Brett Dickerson displaying his tent as essential gear

WARSAW — A local man has clocked more than 9,000 miles cycling the globe.

In March, 2015, Brett Dickerson, 36, Warsaw, hopped on his bicycle without any idea where his next stop would be. This turned into 10 months of riding, living day by day. He said not much is really needed when you start out, just a few essentials.

“So many people might ask themselves what do I take for a bike ride for a weekend. We always think we need so much,” Dickerson said.

Dickerson didn’t invest any money in his trip until about three months in.

“I didn’t have bags, I didn’t have ‘waterproofs,’ I didn’t have anything and that was great because it kind of helped me work out some of the kinks in my planning and in my mentality of what I was going to be okay with on this trip,” he said.

After three months, he decided he is “okay with” a pouch tied to his handlebars, holding his tent, a sleeping pad and a rainfly for his tent. Dickerson also has a frame bag for his tools: chain lube, WD-40, patch kits and an Allen wrench toolkit, essential for bike fixes on the fly.

He has two saddlebags on the back of his bike. “You think you need to pack all of these clothes and all of this ‘stuff’ for ‘just in case,’ but you don’t,” he said. “Probably my hygiene wasn’t as nice as everyone would have liked over that 10 months, but you just got to roll with it.”

Compression sacks for his clothes keeps things dry and he says it’s a good idea to have an extra dry bag. This could easily turn into a placemat, backpack or sling. “You have to have things that can double, triple, even quadruple their intended purpose,” Dickerson said. His Sea to Summit cooking pot has been used as a bowl, cup and cooking pot. “I shouldn’t tell you other things I’ve done with that,” he said jokingly.

Dickerson’s Sea to Summit cooking pot (Photos by Michelle Reed)

A Sea to Summit cooking pot is a collapsible silicone pot with an anodized aluminum base that allows cooking over an open flame, which Dickerson uses with a standard three-prong element. He also carries a canister of butane for the element.

Dickerson has traveled through 11 countries and six states with this gear. “It’s just what I was comfortable taking or, rather, what I was comfortable not having, “ he said.

Considering books cumbersome, Dickerson reads on a tablet. He also listens to music and podcasts while cycling. He also takes this time to learn languages and has downloaded a French language learning app. “Nine hours a day, you need something to occupy your mind because the distance you travel in your head far exceeds the distance you will travel on the road,” he said.

Dickerson came back from overseas last year. He flew from Mongolia to Seattle because he had a longing to immerse back into U.S. culture. After visiting with his family he’ll be heading to Texas, then he’ll ride to South Carolina. From there he’s going to fly to Morocco and continue his journey. When asked when his journey will be over he said, “I’ll call it quits when it’s not fun anymore.”