, all. One thing about the bike as opposed to hiking, I suppose, is that time to resupply can be dramatically shortened, if need be thanks to being on wheels and generally operating somewhere near some kind of roads. So you’re right, the loss of one’s food isn’t likely to be disastrous unless one is doing something incredibly remote.
You’re also right that safety protocols about food storage and placement matter much more than containers. There’s something freeing about thinking of the food as largely expendable.
But then again, how much of an ethical obligation do I have to take whatever steps I can to keep bears from getting used to people-food? That is, what if I think of schelpping the weight of the can as something I do not for myself, but for the bears?
~Val
@Val – the problem isn’t that bears get attached to people food. The problem is when they associate towns, people and tents as a food source. If a bear finds a cache of food in a tree or under a rock all you are training a bear to do is look for more food in a tree or under a rock – a strategy that won’t last too long since there isn’t much of a food source there and since there aren’t people involved the bear won’t be shot as a result.
BTW – if you tour somewhere that you can’t afford to lose your food you have to accept the weight penalty of a bear can or something along those lines and just get on with your trip.
Probably not helpful but…Bear country may be a nice incentive to do a little overtime. Keep the cranks spinning.
@Brent – all of Western Canada and Northern Canada is bear country so most places I camp and cycle are in the “danger zone”. That doesn’t give you much incentive to go anywhere special unless it’s a hotel or campground with bear lockers or something like that. To be honest I don’t think much about bears. I’m used to taking reasonable precautions and so have never had a bear encounter in my decades of outdoor activities.