Click here to see a slideshow of Rick Gunn's homecoming set to music!

The 44-year-old South Lake Tahoe resident completed his around-the-world bicycle journey Saturday at the same location he left from on July 1, 2005. His bike came to a stop on the south end of the Golden Gate Bridge, where he fell into the arms of a couple dozen family members and friends.

While he was gone, people kept in contact with Gunn by e-mail or visiting him at various locations, but they usually followed his progress through the 55 journals and photographs that were published in the Tahoe Daily Tribune and Nevada Appeal, where he worked as a photographer.

“Obviously, as a father, I am proud of him,” said Richard Gunn. “And it’s always hard to separate myself from being his father, but it’s almost as if he’s become a holy man. Just reading all his journals, there is a very special quality about him. The people he met, he offered his friendship and kindness, and he got more than that back in return. Those kind of qualities make him a special person.”

Several members of the South Shore cycling community were there to congratulate Gunn on his journey. Gary and Becky Bell, two of the area’s best-known outdoors enthusiasts, shook their heads in amazement.

“He’s made people in Tahoe proud,” said Gary Bell, owner of Sierra Ski and Cycle Works. “He’s made people inspired. He’s made people think; when they’re on the couch, saying they can’t do something, that they need to think about Rick.

“He’s always going at it and looking over that next ridgeline, and I love that about him. I didn’t fully get the concept of what he was going to do until he e-mailed that letter out about him riding 25,000 miles. I would see his stories and pictures, but it still didn’t hit me until I saw that number.”

During his 34-month trip, he cycled through the United States, Europe, Asia and Australia. In New Zealand, he passed the 24,000-mile mark, which he thought was the circumference of the Earth but later learned actually is 24,902 miles.

So he flew to Hawaii in late February to circumnavigate the island of Maui, then to Vancouver, British Columbia, and cycled south along the Pacific Coast until he reached San Francisco.

Along the way, he wrote journals in toilet stalls, slept in boxing rings, ate sheep intestines and contracted dysentery. He cycled in 120-degree temperatures (Death Valley) and below-zero temperatures (Tibet). Through it all, he developed an ability to survive.

In the Australian Outback, with $3 to his name and his food supply dwindling, he came across a kangaroo that recently had been hit by a truck. He dragged the carcass off the road, took out his knife, inserted it into the animal’s leg and proceeded to cut himself several kangaroo steaks that lasted him until his next check.

“When you go on a trip like this, all your senses are heightened,” Gunn said. “I didn’t watch a lot of television, but I could spot an electrical outlet from 250 yards away. I could spot a water source from a mile away. You are reduced to the very basics. Everything becomes a resource.”

Gunn estimated he camped more than 800 nights in the past three years, enjoying the comforts of a hotel room only when the price was right, when family and friends visited him or when strangers along the way invited him into their home.

To stay afloat financially, Gunn rented his Al Tahoe house for $600 per month to three different tenants — and received several thousand dollars from Swift Newspapers, parent company of the Tahoe Daily Tribune — but the price tag grew uncontrollably as the months passed.

South Shore-based photographer Eric Jarvis sent Gunn replacement parts for his camera to the tune of about $5,000. The only original part of his bicycle remaining is the rear derailer.

When Gunn returns to South Lake Tahoe this week (he’s spending a few days with his family in the Bay Area), he will begin the process of piecing his day-to-day life back together.

He doesn’t have a car or a job, and he has a $20,000 loan to pay back. All these obstacles, he said, are a small price to pay for what he said was a truly transcendent experience that illuminated humanity’s greatest asset — learning to love and to not be afraid.

“The most dangerous place I visited was north Baltimore,” Gunn said. “Seriously, we have nothing to fear in these other countries. ... As far as getting a job, I’m getting really good at saying, ‘Welcome to McDonald’s, how can I help you?’ ”

This story originally appeared in the Tahoe Daily Tribune on May 5. The Tahoe Daily Tribune is owned by Swift Communications, tahoe.com's parent company.

Click here to see a slideshow of Rick Gunn's homecoming set to music!