When I started this site in January 2020, I intended it to be purely about the wonders of bike touring in Europe and beyond, and specifically about a more relaxed approach to bike touring that was about good hard days on the bike, followed by checking into a nice hotel, and going out for a big fat dinner of the local specialities, accompanied by a nice glass of wine. Or two. For purely medicinal purposes. About making it more accessible for those of us whose bodies are old enough to appreciate a warm bath and a big soft bed, whose budgets will stretch to it, and who can’t take months out on a continent-long trip, but just want a few weeks every year to get out there. When I read advice that you should choose a name for your site that is sufficiently generic that it can take later changes of direction, I thought “but I only want to write about bike touring…”
Fate had other ideas. First I came off my bike – again – and broke a collarbone, and then the day I was cleared to go, the lockdown was imposed.
So I have let this site go in a new direction, musing about the happiness of the past, the joy of living in the now, and the pleasure of looking forward to the future. But above all, I want to write about that intense privilege of being alive that we never appreciated sufficiently before, but which is so important to us now.
So I am using this site to write about being alive in all our senses: seeing beautiful sights, hearing wonderful sounds, smelling sublime scents, tasting great food and drink, and that previously most neglected of senses: the sense of touch. Neglected until the only touch we could make with another human was an awkward elbow to elbow. Neglected until we had spent long months without a loved one in our arms.
But the funny thing is, that the more that I have mused about living, the more that I have come to the conclusion that bike touring is when I feel most alive. In the thick of it all, I managed a ride through Brittany and 1,500 km through central and northern Italy. The strangest of times and the most intense of times, and being out on a bike was a release from it all.
So here is what I wrote in January 2020. I feel that it is more valid than ever. So go live and get on that bike. While you can.
At least once a year, I head off for a few weeks of bike touring. There is absolutely no better way of seeing the world up close. Compared to a car or train, you have the time to appreciate not just the sights but also the sounds and the smells: flowers, the sea, fires burning. You can stop pretty much whenever and wherever you want to admire the scenery or stop in a village and watch the world go by. You are out there, just you and the bike, the sun on your skin and joy in your heart.
And your body feels so gloriously alive: legs, lungs, heart pumping, whether you are cruising along on the flat, enjoying a spectacular descent, or pushing yourself up a long hill, steadily pedalling away to the brow. You reach the end of a day’s ride weary but healthy and enriched, and ready for a good meal and excellent sleep.
There are thousands of sites dedicated to bike touring and adventures, ranging from the blogs of those on round the world trips lasting many years to commercial sites offering high-end trips on racing bikes along the stages of the Tour de France with your luggage travelling ahead of you. And if these are what you enjoy or what your budget will cover, go for it. The more of us out there touring by bike, the better, as it means greater recognition by tourism authorities, transport companies, and accommodation providers.
But there are very few sites dedicated to the joys and practicalities of short holidays of a few days to a few weeks that you can plan yourself and that combine the joy of getting out there in the daytime and experiencing great scenery with the comfort of checking into a nice hotel with a comfortable bed and then going out for a decent dinner with a glass of wine. Or two. And usually for far less than you would imagine.
This is the way that I tour and l LOVE it, and I think that more people should experience it.
Bike touring does not need to be a massive adventure on $5 a day at one extreme or cost the earth at the other: it can simply be fun and a fantastic way to see countries.
So this site is for me to share my adventures, provide some of the lessons learnt on my travels and hopefully convince more people to take it up. Let me know what you think.
