Excerpt from my interview with Barry Lachapelle, which can be read over at bikegeardatabase.com
Erik (known to many as @truemarmalade) is the first interviewee that I have met in real life, and meeting him made me a bit nervous. I'm a bit of an introvert. I'll admit before Erik showed up on the island, I was putting up walls to protect myself from incoming unknown human interactions. I have been following Erik for a while now and have seen a ton of his content on Instagram. Even though you see a person online, you never really know what they may be like in real life, especially when you've invited them to stay at your house for a few days.
But my pretense was unwarranted. Not only was Erik a fantastic houseguest and immediately got along with my dog, but I learned that he was also a designer, is a descendant of Benjamin Franklin, has bikepacked over 50,000km (31,000mi) in the past year and a half, and has managed to do it as a Type-1 diabetic and eating out of dumpsters. Erik became a fast friend in the few days he stayed with me.
I very quickly understood that not only is Erik smart as hell—he is able to communicate his many ideas and behaviors in an eloquent and convincing manner. We batted around ideas for cycling apps, talked about how he grew up, and everything in between. We spent a day experiencing how Erik lives on his bike. We pedalled road after road, aimlessly collecting Wandrer points and checking dumpsters in Victoria for food and other goodies.
My time with Erik taught me more than a few things. But mainly, I was inspired by his adaptability in embracing a minimalist, adventurous lifestyle through cargo bikepacking. His fearlessness, not just in his culinary and bikepacking adventures, but in how open and transparent he is about it all. If anything, Erik is his own human and seems more comfortable than most people I have met—something to admire.