Everything in the trunk - Click picture to see full size

Welcome to my chronicle of my trip down the California coast from SF to LA on a slightly modified segway.

What is a Segway, you ask? Well, I've described it as a "perpetual wheely machine". Do you remember when you were a kid on your bike, how you'd pop a wheely and then with the front wheel of the ground you'd carefully push the pedals so that you'd maintain your balance and thus the wheely? Well, that's what a Segway is all about.

The only difference is that the Segway has motors that drive two wheels (instead of your legs on the pedals of your bike) and gyros so it knows how to balance you (instead of your own sense of balance). To make a Segway go, you just lean and detecting a shift in balance, it quickly drives its wheels to scoot itself under you and maintain that perfect balance.

In a sense, as you lean forward you are also constantly falling slightly forward and the Segway is keeping up with you. Very soon you gain confidence in the machines ability to keep you upright and then presto...the "segway smile" crosses your face! I've seen this hundreds of times since I take every opportunity to get folks that I meet in my community up on it to experience this thrill.

In a way, I feel a bit like a drug dealer. You're first ride (or as we call it "glide") on the segway is free, and once you're hooked then I mention that the machine costs $5000 new!

I've digressed. Let's get back to this trip I'm planning. I've owned my Segway for 9 months, and I commute a couple miles to work daily on it. I've almost gotten rid of my car that I use only once every other weekend (though I will need to use it a fair bit to move equipment around for this trip). One of the annoying things about Segways that use the older battery technology (NiMH) is that you have to do monthly battery conditioning where you run the batteries flat and then fully charge them so the batteries don't retain a memory as they charge and recharge. Soooooo, I had to go on long glides of 10 miles or so to do this.

Well, over the months I found myself gliding further and further. I bought a couple spare sets of older batteries when the new battery technology (Lithium Ion) became available. The older batteries were flooding the market and the prices plummetted. Now I could glide from town to town with a spare set of batteries in my backpack! But my feet hurt riding 20 miles continuously with a heavy backpack full of batteries.

This is when some new accessories got me to thinking. The first one was an aftermarket item called a Segseat which attached to the control shaft and allows the rider to sit as they glide! Combined with a new type of converted trailer, I had everything necessary to glide for REALLY long distances.

And that's when the idea struck me that if I could rent or borrow pairs of the new batteries that had longer range (of 20 miles), then I could go on REALLY long glides. In fact...I might even be able to glide down the coast from San Francisco to Los Angeles along bike routes.

Some research on the internet showed me that these bike routes are mapped out in detail, and I started making lists of items I'd need (like off board chargers, tools, spare tires, etc) and planning stops every 40 miles along the way to recharge at a motel while I slept. Heck, I could probably do all this without a chase car! The planaholic in me was coming out again...

Steve Oz and his amazing mechnical mule, Eeyore