On the very first night of our first as-a-couple Big Road Trip back in 1997, my sister in New Mexico gave me back my old Univega touring bike she used in college and for a few years afterward. However, we were eastbound, and that bike rode tied on the top of the truck shell all the way out to Wisconsin and upper Michigan and back for several weeks, through the rain, heat, wind, and bugs - many thousands of miles.
And then it sat for years in rusty decrepit shape until I rebuilt it as a neighborhood 6 speed, then a 3 speed, and now semi-permanently as a fixie.