The next day we tiptoed out of our beds at an obscene 5am, getting ready for our big journey home. We waited outside with some other travelers for a bus to Edmonton Airport, where we would flying out next day. The bus arrived late and was unhappy to have our extra large and unwieldy bike boxes into the back. Despite us paying for the oversized baggage, he threw the boxes around like they weren't many thousands of dollars of delicate gear. The bus left Jasper behind and, surprisingly, the entire town would burn to the ground less than two weeks later. We were incredibly lucky with the timing of our trip and were very upset to hear about the devastation to the gorgeous surrounding nature. The bus driver, it would seem, was sponsored by Timmy Horton’s as we took not one but TWO pit stops there on our 3 hour journey. I got back at the driver for manhandling Poppy by (accidentally) spilling coffee all over the floor of the bus when a large bump jostled my drink. When we finally FINALLY got to the airport, we wandered around with our cart of huge boxes, going up and down the same elevator and talking to more unhelpful information assistants. They would not let us store our bike in the temporary luggage storage area because we were not on a connecting flight aka we weren’t on a layover and they couldn’t trust our bike boxes

by Ziven:

Elisa and I returned to the Bay, and my sister picked us up from the airport. Our bikes missed the connecting flight and would be delivered to our house later. Things like that didn’t phase us anymore, and we were both happy to be home. Elisa was staying with my family for a couple days so that she could help me clean up everything Great Divide related. We took our rigs apart, cleaning everything. We washed the bags, the bikes, and our camping equipment. The only thing we didn’t wash was our rainfly, which was still a sore subject. With our down time, we regaled my family with all the stories fresh in our minds, and enjoyed doing nothing.

I wasn’t quite ready to start looking for a job while Elisa was still with me, but as soon as she left I started the hunt. My job search was brutal and lasted about a month and a half. After the freedom of the Great Divide, settling on a job that could become a career felt overwhelming. I wanted nothing more than to find the perfect job, but felt that it did not even exist. Did I want to start my own company or have a cushy job working 30 hours a week? Did I want to focus on making money or being happy? I went into the Great Divide with many of these questions and assumed they would be answered by the end. However, I realized that answers don’t generally appear out of thin air, but rather take effort to find. Every single minute of every day of the trip had been packed to the brim. Ride, food, ride, food, ride, sleep, repeat. I could have thought about my life while riding, but it was too much for me to have uncertainty about the present and future at the same time. Instead, I used the time living at home to work through all my internal questions. It was also far more productive to use actual job posting to guide my understanding of actual career options. In the end, I obtained 4 job offers and took a role as a Mechanical Engineer at a startup in San Francisco. In hindsight, the choice was easy. I have wanted to be a part of a startup my entire life, and it was only until I recovered from the Great Divide that I remembered.

When I say recovered from the Great Divide, I don’t just mean physically. In fact, we both felt pretty great immediately after the trip. The only symptoms Elisa and I had were a burning hunger for about 10 days after returning, which we made sure to satisfy. Another odd quirk I picked up was an obsession with gas stations. I was still in the foraging mindset, in which food was always scarce and calories burned needed replenishing. Every gas station I saw resulted in a tug pulling me towards an iced tea, ice cream, and snacks to go. It’s especially prominent at work, where we have a fridge stocked weekly with food and drinks!

I have been working for a little over three months at the time of writing this, and I have loved almost every day. I hit the ground running and built a product that we premiered during Art Basel in Miami, Dec. 5th 2024. I’m now taking a short Winter break before going back to work where we’ll build the rest of the product and company. I have a serenity now, partially from the Great Divide. I know what I want in life and I am working to get it, and there is nothing more calming to me than that. I’m still an anxious person, but the trip gave me a lasting self confidence that I can do anything. While I can’t speak to exactly how the trip has affected Elisa, I will say that she is as brilliant as ever. She continues to lead clubs, conquer her classes, and even has a badass internship planned for the Summer of 2025. The trip brought us closer together, because immense struggle strips a person down to their simplest form that makes it exceedling easy to see and love them. I love Elisa, and looking in a mirror I love myself too.