On June 1, Keizer resident Brent Lee Bundy launched his bicycle ride from Seaside to Staten Island, New York.

An amazing achievement for anyone, but this is his sixth coast-to-coast bike ride after a car accident and subsequent strokes which forced him to relearn how to walk, talk and eat.

This will be his sixth cross-country bike ride he said. With his first in 2006 to raise awareness for breast cancer. Gina Kosmas, a former high school friend, who died in 2004 at 35, inspired the ride.

The family has a Seaside connection: Kosmas’s in-laws have retired here.

Bundy said he likes to jog “way more” than bike. “But I wasn’t going to run across the United States and carry all that stuff.”

He will travel alone carrying 80 pounds, including tents, clothes and camping equipment. “It’s just got tons of stuff on it,” he said.

June is Bundy’s preferred travel month. This trip, he will bicycle through Idaho, to Utah, Wyoming, Nebraska, Iowa, Illinois, Ohio, Pennsylvania, New Jersey and then New York. In his travels, he’s established a lot of friendships, he said. “I don’t do it to raise money, I do it to raise awareness,” he said.

Follow the ride on Twitter, @Brentleebundy1.