CYCLING Europe

post-ride recap

Traveling by bicycle was a perfect speed to experience Europe. Long days of riding, delicious food, mostly camping, luckily only one puncture, some very hot days followed by some rain and even hail, and most of all welcoming and encouraging humans. The more north I cycled the more bike-friendly the culture (and roads) became. I chose to plan as I was on the go, and in a way this route chose itself.

There’s something to be said for anything in life that awakens your sense of ecstatic wonder and awe. I can thank journeys like these for unfolding that simple yet profound human experience.

In the beginning, cycle touring struck a familiar chord as long distance hiking. Although they are two drastically different travel modes, the intersection, I found, lies in mindset. There is an indescribable power in the meditation of movement. This rhythmic flow helps me navigate a parallel quest of a cycle voyage and a path of self expansion, side by side.

Type 2 fun is always funny in hindsight, thinking back to the days where you have to embrace the suck and cycle when it’s the last thing you want to do. But, paradoxically, it’s the only thing you want to do. Because it makes you feel so alive. All in all, choosing to travel long distances by one’s own human power is as liberating as it is illuminating.

This was the first part of a bicycle journey that would take my partner and I down the length of the African continent from Cairo, Egypt to Cape Town, South Africa. I embarked on this European quest as a 4,000km gear shakedown before my African voyage, and to explore the means of bicycle travel to see if I enjoyed this type of two-wheeled travel.