What’s the craziest thing you had done in college?

With graduation looming on the horizon, this was a question a few of us were burdened with. We wanted to have a story to tell. A story of change, of inspiration, of adventure. But none of us had any money to do so. Typical broke college students if you may say so. We all fancied traveling – Mike, Chris and Ben had toured extensively through West Africa and backpacked through Europe. Brett was in Jordan this past summer and for me, America was the foreign land.

But it wasn’t enough.

We started to think locally. Well, all of us were yet to experience America as a whole so why not tour the states? That got the wheels rolling. Which states? Head east or west? Why not go through all of them?

Wait. What?!

There literally was a pause when Mike said this. And for some reason, none of us shot the idea down. On the contrary, we actually entertained the idea for a couple days before agreeing that it was a perfect situation of “Go big or go home.”

We wanted to explore the beauty of the continental US and the only way this was truly possible was by biking. Being broke didn’t leave us with much options either. But just the thrill of the trip wasn’t enough motivation to bike all 48 states. We lacked purpose. And so upon self-reflection, we realized that education brought us together and we needed to give that back to those that weren’t as privileged as us. The Great 48 team was born.