I bought a Bright Eyes CD today called Cassadaga.  The first song is about traveling, visiting places/towns called Cassadaga, searching for the vortex sites and spiritual sites in Arizona, Utah, California, in order to commune with the dead.  The song suggests that there are Cassadagas all over the country where spiritual power is concentrated. The only Cassadaga I know is in New York State, a village near Lillydale, NY. Lillydale is the largest spiritual community in the world. Online I can only find Cassadaga, FL.. also a spiritualist community.  

What does this have to do with cycling? Leaving on a long bike trip requires escaping the everyday concerns of the average person. You’ve got to be focused on something besides work, earning a living, retirement, etc. It's like an Astronaut trying to get to outer space,  you’ve got to escape Earth’s gravity.  All these things in our lives hold us down to the local concerns; job , family, fear of the unknown. You need something powerful to get you out of that initial gravity well, a boost that can be hard to find. It is nowhere in our normal cultural exposure, not on TV, no news stories, no friends or acquaintances saying it’s going to be alright. Thinking about something that is secret, not in the news, but still out there, a mystery that a quick google search does not solve brings some power to the trip. Maybe there are things to discover out on the road, maybe after a day of listening to the sound of my wheels going around I will hear a secret.