So last summer/ autumn I finally embarked on a long planned and long delayed European cycling tour.
I had planned on this being an in depth tour report, but in all honesty it wasn't writing itself and I'm not that good at witty and engaging writing, so thought I'd go for a shortish write up and let the photo's do the talking.
Anyways I had originally planned to do a similar tour back in 2020, but that was put on hold regrettably due to the pandemic.
By 2023 and after a couple of tours in the UK, it felt I finally had the right setup and was ready to go for it.
The basic plan was to ride from Dunkirk in France to Corfu in Greece, leaving enough wiggle room in my 90 days for things to go wrong in central Europe or carry onto Athens if it all went well.
I would be taking my Trek Remedy full suss bike recently upgraded with Hope Tech 4 V4's and SRAM Eagle for the big alpine climbs and descents.
I know it's not the usual choice of bike for a long tour, but my aim was to ride as much technical singletrack as I possibly could. Plus I like the comfort of a full suss bike.
I would be going fast slow and light with a lightweight tent setup, minimal spare clothes, stove, tools and some spares.
Navigation would be taken care of by my trusty Garmin Etrex, with multiple copies of the route on SD cards in case of mishaps. Back up would be the Komoot app on my phone, which came in handy when having to change route on the go (which is quite often sometimes with a Komoot planned route).
The tour would take me through Northern France, Belgium, Switzerland, Northern Italy, Slovenia, Croatia, Bosnia & Herzegovina, Montenegro, Albania and Greece, passing through a selection of destinations I had been dreaming about visiting for years.
Daily efforts had been planned around keeping sensible distances/ elevations, as I'm not the fittest/ fastest rider and was aware that there would be many slow going sections of trail to delay progress. In hindsight I can definitely say this was the best way strategy for me, as I didn't totally exhaust myself and managed to keep to my schedule.
Luckily by the time I left the Schengen area in Croatia, I knew I had a enough days spare to finish in Athens and set about planning my route through Greece.
Accommodation would be a mix of wild camping, official campsites, B&Bs, hostels, hotels, eco tourism places and villa's. These would be booked on the day depending on how I felt and what was available in the area.
Starting in early June and ending late October, one of the abiding features of the trip was just how relentlessly hot and sunny it was each day. Out of the whole 5 months I could only count a handful of times it actually rained (and more importantly got caught out in it), which is pretty scary to think about.
However when it did rain, boy did it do it properly. One particular storm in the Sarntal comes to mind, cowering in the foetal position on a hillside sure I was going to be struck by lightning.
Early on in tour I soon learned to get up early and on move, to at least get some miles in before the blistering heat came at 9am.
After getting caught out numerous times early on by the midday closure of shops, I soon learned to get my lunchtime baguette, water and other snacks with my breakfast shop.
As is the way with tours like this I did get quite ill on a number of occasions with a stomach bug. Once in Switzerland, once in Italy (Two weeks later) and once in Montenegro. Although the worst of it was over pretty quickly, the after effects wiped me out for up to 8 days each time, which made these weeks quite a struggle.
Luckily the first occurrence coincided with meeting my folks for a week in the Valais Alps, following me around in their campervan, whilst I attempted some of the big passes on the Haute route.
One thing that was concerning me before my trip was wildlife, as I would be heading through areas habitated by bears, wolves and the like. Luckily I didn't see any (Although I did think I nearly stepped in what looked like a bear poo in Bosnia), but what I did see a lot of was dogs.
For the most part they were fine and some stray dogs really broke my heart seeing the state they were in, but Greece was a different story. Never have I come across such a selection of vicious snarling beasts; strays, pets, guard dogs, sheep dogs all out for my blood. On my first couple of days in Greece I had so many attacks, I seriously considered calling it a day. Luckily the situation improved enough for me to carry on.
Reaching Athens was a very weird feeling, I thought I would have felt more jubilation to have finished. It was just a very quiet nondescript finish.
The final stress of the trip was trying to locate a box to pack my bike in. Despite contacting bike shops ahead of my arrival, no one had any available and after a frantic search around all the shops, I had to settle for a flat pack sofa box next to a dumpster and remodel it in my hotel room in to something that resembled a bike box.
I'm pleased to say the bike survived the flight home.
I can honestly say that despite some of the hardships along the way, this was the most surreal and amazing thing I have ever done and so glad I did it.
It's hard to pinpoint exactly what it is was, but guess it was just a culmination of blue skies, amazing trails, beautiful views, stopping off to swim in azure coloured lakes & seas, meeting friendly people along the way and great food.
If you're thinking of doing your own trip and worried your not up to it, I say just go for it. You'd be amazed what your body is capable of and you definitely won't regret it.
Couple of highlights:
Descending off Le Grand Ballon following the GR5 to Thann, such an awesome and long descent.
The views of the western Bernese Alps walking in the hills around Gstaad
Reaching the highest point of the tour on Col de Torrent (2,919m) in the midst of being ruined by a stomach bug (I did have a little cry getting to the top).
Early morning ride along the shores of Lake Como
The day I rode Passo Alpisella, Val Mora and Val Mustair - Just insane trails and views
Riding through the incredible landscapes of the Dolomite's
Rafting on Soca River in Slovenia
Riding singletrack trails with coastal views in Croatia
Climbing Bosnia's highest peak Maglic in the Sutjeska NP with a nice couple I met at the campsite the day before
Walking high up in the Durmitor NP, Montenegro.
Kayaking in the Tara Canyon on the Bosnia/ Montenegro border
The views across Lake Skader to the Albanian Alps
Riding slick rock trails around Tirane, Albania
Admiring the architecture of the places I rode through (Mostar, Berat, Predjama Castle, Ostrog Monastery and the temples in Corinth & Athens particularly spring to mind)
Ustipci (Balkan pancakes) with homemade jam and honey for breakfast
Finding that a shop sells cider and having a midday drink at the beach
Seeing tortoises chilling by the trail for the first time
Still being able to swim in the sea in late October.
I'll let the photos do the talking now:
Looks fantastic! What tent did you use?
Thanks - Trekkertent Stealth 1
Great little tent
More please
Impressively light set up! Inspiring trip, thank you for sharing,!
More to come...
Thanks Anorak.
It took a while to find the right setup, but I think it was worth it in the end
Chapeau. What a trip!
That’s definitely a, err, unique touring bike choice, but jolly good effort!
The dogs sound dire - someone I know bailed from the trans-continental after 1700km ‘cos he could take the stress of the dog attacks anymore, so you did well.
Looks lush. How did you manage power across various electronics using GPS all day long?
Amazing. What a great adventure 😀
Thanks for sharing
Sounds and looks like an awesome trip and route..... 👌😁 Totally my kind of touring, endless road days would break me..
Do you have a route gpx? Or some Strava link etc.....
Pics are cracking also, looks like the weather behaved for the most part? Bar the heat it was fairly stormy last year (I live in Croatia.... Last summer/autumn was brutally hot. Pretty much did not have a winter this year.... Lush but worrying)
Nice! How much technical singletrack did you actually ride? (Ie was it enough to justify the extra weight and draggy tyres?)
Long tours are great aren't they.
Different style to mine but the same peace of mind. Not having to be home in two weeks alters the mentality.
Great stuff
This looks fantastic. How was wild camping in those different countries?
Brilliant, inspiring, well done, and thanks for the post!
Congratulations! What an adventure!
How did you deal with the dogs? Kick 'em in the snout and then pedal like f*ck!? Or did you get creative with a bike pump or anything to give them something to think about? I read about people riding the Transcontinental with rocks in their bar bag ready to lob at dogs! Mad!
Thanks for this. Looks great. Love the idea of the FS bike. I think people, including me waste too much time worrying about which bike. In the end you pedal and they move forward.
Do you have some stats on total distance etc?
This seems SO ace, it deserves a wripe-up on a blog/wordpress account so that more people can see it and some more details can be shared!
Brilliant trip. Chapeau!
How did you plan the route? Were you sure that the trails you picked were ridable before setting off?
Looks like a great trip, well done!
+1 to ampthill... If it's a holiday, not a race, take the fun bike and don't try and race through everything without seeing it.
Awesome!
Superb.
One day...
just fantastic mate. what a great adventure.
best thread for ages.
If you ever get the chance to go riding in Omis, then take it. One of my favourite days riding
Oh my there are some beautiful trails on that trip
I'm not sure what's most impressive, the ride or that fact you successfully uploaded so many photos.
Sounds like an amazing trip
Proper staunch effort, fantastic.
Looks like you spent a bit of time off the bike- did you have to make any special efforts for bike security?
Epic trip and good write up - I'd say you're easily a good enough writer to turn that into a longer more detailed version if you CBA.
Some of my photos I may have added a little filter to bring out the colours, but believe me this one didn't need a filter
So what happened to the tyre?
Awesome, absolutely bloody awesome.
Best bit for me is the bike choice and the off-road/singletrack/fun part. I guess it would have been tempting to to just stick to the roads and chip away at the massive distance.
@stwhannah - this would make a great magazine article.
Superb effort!
I bet you were a lot fitter and faster when you got home!
Did much stuff break?
Would you do anything different next time?
Fabulous thread.
Certainly was a trip of a lifetime.
How easy was it to find fresh water to keep hydrated?
- What's the story with the zip ties and the tyre/rim?
- Why no pictures of the dogs?
- How was riding the single track with such a loaded bike?
- What would you do differently next time?
OK, fine. I'll stop using the car to go to the trails and just ride there instead!
Fantastic effort and it looks like an amazing trip.
Thread of the year and its only March.
Absolutely brilliant mate!! very very jealous.
You need to run a Q&A with all the questions.
@ricko1984 do you realise the negative effect your post has had on the UK's national productivity? How many people do you think are right now looking at maps and Komoot? How many are spending hours speccing the ideal singletrack bikepacking setup?
That looks amazing. What a trip!
Thanks for the photos and write up.
That looks and sounds an amazing trip, thanks for sharing!
Fantastic trip and pics. I have been lucky enough to do three multi-month tours. Road based. There is a sense of freedom that comes from having no appointments or dealines. Just packing the bike, riding, camping, repeat. First one was 11 weeks. Using paper maps. No mobile phone. Only contact was using my netbook when I got wifi in any small towns I passed through. Once is never enough. Domestic arrangements mean I'm unable to do long tours right now. Managed a month last year but I will do another in a few years.
Amazing trip!
Best bit for me is the bike choice and the off-road/singletrack/fun part. I guess it would have been tempting to to just stick to the roads and chip away at the massive distance.
100% this, makes it much closer to something I can relate to.
I bet your bicep/glove/knee tanlines were incredibly defined by the end of it!
Awesome thread, thank you for taking the time to post.
Can you show us the route on a map somehow? (turn it into a Strava segment maybe 😉 )
Fantastic achievement!
I gave up a hiking trip in Greece due to the dogs, so kudos for persevering!
I thought this would be worth a read and am glad I came back to it when I had the time… I’m slightly jealous (having cancelled both my personal biggish - but nowhere near as a big as yours - ride plans due to COVID and post financial crash job loss). I’m also impressed by the commitment to ride big, wild stuff on your own. I think that’s quite something and I know it would have held me back. Thanks for sharing
oops..didn't mean to post those last photos twice
Anyways thanks again all for taking an interest in the trip and nice to know that my little weird idea dreamed up a couple of years ago struck a chord with so many of you.
Now I've had a chance to go through your questions, I'll start responding to them:
For powering electronics essentially I had 2No sets of Eneloop Pro batteries for my GPS that I rotated after charging in a mini charger that I had. I would usually get 3-4 days life out of each set. The same charger also charged the batteries for my head torch.
My phone had 2No sets of batteries that again I would rotate after charging. With the phone mostly switched off or in flight mode, again I would get 3-4 days out of a battery.
The above would be charged up whenever I stayed in some accommodation or dropped by a cafe/ restaurant.
For a music obsessive like myself it was also important to have an MP3 player to listen to music in my tent at night, although the temperamental like b@gger wouldn't turn on sometimes.
I also had a backup powerpack, which also doubled as the battery for my Magicshine light, but I didn't end up using it that much in all honesty.
Generally had no issues with running out of power, unless on the occasion that I arrived somewhere I hadn't anticipated different plug sockets (Such as arriving in Switzerland or older Italian residences) and so would have to find a shop next day that sold an adapter.
I'm currently bring my GPX's up to date to take account of unplanned route changes, which there were quite a lot of.
I'd plan my routes using the Komoot mtb planning function and cross reference that against Google Maps/ Streetview, itineraries off mtb websites and scouring Youtube videos.
In general I'd have a fairly good idea what I was letting myself in for, but sometimes it just wasn't possible with the information available. This led to some surprises both good and bad.
Croatia in particular had a knack for paths/ dirt loads disappearing into nothing, usually with a nice big spiders web across it to catch unsuspecting cyclists. This was a shame as there is so much potential for great mtb riding in the country. To balance it out though Croatia also had some of my favourite trails of the tour.
Holy cow. Amazing. You weren't kidding when you said you were going light!
Wow. Awesome.
Looks amazing. Makes me want to do something similar again.
Think I've ridden that path before.
Awesome stuff, thanks for sharing!
I did a lot more wild camping earlier on in the tour.
Generally it was fine, but I tried to keep myself out of view, which led to some less than ideal dirt patches in woodland. Still it's all part of the fun though and I did end up having some pretty nice spots as well, such as below:
Later on after my second round of being sick and heading into increasingly wilder places in the south (With wilder animals) my resolve cracked and I mostly stuck to official accommodation.
With regards to the dog situation, if I weren't far enough away to get a good head start, I'd usually just stop, get off my bike, place it between me & them and calmly talk to them. Usually after a bit they'd calm down/ lose interest and wonder off. Sometimes a local would step in to give the dogs a good talking to and I'd make my escape.
Always kept some stones in my top tube bag just in case they didn't get the message.
With regards to the bike its always difficult to choose one that meets all kinds of riding you'd encounter on a tour such as this, but yeah I think I chose right with the full suss.
It definitely came into it's own on a lot of the trails in the alps and some of the rockfests in Croatia, but even if the going was smooth or asphalt I never felt begrudging of the knobbly tyres. I just accepted it as part of the package, along with the funny looks from the other tourer's I met along the way 😉.
Nice one Alpin, somewhere in the Ritten?
Packing list for the weight weenies:
Alpkit 20L bar bag
Ortileb 11L seat bag
Revelate 4L frame bag
Revelate jerrycan bag
Btwin gas tank bag
Salomon 20L backpack
Trekkertent Stealth 1 tent with carbon posts
Thermarest Neoair XLite Torso length sleeping pad
Mammot Hydrogen down sleeping bag
Sea to Summit dry bag
1 x Lightweight running boxers
1 x Decathlon running trousers
1 x Icebreaker long sleeve top
1 x Knee length compression socks
Montane down jacket
Some Amazon aqua shoes
Small Karrimor dry bag
1 x Endura padded shorts
1 x Endura Singletrack Lite shorts
1 x Endura long sleeve top
1 x socks
Scarpa Crux shoes
Giro Montaro helmet
Rab Nexus hooded mid layer
Endura Hummvee Lite gloves
Montane Minimus jacket
Gorewear Paclite waterproof trousers
Sealskin gloves
TLD knee pads
Lightweight buff
Ray Ban Wayfarer sunglasses
Inov8 2L bladder
Katadyn BeFree 1L filter bottle
2 x spare bladder bite nipples
Udderly Smooth chamois cream
SPF 50 sun cream
Handgel
Toothbrush and toothpaste
Wet wipes
Small bottle of shower gel
Microfibre towel
The Deuce #2 UL trowel
Toilet roll
Vango compact stove
Gas canister
Toaks 450L titanium mug
Plastic spoon
Leatherman tool
Black diamond headtorch with spare rechargeable batteries
Cateye rear light
Magicshine Monteer 3500 front light with helmet mount and 5,200mAh battery/ powerpack
Garmin Etrex 30 GPS with spare Eneloop Pro rechargeable batteries
Small battery charger
Plug adapter and leads
Samsung Galaxy XCover phone with spare battery
Waterproof phone case
Sandisk Clip MP3 player
Paper and a pencil
PDF phrase sheet
PDF itinerary/ information sheet
Copies of important documents
Passport
2 x debit cards, 1 x credit card, driving licence and GHIC card
Toolwrap with multi tool, tubeless repair kit, tube repair kit, tyre levers, shock pump, tyre pump, cassette tool, wire cutters, small adjustable spanner, dry lube, rag, 2No spare mech hangers, 3no spare brake pads, spare cable, zip ties, wrap of duct tape, dental floss, spare spokes.
Super glue, repair patches for tent/ sleeping mat
First aid kit, various pills/ gels, moisturiser cream, lip balm
Ankle support
Knee support
Yes I did only wear one pair of padded shorts for the whole trip!
Good lord, some trip tht. Quite inspirational and (selfishly) depressing at the same time. Liking the bike choice.
How was it landing back in the UK, dare I ask?
Jimmy - quite an adjustment to say the least.
I think I spent the whole of November and December in perpetual holiday blues mode, after the initial 'its nice to be back' honeymoon period. It didn't help though coming back to what seemed like the most miserable winter in recent memory.
Hence any fitness I did have has kind of gone off a cliff and now probably in the worst shape I have been in a long time. I'm confident though that as spring progresses I'll get it back.