God always gives us more than we can imagine.  Look at what has happened in my life since the completion of my trip.  

"Bike it Solo" by Emmanuel Gentinetta (that's me) is coming soon. 

My book:   I do not know when it will  be ready, but I am currently doing the final revision of the Spanish Version.  Once I  finish the revision, the book will go through correction. I will then translate it to English and be ready to  publish both "Bike it Solo" and "Solo en Bici" at  the same time.  The reason that I first wrote the book in Spanish  is that all my journals I kept in Spanish.  I handle both languages the same, but since most of my trip would be in Latin America, I decided  to write my journals in Spanish.  The writing style of my book will  be as the one which you can see in the  reports. I thank you all for your support and encouragement with my  goal of writing my book. Please keep in touch by emailing me at  emmanuel.gentinetta at bikeitsolo.com 

My presentations: I am still giving inspirational slide presentations and speeches at elementary, middle, and high schools, as  well as colleges, community clubs, churches, individual groups, and to anyone wanting to hear more about shooting for the stars and trusting in  God. For information on presentations email me  at hearthestory at bikeitsolo.com or call me at (815) 345-4902

1999 - Today: Achieving a goal is not easy, I know that. Remember that with God's help and determination, anything is possible. One pedal turn at a time, one page at a time. Continue on. With His help you will accomplish it, and on top of that, for trusting in God, He will reward you with more than you can imagine. God does give us more than we imagine. How great God is. I thank Him for everything He gives me. 

2000: After finishing my trip on March 9, 2000, I stayed in Argentina for a couple of months, visiting friends and family. In May I went back to California, to Sonora, where my parents live. I did a lot of work on my book, especially getting all of my nine journals into digital form. I had my first presentations in May of 2000.

2001: I spent the year in Sonora, spending time with my family and giving lots of presentations. I applied to University, and got admitted to Cal Poly San Luis Obispo. I planned on starting in the fall of 2001, but then deferred to begin in January of 2002 to spend some more time with my family.

2002: School started!! I began my university career studying Journalism at Cal Poly in San Luis Obispo, California. Cal Poly is on the quarter system (fall, winter, spring, winter). During this year I took classes all four quarters, taking lots of courses. I got a job making sandwiches for students, and on Thursday nights I was “quesadilla boy”, producing some 20 quesadillas a minute for the hungry students. During the summer quarter, although I was a Resident Advisor, I still found plenty of time to follow every world cup game, make lots of friends, and to go to the beach 49 percent of the days.

2003: At the end of January I found John filling out some paperwork to study in Italy beginning in the fall. I was planning on doing this in 2004, but had a slight something ask him “When is that application due?” “In two days,” he said. I went to the Study Abroad Office, filled out a lot of paperwork over the weekend, and a couple of months later found out that both John and I had been admitted.

I realized I was not really enjoying my journalism classes, but rather enjoying English courses I was taking, so I changed my major to English. Once I began to take some Spanish literature courses and to study Italian, I also decided to add Modern Languages as a second major. On top of that, I will be pursuing at TESL certificate (Teaching English as a Second Language).

I was a Resident Advisor again during the summer quarter, and then in August moved to Italy. I lived and studied literature and language in Florence. I also took some art classes.

2004: Here it gets interesting and I start jumping around... I was in Italy until May. There was a girl at school in Florence; an art student; Katie Andresky.

KT is from Chicago, but had been studying in Arcata in California, and so was able to be a part of the CSU Study Abroad Program in Italy. Toward the end of the school year, we were travelling together near Montecassino in Italy - where her grandpa fought during WWII - and I got a crazy ear infection. So back to Florence and the doctor says “You should go see a specialist; it looks serious.” The specialist says “It’s serious. You should go see Dr. Scaramella in CHICAGO.” So I go to an art show that KT was having and tell her “Hey, I have to to Chicago for my ear.” “You can stay at my house,” she says.

I got there before she did, had my ear fixed up, and hanged out with her mom, dad, sister, dog, and cat (Terrie, Andy, Sam, wishbone, blackjack). We drove out to Colorado to see her brother Joe graduate from the Air Force Academy and a couple of days later, while we were still in Colorado, KT arrived directly from Italy.

Somewhere between these winding mountain roads, ear infections, dread-lock-making and mate-sipping sunsets, drives across the middle third of the United States, flights to Italy, soon to come water sales, long distance phone calls, and plenty of long sighs westward, KT and I became a couple.

In July, after having decided I wanted to experience a different Italy, an Italy without school, a working Italy, and an Italy with lots of Italian spoken, I went back to Florence. I went back with 12 euro in my pocket. I sold cold water to thirsty tourists, drove rental cars around from city to city delivering them for tourists, sold cold beer to kids my age at night in Piazza Santa Croce, made tons of friends, nailed down my italian, and in October went back to California, with 6 euro in my pocket.

KT had moved to San Francisco to continue her studies at San Francisco State. I visited her during the month of November. In December I went to Argentina to work on my book, knowing that KT would come visit in just a few weeks....

2005: I was in Argentina, and KT came to visit. Chelsea, another friend of ours from Italy, was also able to come. Travelling in Patagonia during those three weeks I rolled the double cab 2004 Ford Ranger we were driving. Thanks be to God we were ok, with the most serious injury being two cuts of three stitches each on Chelsea’s right elbow. We still had a great three weeks in Argentina. With my finances hit hard after those two tumbles in Patagonia, I had to decide whether to go back to California to work right away, or to stay and work on my book until March, as planned.

I ended up staying in Argentina until the end of March, completing the first revision of the Spanish edition of my book. In April I went back to California, and got a job with Backroads, a company based out of Berkeley that does bike trips all over the world. Before starting with them, however, during the month of May I went to Italy, more specifically to the island of Elba, where I sat on an empty beach and completed the first 22 pages of my book, which were in my head but had not yet been written.

In June I got trained in California by Backroads as a trip leader, and then at the end of June went back to Italy to lead trips in Tuscany until the end of October. The nice thing was that during these four months I was sent to Alaska for three weeks to lead a couple of trips, so on my way there I visited KT in San Francisco, and on my way back to Italy I visited her again.

In mid October it was back to California, until the end of November, when I headed down to Argentina and Chile’s Patagonia to lead trips there for the “winter” season. Of course it meant I was going back to summertime, making it some two years almost without having seen winter.

2006: Again, I began the year in Argentina, this time working for Backroads in Patagonia during the months of January and February. KT came down for new years, and stayed with me for three weeks. During the first few days, I was still working, but we had a good undercover plan so that we could still spend time together without causing distractions to the guests, who actually never found out she was there!

In March I went to our family home in Córdoba, Argentina. It was fantastic to have KT come down again during the time, as well as our good friends John and Dorothy.

At the end of March I went back to California, to take classes and to await the arrival of my first nephew, William “Jameson” Baldwin, who was born on March 29th. Cal Poly San Luis Obispo is still my home campus, but I did all the paperwork necessary to study in the Bay Area (CSU East Bay, Hayward) so that I could be close to KT during Spring Quarter 2006.

In June KT and I moved to the roof of the Art Collective (www.millionfishes.com) we were living at together since April and where she had lived for a couple of years already. And I don’t mean the last floor, I mean the actual roof, like you go outside and there are a bunch of little pebbles on the roof and there was our room, small but with a 360 view of our surroundings. Quite magical, I must say.

I took the entire three weeks of World Cup off to watch all the games, then in July went to Italy to work for a month. On my week off I went to Albania, to visit my friend Joey Deschenes, who is over there with the Peace Corps. We had a fabulous time and I drank plenty of rhaki!

Burning Man was at the end of August. I helped build Monticello, danced with the Royal Society of Powdered Wigs, experienced art in the vastness of the Nevada desert as the Marquis with the Mistress, lost sight of people who were two feet away from me when the dust storm came, and rode my bike-turned-steed circularly with no certain destination but gaining much travel knowledge. Burning Man was a fabulous travel destination.

For fall semester I again did a bunch of paperwork so that I could stay in San Francisco with KT while still advancing with my studies. This time I studied under my Modern Languages Major, taking classes at San Francisco State University (SFSU).

I did the impossible come November and December, when I applied for and got the position of Trip Specialist for Backroads’ Patagonia mountain bike trip. So now I am in charge of any changes to the itinerary, as well as being guaranteed work down there during the December to February “winter” season, which is summer down there.

I say I did the impossible because I flew down to Patagonia for 10 days in mid November, during my Thanksgiving break from school, plus missing a week of school, to set up the season. As I explored the arrayan forests of Patagonia, where lakes meet mountains in a shimmer of silver, KT decided to seek her independence. 

I flew back to California for two weeks to take all my finals, which I arranged to take a week early, said goodbye to KT, and then flew back down to Patagonia to lead trips and - while Orion would dive head first into the southern sky’s hemisphere - shimmer away myself into each sunset, moonrise, body of water, cloud and mountain air from above.

2007: The first two weeks in 2007 brought some big changes. After living in San Francisco for 9 months - tying my Florence record for longest time in one place in the past few years - I moved to San Luis Obispo, where I began my university career back in 2002. I was out of “study abroad” programs I could be a part of, and Cal Poly basically said “Hey, if you want a degree from Cal Poly, you have to study at Cal Poly!” So after more than three years of studying elsewhere, in early January I returned to Cal Poly.

I had no idea where I would be staying, and was blessed when my high school friend Kirk Vaughn said “Dude, I have an extra room and it is all yours until you graduate.” Kirk’s place is on the beach in Pismo Beach, with views of the Pacific from the upper floor. My room is downstairs, but if I sit up just right I can see the ocean too. Thanks Kirk!

I planned my classes so that I would study in the winter and the spring, graduating in June 2007 with a double major in English and Modern Languages. Winter quarter was quite insane, taking 7 upper-division college classes (28 quarter units). I read on weeknights, read on weekends, read, read, read. 

Over spring break I went to Cuba, visited my friend Kevin Repp, then hitchhiked around the island, met two Italians (Sergio and Melania) that I traveled with for two days, built a huge bonfire on a deserted beach with them when it got cold, and when we got hungry, I sharpened a stick and hunted crabs that Sergio cooked on the fire. What a trip!

For my final quarter, Spring 2007, I enrolled in 22 units. My senior project was a finalized version of the beginning of my book. Yes, I know, most exciting!

In mid May I moved to downtown San Luis Obispo, into a collective called The Establishment. It used to be an old hotel for the train station. Now it is a collective living space, with 19 incredible and unique people living there.

A week later, just three weeks before finishing my college career, I crashed my bmx bike after clipping a road barrier (or snagging my pants on the chain), went down hard, bounced my right elbow off the pavement and broke it (the elbow, not the pavement), had surgery, had three titanium screws put in, took Vicodin, stopped taking Vicodin after I realized it was making me stupid and that I could not concentrate, learned to write and draw with my left hand, showed my scar of 11 stitches off, learned how to throw a frizbee with my left hand, scrambled to type away my last college papers with one hand, and graduated with a double major in English and Modern Languages and Literatures on June 16th!!

Because of my injury I had to drop my summer work schedule leading bike trips in Italy for Backroads, so I simply relaxed and enjoyed summer, going to physical therapy twice a week and determined to regain 100% mobility and strength to my right arm, and a mean frizbee throw with my left. I also made a short two-week trip, first to Florida to visit my sister and Greg, then on to New Orleans to visit some family and my friend and ex-college linguistics professor and philosophy authority Aaron Nitzkin.

August and September will be dedicated to regaining my arm strength, with a trip out to Black Rock City in the Nevada Desert with my trusty tricycle steed Galánt in late August to join the rest of the members of Monticello (www.theroyalsocietyofthepowderedwig.com). Come October 1st, I will be ready to work once again.

I am still giving presentations, and will be in California through the end of October and maybe even through November, before going to Patagonia for work in December, so if you want to know more about my trip, email me! My email address for presentations is: