So far we’ve cycled 6,646 km through Europe: the Netherlands, Germany, Belgium, Luxembourg, France, Austria, Italy, Slovenia, Croatia, Montenegro, Albania, North Macedonia, Bulgaria and Greece. Our journey is a once in a lifetime experience with ups and downs. It takes a lot of flexibility and perseverance.
Mind breaker
Our luggage is the biggest mind breaker. We’ve already sent 18 kilos of luggage home. Cycling with less weight makes it much easier to climb those high mountains. Still… we have a lot of luggage. All stored in our Arkel panniers and Duc-Kit Pro bags.
Panniers and bags
The Arkel panniers are on each side of our tires on Tubus carriers. The Duc-Kit Pro bags are on the back luggage rag. We tie them with soft straps and a luggage net.
Water and vandal-proof
Both Arkel panniers and Duc-Kit Pro bags are waterproof. When someone helps us with our luggage, we always have to make sure the Arkel panniers are carried correctly because the cord to put them on the Tubus carriers isn’t a carrying handle. Duc-Kit Pro bags can only be carried in one way and till now they seem indestructable.
Changes
Besides lowering our luggage weight we’ve made some more changes since we started our world bicycle tour.
Different handlebar and grips: Linda is having problems with her left hand. She suffers from a cyclist's hand. The Vakantiefietser offered us a different riser handlebar with a back sweep of 12 degrees. We assembled it early September. Ergon offered us different grips: the GP5 offers more hand positions. We haven’t really tried the new grips yet. Let’s see how this all works out when we start cycling again;
Tubeless: it takes a lot of effort to remove the tires from the carbon rims. Idworx advised us to go tubeless. Cycling tubeless 2,431 km so far we are really happy with this change.
Water and rest: you should drink 150 to 300 ml for every 15 to 20 minutes of cycling. We cycle (without breaks) 5 hours a day, that’s 4.5 liters of water. We now carry 5 liters of water per day. In the evening we will review the next day's route to decide where to stop based on the number of kilometers and climbs;
Records
Winter break
We’re now on a winter break in Greece. We would like to continue our journey in February cycling further to the east through Turkey, Iran and the Stan countries. When we leave in February we won’t be able to apply for the necessary visas in Ankara to cross all the borders to the east.
Probably we have to wait until the end of summer 2021 before we can travel again. Moreover it might be safer and easier to stay in Europe. That’s why we are planning to cycle to the North Cape first before heading to the East. We actually had this tour in mind after our 7 years’ bicycle tour. Bulgaria, Romania, Hungary and Slovakia will be our bonus countries.
North Cape first
Cycled in Greece
Cycled so far
Polarsteps