New Website "Where's George"

As Labor day is fast approaching and the end of another summer is upon us, it's finally time for me to announce my new website and new plans.  I have been dreaming of a new adventure for a very long time, actually since I returned from Alaska my mind has not been the same, constantly trying to figure out how I could do a much longer trip and still maintain the family happy.  It hasn't been easy but I'm finally approaching the end of this long road.

I started thinking about designing a new website because of the limitations of blogger and also because of the name I am using for my current blog.  I already mentioned in a previous post that "Riding The USA" implies riding inside the US but this new trip was going to be over many countries.  First I started researching names and testing to see if the domain was available and of course checking Facebook and Instagram for similar names. After I had a name picked I registered the domain, the Facebook page and the Instagram name.  Soon after I registered another domain and ended up with two domains registered with their respective Facebook and Instagram pages.  I started getting followers on both pages on Facebook even though I hadn't announced either page.  I then had a dilemma, I liked both names and setup both sites identically including making the same posts on both with the same dates. After enlisting my family and a few close friends for their opinion, almost unanimously the first name I had picked was the one people liked the most.  With the name settled it is now time to announce it.

The first new website was setup over two years ago and the first post to test the design was done on May 14th, 2015.  The second post was done on September 28th of the same year.  Since then I have been tweaking the design, adding a few galleries to test plugins, added links to social media pages and most importantly adding a count down timer to keep me sane.  The day I added the timer and put in a preliminary departure date, the number that first appeared was slightly over 700 days.  Since then I have watched it slowly tick down the seconds, minutes and hours until it dropped below 700, then 600, 500, 400 and finally 300 days.   The counter stands as of today at 273 days to go.  Watching the counter is worse than watching grass grow as the saying goes but even worse is looking at the travel fund and not seeing it grow as much as I was expecting.

I still have a lot to do and plan before I leave but barring a major catastrophe or health issue the departure date will be sometime in June 2018.   For an idea of what my plan is, click on the "About" page and at the bottom you will see the "Dream".  Follow up post on this site and on the new website will describe my plan in more detail.  I will make posts about everything as the date approaches, from bike preparation, equipment I will use and route planning.
I chose this template for the website because I want the last five post's "featured" photo to scroll in slideshow fashion at the top.  Currently only two are sliding because there's only two posts on the site.
Please feel free to comment on anything you see wrong or you think I should address.   Your opinion is very much appreciated.  Now, without further ado:

Where's George Adventure