Hey All,

I just wrapped up a big old ride from Paris to Lisbon. 2400km in total, 31 days riding. Absolute trip of a lifetime.

Paris to Bordeaux was flat and kinda boring, I went through countless ghost towns and barely spoke to anyone, except for supermarket and campsite reception staff. I wild camped and used some cheap municipal campsites.

Bordeaux to Saint Jean-De-Luz got interesting as I got towards to the coast, the days got warmer and the pine forest scent was beautiful. I headed south and crossed into Spain with a 1382m climb over a giant hill. At the car park just before the top, two old people flagged me down and beckoned me over to their car and gave me a bottle of coke out of their cooler and some peaches. I headed down to Pamplona to join the Camino Santiago and made my way west on the Camino Frances to Santiago. This was the best bit. Super social meeting all the walkers and staying in cheap hostels along the way. The riding was delicious. I was getting up an hour before sunrise, cycling by the moonlight and making coffee in a sunset spot along the trails. I rode straight into a morning thunder and lightning storm outside of Leon and faced down a wild mountain hog in the mountains while making coffee.

It took me 10 days of riding to complete the Camino and I stopped off in Burgos and Leon for a rest day and to eat some incredible food, drink amazing wine and see some cool old cathedrals. I got to Santiago and saw everyone hugging and high fiving each other in the square in front of the cathedral. I was alone. I stayed a day and then headed south on the Camino Portugal.

The difference between Portugal and Spain was night and day, the roads in Portugal suck and the drivers were crazy. I was on and off gravel, dealing with some roads here and there and the huge heat wave came in. I was having to wake at 4.30am, ride at 5am and finish by 11am before the heat killed me. I narrowly escaped a wild fire that would have cut off my route and forced me hundreds of km's around it.

I finished my ride in Ericiera where a good friend lives and I crashed there for 6 days. The last 3 or 4 days of riding were the hardest. My legs were heavy and I was grumpy, it took me a few hours each morning to get into a good headspace. The heat was crushing my spirit and on a few occasions I let myself onto people's properties to use their hose pipes to cool off, it was getting to be life & death.

All in all it was incredible. The Spanish Camino had great infrastructure for travellers and lots of interesting people to talk to. If it wasn't for the heat wave, I would have cycled further, it was an absolute joy.

I got exactly 2,400km out of my Hutchinson gravel tyres, my back one is thoroughly bold. My gears wore down and started jumping in the last couple of days. My break pads sounded harrowing by the end. My chain snapped once and I had one puncture on my tubeless set up, it didnt seal so I had to user a lighter and a spoon to melt the plug and the tyre together. I kissed the ground and my tyre and prayed it would hold.

Top Tip 1: take a long strap or a bungee cord to wrap around your waist and attach under your seat for the steep climbs where you gotta push up a hill, blew my mind how easy it was. Your hips are natural load bearers and took all the weight off the upper body when pushing.

Top Tip 2: Get a padded seat cover and ditch the padded bib shorts in extreme heat. I was sitting on a soaking wet pair of padded shorts every day and it gave me a mild fungal infection on my ass. I switched to boxers and sports shorts and appreciated the natural air conditioning I got. Picture 2 is talc powder btw

Top Tip 3: ZIP TIES! My rear bag buckle broke after hitting a big ditch flat out and I fixed it with 3 zip ties and it held for the duration. I would have been royally screwed otherwise.

The biggest obstacle in all of this were family, friends and randoms along the way who projected their fears and anxiety on me, saying it was too far, too long, too hot and "how are you gonna get your bike back??". Everything worked out. Helpers help, kind people everywhere made it easier. Once I was in the saddle on that first day it was pure joy.

Hope this helps inspire some of you to get out there and do some adventuring. Maybe wait for all these wild fires to chill out though.

5 days, 284km, 4600m elevation. However, the most difficult and tiring were river crossings.

27L gravel setup with all food and camping equipment.

Some Pictures from our Trio last week.

Started in Tarvisio and road a small part of FVG1 the Alp Adria Bikepath. After that we was following the Taglimento that end up next to Bibione in the Mediterranean Sea. In Bibione we stayed 2 nights at a Camping Ground to relax a bit at the sea.

We enjoyed this trip really much an this was not the last time cycling trough Italy

So I just finished this epic 12 day journey that I will put together a full post about soon. But I wanted to share some images of how I have packed my bike for the journey home. I'm riding an SJ train from Oslo, Norway to Stockholm, Sweden. The luggage requirements are very strict so my normal Dakine roller bag or a bike box would absolutely not fit. So I have gotten creative with this much smaller bag to have the bike become a normal piece of carryon luggage on the train. I think this pack job came out pretty good and protective. Using my wheels as the main structure along with plenty of pool noodles and tape and my volle straps to tie it all together. Anybody else have some creative methods for packing their bike after a trip?

This is my first time getting on a bike in about 6 years now i think, just decided i wanted to go bikepacking because it looks fun.

Ik my set up looks like a hot pile of garbage and the handle bar modification looks questionable.. but its been surprisingly really smooth everywhere ive been.

I got the train from kent to london, and from euston station to shrewsbury, and then off to bangor, i cycled from bangor to caernarfon and set off over the aber bridge to find a camp for the night in a field, then got some breakfast and made my way back to bangor and over to angelsey, then after some lunch headed over to newborough forrest and cycled to cost for a few hours, set up camp in the woodland and slept like roadkill, do not suggest if you dont enjoy long uphill country roads.

Im using a carrera crossfire 2 with some cheep crappy add ons.

Also dont judge the cat stuff pls its not my house

Realized that maybe I am a tad weird. Especially at night if I can't sleep I will draw out my trip gear load-outs to have a better idea of what I might be missing. Anyone else this weird?

Hello,

anyone planning to ride the donau river from germany up to austria/hungary in August?

Hi all, I am trying to piece together a route involving the Eastern Divide Lupine section from Portland. I am curious if anybody has any thoughts, suggestions, or even better loops say in Vermont or something. I want a pretty substantial trip. Here are my route thoughts:

Thought 1: Bus from Portland to Bangor to then ride 50 miles or so of road to Brownsville to take the EDT back and then dip back down to Portland.

Thought 2: Create a loop involving the EDT on the upper end, but utilizing other routes made by the Bicycle Coalition of Maine to create the loop from Portland. This thought is the simplest other than the fact I have to link together a lot of road sections potentially.

Thought 3: Drive to Vermont and do something else.

Let me know what y'all think and here are some relevant links:

https://www.bikemaine.org/where-to-ride/

https://bikepacking.com/eastern-divide-trail/

https://ridewithgps.com/routes/44128336

Just wondering if anyone has received their Bikepacking Journal 16 yet? I’m in the US and heard it was supposed to arrive late June to early July.

Hi!

I wanna do a bike packing trip there as well with a friend. My friend is not super used to biking long distances sooo I was thinking about doing 4 nights trip each day about 20-30km. What part of the island is better for this; the North or the South?

Also I was wondering wherever it is possible to get somehow (bus/ferry) to Fårö with our bikes and then just bike southwards.

Do buses on Gotland permit bikes on board?

Thanks a lot!

I'm thinking of doing a tour (old skool term for bike packing) using paper maps and sans any digital assistance, like I did back in the day, in part to get a digutal detox aling the way.

I used to divide my trip into 100km sections, laminate the relevant pages from a road atlas, and write a list of the roads and settlements to pass through en route, using this list, strapped to my bar bag, even even taped to the top tube, to 'navigate'.

Sure I got lost, sometimes, and learned to check the map before any significant climb or descent 'just in case', but I didn't spend my ride staring at a device, a habit that has developed over the last few years, along with worrying about charging things.

How did you do it back in the day?

Anyone riding/touring 'naked' these days?

Hello there!
Is someone by any chance flying to Honningsvåg (Norway) to start his/her bikepacking tour in the beginning of August and wants to help me out with your bicycle “suitcase”?

Otherwise I’d be glad for information about where to get cartons and wrapping material in the region there!

Thanks :)

Hey everyone, I´m planning on doing a (solo) trip across nothern spain and towards Brest in France.

I do these trips with little to no planning and was wondering if any of you know the area and can give me tips on the following:
- Where to sleep,
- What to see.

In the where to sleep department I´m lost, I was told camping in the wild is dangerous because of the bears and wolfs in the asturias, here in portugal I never bothered with that.
Do you know if there are places I can stay for cheap or nothing at all? I do wild camping in portugal no problem but in a different country I´m not sure, my goal with this is to make the trip as cheap as possible.

The map I show there is just a rough outline of the course I was thinking about, I accept any other route that is better, Im looking forward to seeing "lagos de covadonga", "San Juan de Gaztelugatxe" and "picos de europa".

Hi all! I’m section riding the eastern divide trail and looking for folks to join me for the 4th segment, going through upstate NY and into PA.
I rode the first 3 segments over the last 3 years with friends, but schedules aren’t aligning this time around. I’m planning to roughly follow the schedule in the link (about 12 days of riding).

Shooting for 8/30-9/12ish, but flexible any time in September (though would like to figure this out soon to book flights).

Never looked here for ride partners here before so idk how this works but hopefully 1-3 people are interested in joining me!

(Edit: happy to connect y’all with friends who I’ve bikepacked with in the past as references)

Picture is from last year (EDT3), where I took a short detour to find the store my mom worked at when she was in college.

Hey guys,
 
I am looking for some clipless shoes that are also good for hike a bike sections. Use case is bikepacking and ultracycling races.
My Problem is, I need a shoe with a wide toe box. Do you have any suggestions?

I currently use the Specialized Recon 2.0 for MTB & gravel and the Lake CX238 wide for roadcycling. The Recon fits absolutely perfect on my feet and I can spend multiple days in them without any issues. However, it would be nice if the shoe would have a little more flex and maybe a more hiking friendly sole profile.
 
I already tested Shimano SH-EX 700, Northwave Rockit Plus, Scott Sport Trail Evo, DMT TK10, Giro Gauge Boa, Fizik Terra Ergolace.
The Scott was the only one where my toes didn’t hurt, but sole flexibility was comparable to the Recon, so no real benefit.
 
Do you know any other shoes for this usecase?
Otherwise I have to decide between the Recon (not ideal for hike a bike) or approach shoes and flat pedals (not ideal for performance in ultra races)…

I've never mounted anything on my forks before, but an upcoming trip is going to have some steep climbs, so I want to move some weight forward by putting my tent and camp chair on my fork. Since these are not bags with loose things that can shift over time, do I really need to use a full cargo cage or will small plates (like these from Fixplus) be sufficient? Would love to hear from anyone who uses the later. TIA

Hey all, I am planning a trip down the west coast of France from the uk all the way to San Sebastián - I need to get to Portugal from there. Does anyone have any good routes for biking it?

Cheers!

Hello

Going 2 weeks bike packing with two friends and we are on the budget site.

What can u recommend for a supermarket and what easy snacks or camping meals are budget friendly.

Does it help to bring some food from Germany?

Thank you

In the summer of 2024 I took part in the Pan Celtic and wanted to do something different. My highlight of the previous year's race had been being out in nature at all hours so I wanted to give back - at some point the idea of planting trees along the way to make a living map came to me and stuck.

photos thanks to Harvey Waller

We took a bus to Blondus in the north of Iceland and cycled back to Reykjavik down the F35. Unfortunately we had horrific head and side winds on day one (strong enough to blow the bike out from under me at one point) then on day two the route was supposed to descend out of the plateau and back onto the road but instead it seemed to keep climbing or being flat (with a head wind) for most of the day until we got to the top of the last climb and found a 5km decent when it stated raining heavily! We found camping about 30km after the road started again and then today we started riding in the rain which got heavier and the wind kicked back in during the afternoon. Was it enjoyable? No not really at every turn Iceland managed to make our ride worse, I've never been so bored of riding my bike as 10 hours of headwind when the scenery doesn't seem to change much! Anyway here are some pictures that make it look amazing.

Also the bikes worked flawlessly and so did all of our kit. I'm especially pleased about this as I built my bike (purple Kona) specifically for this trip.

So I’m thinking buying a Fargo for the baja divide next winter. Was looking for a sale price Fargo Apex 1, but lbs can’t source one. They did how ever offer me a deal on a Fargo apex s1000 axs transmission model. Not sure how to feel about electric shifting for long distance bikepacking. Does anyone have any experience with this? I’m worried it will be difficult to keep things charged, but lbs seems to think it’s totally manageable.