Riding the Pan-American Highway
November 14, 2025 — It was mid-2022 when Reed Roffis ’18 heard a podcast about a cyclist who had biked around the world.
Roffis, who was a theatre major at Grinnell, had recently returned home to Boulder, Colorado, after spending a frustrating year in Los Angeles pursuing an acting and comedy career. Disillusioned with the industry and wondering what to do with his life, he suddenly had an answer.
Reed Roffis ’18
“I’ve always enjoyed adventure stories, and it sparked my imagination,” he says. “It had never crossed my mind that biking around the world was something that people did.”
Roffis did some research and decided to take on the longest and hardest ride he could find: The 19,000-mile Pan-American Highway, a network of roads running from Alaska to the southern tip of Argentina.
“I felt it would be good for personal growth, and it would be an interesting story,” said Roffis, whose Grinnellian parents are C.J. Roffis ’82 and Leah Bradley ’84, and whose uncle is Clifford Roffis ’78.
“I figured I’ll do this ride and make a film about it.” He also raised money as he rode for the Colorado Foundation for Conductive Education, which serves children with disabilities.
Roffis started the journey in June 2024 in Deadhorse, Alaska, by the Arctic Ocean. “I was the most out of shape I’d ever been and figured I would get in shape as I went along,” says Roffis, who wasn’t an avid cyclist beforehand. His bike was loaded with a tent, sleeping bag, camera supplies, and two weeks’ worth of food. It weighed a massive 100 pounds.
The first part of the journey took him from Deadhorse to Fairbanks, about 500 miles over 12 days with 37,000 feet of climbing. He typically spent at least six hours a day on the bike. “On the sixth day I met another guy doing the same trip, so we biked together the next six days. That was typical,” Roffis says. “You spend a lot of time alone and then you meet someone.”
Reed Roffis ’18 poses for a photo at the beginning of his journey in June 2024 along the Dalton Highway in Alaska.
Roffis traveled through Mexico, spending five months enjoying delicious food and exploring the sites, followed by Guatemala, Honduras, Nicaragua, Costa Rica, and Panama.
He made it to Colombia, where some type of infection forced him to make frequent pitstops. Roffis visited doctors and tried antibiotics, but it didn’t help. With his visa about to expire, he returned to Boulder in August after logging nearly 8,000 miles. He will re-start the adventure in Colombia next summer.
Roffis has been documenting the trip on Instagram, and says it’s been fascinating so far. “Alaska is incredible and wild. I saw reindeer and bears and giant musk ox and moose in the Arctic, as well as massive mountains.”
One night in the Yukon, he heard breathing and snorting outside his tent. Roffis stepped out in his underwear, and a black bear who’d been attracted to his food lunged. “I sprayed it and the bear retreated, but I could still hear it in the trees nearby,” says Roffis, who flagged down a car and got a ride to the next town, where he slept next to a gas station.
Mexico, he says, featured incredible culture, along with pyramids, churches, and cathedrals. “In South America I heard howler monkeys screaming in the trees and saw toucans, giant waterfalls, and amazing scenery.”
Roffis is pictured riding along the coast in Panama as he makes his way through Central America.
He and a friend spent a week at the one portion of the Pan Am Highway that isn’t accessible: the Darién Gap, a remote and dangerous path through rain forests and swamp that’s used by migrants on the border between Colombia and Panama.
“We were at a marina looking for a sailboat ride to get through,” Roffis says. “We finally got on a tour boat that went through an archipelago and the San Blas islands inhabited by a local indigenous tribe. We spent time with them, which was spectacular.”
Canada was the toughest physically and mentally, says Roffis, who spent weeks without seeing anyone as he tackled steep mountain roads. He also learned that the world isn’t as dangerous as some think.
“There’s this idea in America that in Mexico and other countries that you’ll get kidnapped and murdered by the cartels, but I biked straight through Sinaloa and camped outside and never once had a bad encounter with anyone. Everyone I met was super lovely. I would camp in alleys, residential areas, town squares, and public parks and never once had a scary or bad encounter.”
For now, Roffis is working and going to school to be a high school science teacher (he was nearly a biology/theatre double major at Grinnell). He’s also looking forward to continuing the journey next summer.
“This is my way of telling my own story and taking some control back creatively, which isn’t there when you’re an actor auditioning,” says Roffis, who hopes to make a career out of adventuring, filmmaking, and writing.
—by Anne Stein ’84