[Closed] Motorcycling around Europe for a couple of months

Cochem, Ardennes, nurburgring, Spa, Malmedy are all fantastic areas to ride

Biggest hurdle is you can't ride overseas on L plates.

Other than that I think it's an awesome plan. Wish I could have done similar with my Dad. I'm losing him every day to dementia now and regret not doing more with him when I could.

Looks like you can fast track an A2 licence. He's a good car driver so hopefully some road sense!

Sounds like a good idea!

Did a road trip (with a fair amount off road) with my lad when he was 21. Only a couple of weeks, not a couple of months. It was great.

Do it.

I read a book about just this not too long ago: Uneasy Rider, by Mike Carter

Excellent read and may give your boy an idea of what he's getting himself into (in a good way).

How old is your son?  At 24 he can do the Direct Access (DAS) and go straight for the A licence.  But an A2 will still get a nice size bike.

A blast around Europe sounds like a great idea - hey, we're only here on this planet for a short time, so enjoy it while we can!

EDIT: Just noticed you said he's 19 so ignore the first bit.

But do it anyway and have fun 🙂

Do it! The discipline and distraction of getting through the test in a couple of months will help.

places to think about going: Pyrenees, med coast of France, alpes maratime and Italian riviera. The alps themselves are great, but be aware that it can regularly chuck it down for days on end. The famous passes can also get really annoyingly busy.

the Black Forest, Rheinland and Hartz mountains are all beautiful, with amazing tarmac. German tourist board have several downloadable motorbike tours throughout the country.

for a long, long trip I’d plan snippets in Tyre or MyRoute-app then send them to either a Garmin or TomTom Rider on a daily basis. Booking.com is really good as most places give you 24hrs cancellation which allows you to be flexible.

choice of bike for a long tour with an a2? Something more than a single. Restricted Tiger 600, bmw f6/75/80 0gs, fazer 400? Or left field choice Honda nc700?

edit: by all means go to Adenau, watch some people on the ‘ring, but I would strongly advise against taking him on a lap. It’s nasty, unforgiving place on a motorcycle.

A guy from work and his pal travelled to Romania with the pal having just passed his test. By Romania his confidence and skills had come on a lot.

Happened across this the other day and think the author might be a stw member (?)

http://yodagoat.blogspot.com/2017/12/scotland-to-russia-and-back-again.html

My suggestion is that a couple of months would be too long.  3 - 4 weeks

Get him a direct access test and training so he can have a decent sized bike, get him as much riding in the UK first, get radio intercoms

I don't ride a motorbike and neither does my dad, but one of my bucket list items is touring around Europe with him just like this. If you can make it happen, it sounds like a great opportunity for both of you.

Provence in France and the French-Swiss-Italian border region (head east and south from Geneva towards Lake Garda) are two places I've toured by bicycle which have looked really popular with motorbikes and with good reason (great roads, scenery, cafés)

Thanks all, the support for doing it to spend time together is great. And good info re routes and license stuff, looking into all that now.

Interested re a couple months being too long ... genuinely why?

Has he seen / read long way round/down?

As a new rider, riding in Europe is no more difficult than riding in UK. Possibly easier (except Bulgaria - believe me)

Get an A2 (I presume he can't do an A1?) and get on with it - will be amazing!!

I'm very happy to talk about routes, etc.

Can you get over to the Horizons Unlimited meeting (HUBBUK http://www.horizonsunlimited.com/events/hubbuk-2018) in a couple of weeks?  Chance to meet lots of super-inspiring people. Happy to make introductions.

Rachel

Interested re a couple months being too long … genuinely why

It can depend on how you ride, where you ride etc. Motorcycling can be quite intense and hard work. Day after day, especially if wet. If you're not riding, what are you doing instead ? How are you passing time and passing evenings ? What if it's raining for 3-4 days on the bounce, you still going out ? How are you drying your kit for the next day ?

You also have to think about how much ground you can cover in say 2 months at 200 miles a day.... that's a LOT of ground and a lot of fuel, wear and tear, tyres, servicing, you need to think about and plan all of that to an extent.

Having somewhere to go and something to do when you get there beyond biking seems a good idea. Whether you follow Rachel's suggestion or find something else. I have an interesting relationship with my son. By far the best trip we've done together was walking to Compostelle because there were so many people in his age group doing the same thing and we did it together without having to be together all the time.

If it is raining hard, just don’t bother riding. It rarely rains hard all day, never mind multiple days.

Ride an hour or two in the morning towards somewhere interesting for lunch. Book that nights acccomodation whilst having lunch.

Book ferries and the first nights accommodation after a ferry crossing further in advance.

You're not going to wear out tyres in two months. Servicing is easy in pretty much every city in Europe. You live in one now - can you get your bike serviced?

Remember to take holidays during the trip. Have days you don’t ride. At least one day a week. At least.

A target helps a lot. I planned to “ride out of Europe” on my first big ride. Unfortunately, Turkey decided to stage a military coup the day I got there so didn’t quite make crossing the Bosporous. Was still an adventure!

seriously, do it!!

rachel

Nothing to add except it sounds like a fantastic thing to do with your son!

Wish my dad would have done something like that with me at that age. Golf tour of Europe maybe, motorcycles, no... 😁

Servicing is easy in pretty much every city in Europe. You live in one now – can you get your bike serviced?

Not quite that simple. Most UK shops for example are booking 3-4 weeks in advance, if it's the same for servicing on the continent then it's a question of planning it isn't it ?

200 miles a day x 20 is 4000 miles... .That's a tyre.... so again, i'd want to know where and how i'm getting a tyre done.. On my KTM it's probably half that... Sure some bikes with center-stands are simple enough to get done in a car shop, but most bikes you'd want a dedicated  bike shop. Of course you can find them, but with language being a consideration, again, i'd want some sort of plan in place.

Another one to consider is bike insurance. Most policies only allow for 30 days non-UK. Make sure whatever policy you have covers you outside the UK for the time you're going.

Are you telling me you’ve ever had to wait more than 24 hours for a tyre to be fitted?

Also, 4000 Miles is really not that far for a tyre on the kind of bike that would be comfortable to take around Europe. Certainly, any A1 class bike will do a *lot* more miles on a tyre than 4000. Heh - I’m getting 7000 Miles out of rear tyres on my S1000XR!

Knowing they you need to be in a certain city for a day in a couple of weeks isn’t difficult. It doesn’t mean you need to plan every day leading up to that. It’s just another mini target.

I had my bike serviced in Hungary. Perfectly easy to do, nice little official stamp in the book and, frankly, a far posher BMW showroom than the one in Peterborough.

This isn’t complicated or difficult stuff

Rachel

Sounds a great idea although have to agree 2 months might be a bit too long. I'd say plan a 1-2 week trip first and if you have a great time do another 4-6 week one later. The problem with 2 months is if you start getting on each other's nerves or one of you just gets tired of the travelling about it's a hell of a long time to persevere with and although you could cut short a 2 month trip anyway it might end up souring the trip. Also planning a 2 month trip is a pretty big task, especially if you've not done something like this before, by doing a 'taster' trip first you get some experience with it + an idea on costs, distances you can travel (enjoyably) in a day etc.

This isn’t complicated or difficult stuff

I wasn't saying it was... I was saying it needed thought and consideration.

Totally agree with what Rachel says. I've had far better and more immediate service from dealers in Europe on my KTM than at home (though my local dealer has recently been fired so that might change for the better). The dealer in Stuttgart even raided a display bike for new discs when I failed to remove a disc lock one morning.

Touring on twisties is very draining. I reckon 500km a day absolute tops if you're in the mountains and you end up measuring distances in hours rather than KMs in places like Andorra or the Dolomites. I try to blend routes with short stints on the motorway to clear your head. I need to re-work a route I'm working on to give the guys some respite - it's a tad hardcore in places:

https://www.myrouteapp.com/en/social/route/465958?mode=share

I pack pretty much the same for weekend as for two months. On a two-month trip you have 55 days to plan what's next and a smart phone is all you need to help with planning.

Surf the Basque coast, Hossegor, Zarautz or anywhere else with a surf school

https://www.touradour.com/surf/gb/schools64.asp

If there are bands you like are they playing somewhere?

Rent an MTB in the Pyrenees, perhaps with a guide on the Basque coast or just rent Bikes in somewhere with well-marked trails such as Ainsa.

http://www.basquemtb.com/

Ride some of the nutter-biker roads on the Spanish side of the Pyrenees (don't forget to get your EU medical card)

Walk up some mountains

Raft down a river or canoe along a river, there are lots of place you can just rent a canoe along the Tarn and Dordogne rivers.

Do  Europa park or Port Aventura and pretend to be 12 years old

Interested re a couple months being too long … genuinely why?

Having done a 3 month motorbike tour a good number of years ago it became very intense  it also became a bit aimless as in " where do we go today" , we got bored of visiting the same places in different cities and got castled and museumed out and cost a lot more than we thought.  60 days at 300 miles a day is a lot of distance.

Thanks again all.  Have ordered the Mike Carter book. And good suggestions re timings - starting to look at basing it around activities to do when we arrive at a destination, as much to allow time apart/allow him to mix with others.  All appreciated

If it were me I'd be heading towards Sweden, Norway etc. More expensive yes but quieter and slower roads.

I rode to Barcelona on my Fazer 600 3 months after passing my DAS test (around 15 years ago).  Granted I’d been riding on Ls for 1 year previously so had plenty of road sense.

I’d say definitely do it.  I’ve been in Europe on a motorbike many times and never had any problems with servicing, tyres etc.  They are more set up than us as so many more people ride bikes and scooters.

There are a number of biker campsites all over France - some are more party like than others (particularly the Dordogne one), but the one in Crest, near Valence is excellent.  Good mix of people and excellent facilities, plus a great base to tour a lot of places from.

Have an amazing time.

With a novice rider I'd be thinking either starting off by wandering around France off the main roads (lots of the smaller roads in France are very quiet and very scenic) or possibly heading up to Scandinavia where the roads would also be quieter.

I would recommend Chris Scott’s Adventure Motorcycle Riding Handbook. It’s geared a bit more to round the world travels but has a lot of very good advice on prep, Bike choice an d general travel tips. I’ve always enjoyed dipping into although I’ve never managed more than across Spain and back and Germany a few times. An planning and research is part of the fun. As mentioned HUBB will be very useful.

if it were me I’d head for Turkey, but jealous now!

To answer your original question, no, taking a novice rider abroad by motorbike isn't daft but you both need to have your eyes open. I used to motorcycle tour and I'm horribly familiar with the fatigue that sets in after a few hours on the bike and the possibility of loss of concentration leading to an accident. Inexperience will make an accident almost inevitable. My brother rides big bikes on long multi-day trips around the USA and a couple of years ago he bought a bike for his wife; she learned to ride it but crashed on day 2 and went straight home never to ride again.

Europe may have been a nice place to ride when you were younger but traffic is a nightmare now all over Europe, same as the UK, especially around the tourist hotspots and big towns. In summer you will swelter in leathers in traffic jams. Europe is also full of desperate people who will relieve you of your kit or even your bike especially when parked at that budget hotel just out of town. I reckon that for an inexperienced rider the romance will soon pall and depression will set in, especially if the weather is bad, you suffer a crash or a theft or even dodgy tummy.

Why don't you look around for assisted bike touring somewhere specific like France or Spain or even Scandinavia? That way the logistics are taken out of your hands, you'll be guaranteed good, secure lodgings and there will be the option of jumping into the backup van if things get too much. There won't be the hassle factor of loading the bikes and finding secure places to leave them, storing kit while you walk round the town and getting assistance if anything goes wrong. If your lad enjoys that you will both have the experience to organise another tour, self-supported, somewhere else.

but traffic is a nightmare now all over Europe

And yet you suggest cycle touring. You can ride the same quiet roads whether motorbike or cycle touring, and frankly traffic is less of an issue on a motorbike as you are travelling at the same speed.

If you want quiet roads never use a GPS and use a paper Michelin atlas. We do that and there's newt nothing on the road because the tourists just go wherever their GPS takes them. I live SW France and can get stuck in a traffic jam any time I want on the Basque coast or go the quiet way.

I passed my Direct Access and within 2 weeks did a 2000 mile on/off road motor bike tour around Turkey with a friend (who was much more experienced). We hired a pair of rather poorly Suzuki DR350s in Fethiye and just went off with a map with the aim of avoiding big cities and finding remote spots.

Had a few nervous moments (mainly artics coming at you on the wrong side of the road, just expecting you to get out of their way). Was a great adventure.

Europe may have been a nice place to ride when you were younger but traffic is a nightmare now all over Europe

That's true in some areas (the Benelux countries are worse than the UK in my experience, and in the summer there are lots of areas that can get really busy) but not everywhere. I've done a lot of touring in Europe and much of France (off the main roads) is very quiet indeed and away from the big cities in Scandinavia is also very quiet.

And yet you suggest cycle touring.

Who said anything about bicycle touring?

Some of you lot make it sound like mainland Europe is somehow less suitable to motorcycles than UK - it really, really isn’t!

France, Spain, Germany etc all have far quieter roads, better access to servicing options, better drivers, even better weather than the UK.

This is not a big deal - just go ride.

* except Belgium - Belgian drivers have no concept of 2 second rule whatsoever.

Rachel

Rachel is right. We in the UK tend to forget that we have roughly the same population as France but in half the area.

I'd still be nervous about taking a novice on a big trp though.

Awesome plan. Have a look at the Honda CB500X

Mondo Enduro instead of Long Way Down for motivation unless you can afford expensive bikes and support crew!

Sounds like a great idea. I guess the length of trip is about breaking habits/connections. I would actually buy a couple of cheap matching bikes, hoping they break down and add to the adventure. No point in you on some missile and your lad on a restricted 500. The DR350s above sound like a great idea as does Scandinavia!

Yeah, smallish dirt bikes would be my preference too. That opens up the option of lots of offroad sections (road riding gets tedious quickly).

I think a long trip like that might be good fun on something like a Honda C90 or a Vespa.

No, at the start of my motorcycling years I rode a C70 from Newcastle to Wolverhampton avoiding motorways; it took 9 hours, I was almost blown off the road several times by huge trucks and the engine seized in Stafford, leaving me with piston slap.

I am biased as I love touring around Europe on my bike, so I am bound to say its a good idea 🙂

As Rachel intimated, its not rocket science, it really is as easy as filling your bike with fuel riding to the ferry and off you go.

Booking.com and air B&B make it super easy these days too. If your camping you will learn as you go and work out your system as you go along.

To have done something like this with my Dad  would be amazing and something you will remember for ever.

Touring on the bike for me is a great stress buster, I am living in the moment and rarely think about back home.

I would not worry about servicing and tyres etc, as has been said europe is not Africa and there is a BMW dealer on every corner 🙂

Don't worry about having it all worked out its an adventure 🙂 It will all be OK in the end and if its not OK its not the end 🙂

Bazzer

PS can't wait for my 17day trip end of July 🙂