Author: Tim

Although we’ve been enjoying our time off since leaving our jobs in preparation for this trip, we’ve also been getting a lot done. With having to downsize from two households worth of stuff to what we can fit on a bicycle, there’s quite a lot we have to work on. Here’s what we’ve accomplished so far. There’s still a lot to do, but we feel like we are on top of it now.

Social

• Flew out and visited both of our families
• Met up with a bunch of friends and planned some time to meet up with as many as possible
• Planned a going away party in February

Downsizing

• Donated a ton of clothes, kitchen items, etc. to local charities and friends
• Donated all of our Christmas decorations to friends and family
• Sold/donated all of our books to a local used bookstore
• Sold a whole bunch of stuff on eBay that we won’t be taking (my saxophone, iPad, etc.)
• Sold some of our furniture that we don’t use often using OfferUp
• Found friends who will adopt my kitties, booked a flight to fly them to Dallas

Planning

• Planned our route in detail with turn-by-turn GPS routes and notes about where to stop and what to see as well as expected temperatures and lodging options (camping, hostels, WarmShowers, CouchSurfing, hotels, etc.)
• Met up with friends and family who have traveled (or lived) in the countries we are visiting to get tips for what to see what where to ride
• Researched visa requirements for all countries we will be visiting (the only one we need to apply for ahead of time is India, and the EU’s Schengen visa is the most restrictive due to the size of the EU)
• Researched health insurance options and decided that BlueShield’s emergency international coverage should be sufficient, switched Steve to this
• Booked our flight to Lisbon, Portugal, and booked our first few nights at a hostel
• Scanned all physical documents and stored them in the cloud so I can access them from my phone if needed
• Switched to a good travel credit card with no foreign transaction fees and good travel benefits (Chase Sapphire)

Preparation

• Continuing to cycle to maintain our fitness (though we haven’t been very good at this)
• Booked a wilderness first aid class (from REI) so we can both be prepared in case we have an accident in the boonies
• Planned a fully-loaded test run next week to a local campground to test out our new gear
• Met with our doctors and got a checkup, necessary vaccinations, emergency antibiotics, and two years of refills authorized for medication we take regularly
• Wrote a short description of who we are and what we’re doing and translated it into dozens of languages for the countries we are planning to travel to (using Google Translate as well as friends who speak those languages)

Equipment

• Finalized and purchased a list of equipment and clothing that we’ll bring. Most we already had, but we picked up:
  • Warmer lightweight clothes
  • New bike shoes that look like regular tennis shoes
  • Water filter system and purification tablets
  • International power/USB adapter
  • Waterproof passport holder
• Bought new bikes that are more suitable for touring, sold Steve’s previous bike
• Switched to LG Nexus 5x phones with Google Project Fi international phone service
• Switched from Garmin to Wahoo ELEMNT bike computer, which allows better on-the-go route planning

I started posting some info about our trip on the website crazyguyonabike.com; they have some great tools for searching through other cycle tourists’ trips, making maps, etc.

Here’s our blog there – check out the awesome map of our complete route: http://www.crazyguyonabike.com/doc/timandsteve

We will plan to post trip journals to both blogs. SpaceBuggy.com will also include our other random thoughts and ideas.

I will try to keep this updated as we go, but please contact us to get the most accurate dates.

Many of our friends have asked us for our itinerary so they can meet us abroad. We think it would be absolutely fantastic to meet as many of our friends as possible during our bike travels! What better way to keep in touch with you all.

Keep in mind, however, that our tour is quite open-ended. Days may get rained out, we may need to have unexpected repairs, perhaps we’ll find new routes to take and things to see, or maybe even hop on a train to skip some areas. So, if you’d like to try to meet up with us, it’s best if your plans are somewhat flexible, and even better if you have some kind of transportation option to meet us where ever we may be (hopefully not too far off the itinerary!).

So here it goes:

Europe 2017

• March 6-10: Lisbon, Portugal
• March 18-20: Seville, Spain
• March 28: Granada, Spain
• April 2-3: Valencia, Spain (possibly ferry to Ibiza)
• April 6-10: Barcelona, Spain
• April 16-18: Marseilles, France (possibly take train to Paris)
• April 23: Cinque Terre, Italy
• April 25: Pisa, Italy
• April 26-27: Florence, Italy
• April 29-May 1: Venice, Italy
• May 8: Zagreb, Croatia (this is a maybe)
• May 11-13: Split, Croatia
• May 14-16: Dubrovnik, Croatia
• May 16-21: Budva, Montenegro
• May 23-24: Tirana, Albania
• May 27: Corfu Island, Greece
• May 31-June 2: Patras, Greece
• June 8-June 16: Athens, Greece (plus island hopping likely to Mykanos, Santorini, and Rhodes)
• June 17-22: Fethiye, Turkey (and surrounding coastline)
• July 1-3: Izmir, Turkey
• July 12-16: Istanbul, Turkey
• July 21: Varna, Bulgaria
• July 24-?? Bucharest, Romania (we may stop here a while to wait for our EU/Schengen visa to reset, or we may alter our route through Ukraine, Serbia, or elsewhere)
• August 22-24: Budapest, Hungary (Schengen visa should have reset around now)
• August 25-27: Bratislava, Slovakia
• August 28-29: Vienna, Austria
• September 2-3: Prague, Czech Republic
• September 6-25: Berlin, Germany (this is the stopping point for our European portion)

Asia 2017-2018

• September 25-October 1: New Delhi, India
• October 2-4: Agra, India (Taj Mahal)
• October 21-24: Mumbai / Bombay, India
• October 30: Goa, India
• November 1-9: Kerala, India
• November 19-22: Chennai, India
• December 11-15: Kolkata, India
• December 22: Sylhet, Bangladesh
• January 3-10, 2018: Mandalay, Myanmar (Burma)
• January 18-20: Yangon, Myanmar
• January 30-February 1: Chiang Mai, Thailand
• February 3: Chiang Rai, Thailand
• February 9-10: Luang Prabang, Laos
• February 15-20: Vientiane, Laos
• more to come…

I’ve completed the route planning for the next section of our trip from Barcelona, Spain to Marmaris, Turkey! I’ve spent days poring over maps, tourist guides, cycling blogs, Strava heatmaps, and recommendations from friends.

Some people don’t like to plan their cycle tour in a lot of detail, preferring to wing it as they go. For me, the planning is a huge amount of fun, and it allows us to learn about the cultures and history of the areas we will be riding through. More practically, because we have Visa deadlines to contend with (including EU’s complicated Schengen visa with its rolling 90-day time limit), we have to have some structure. And of course, we are still allowing plenty of time for unplanned deviations and excursions.

France

After leaving Barcelona around early April 2017, we quickly enter into southern France and ride through the Provence region, passing through Avignon, where we’ll see the Pont du Gard Roman Aqueduct and the “Triumphal Arch” of Orange, amongst many other things. I rode through Provence in 2003, and I remember the food being divine, and the people welcoming.

If we have time, we’ll take the TGV (high speed train) from Marseilles to Paris and experience Paris en printemps. We then head east through beautiful Mediterranean coastal towns including Cannes, Antibes, Nice, and the small country of Monaco, before entering Italy.

Italy

So much to see in Italy! We will ride along the rugged coast through Cinque Terre towards Pisa, then divert inland, passing through San Giamignano and Siena, before taking some rest days in Florence. We then ride over the Tuscan hills towards Venice, where you’ll undoubtedly see some gondola selfies posted. East of Italy, we pass through Slovenia for a hot second, before entering Croatia.

Croatia

Finally outside of the Schengen visa zone, we can relax a bit and go at a more leisurely pace. It should be near May now, and we’ll have until September until our Schengen visa renews and we start getting more time in Europe. Luckily, Croatia, Montenegro, and Albania have a lot to experience, and it looks like we’ll be here in shoulder season before the hordes of tourists arrive in July.

Our first village of Grožnjan is a hilltop artist colony. This area of Croatia on the Istrian peninsula is famous for its olive oil, truffles, and is a foodie utopia. We’ll post lots of Bike Stomach photos.

We then continue around the peninsula, exploring caves, and visiting quiet coastal villages, before taking a ferry to the island of Cres, one of the many islands in the Croatian archipelago. After a night of camping on the island, we ferry to Krk, and ride inland to see the waterfall lakes in Plitvice Lakes national park. We may also take a few days to continue on inland towards Zagreb, the capital city.

Further south, we stop in Zadar to listen to the Sea Organ, an organ played by the ocean waves! In Split, we will island hop to see ancient towns and beautiful beaches, ending with Korčula with its walled city. We ride the length of Korčula and then ferry back to the mainland on the Pelješac peninsula. Taking a quick detour, we pass into Bosnia for a few kilometers. We end our Croatian tour in Dubrovnik.

Montenegro

Not known as a cycling destination, the country nevertheless looks beautiful. From Budva, we will climb to the top of Lovcen National Park, where you can see 80% of the country on a clear day and explore the historic mausoleum. We will also visit the Monastery Ostrog, built right into the side of a cliff, and pass through the capital of Podgorica before heading south along the coast to Albania.

Albania

Albania is an up-and-coming cyclist destination with several adventure tour companies starting up tours in the country, as well as a push from the Albanian tourism board to promote outdoor activities. There are even a few cycling-friendly hostels.

We plan to explore Tirana, visit the Berat fortress, spend some time in Sarande, and check out the Roman city of Butrint before crossing the border into Greece.

Greece

It should be around June now, and our first stop in Greece will be to visit the Greek island of Corfu, where we hope to camp for a night before continuing on towards Patras. Along the way, we’ll stop to wade through springs, see waterfalls, and ferry to the Ionian island of Cephalonia to visit the Fanari lighthouse. We then ferry to Patras.

From Patras, we stop at a few ancient Roman sites including Olympia, Temple of Apollo Epicurius, Mycenae, Tiryns, and Epidaurus. Finally, we arrive in Athens.

Once in Athens, we will explore the Roman architecture and historical sites, and then begin island hopping. Depending on ferry schedules, we hope to visit Mykonos, Paros, Santorini, and Rhodes.

Rhodes is just off the coast of Turkey, so once we get our Turkish visa, we’ll hop on a ferry to Marmaris. I’ll start working on planning this part next, but our rough plan is to hang out in Turkey, Bulgaria, Romania, and maybe Ukraine until our Schengen visa renews, at which point, we head back west into Europe towards Berlin. More to come!

My initial thought about getting online during our trip was to get prepaid SIM cards in each country where we plan to spend enough time to make it worthwhile.

This would work fine, but it means we’ll have some offline time, either when we first enter a new country, or when we go through countries for just a few days when it’s not worth it to get a SIM card.

I just learned about Google Project Fi, a worldwide cell service that works in 130+ countries and costs just $10/GB for data coverage, worldwide!

The catch is that you have to have one of 3 Google phones. Being an iPhone user, this is kind of a bummer because we’ll have to carry an extra device, but it does have some benefits:

• The plan supports tethering, so with just one phone, we can get online abroad with up to 10 devices.
• There is no bandwidth limiting so we can get up to 4G speeds in any country.
• The iPhone should be able to support iCloud backup because it will appear as a WiFi hotspot vs a data connection.
• My bike computer will only sync routes over WiFi, so having a hotspot is better than having multiple SIM cards for each phone (that may not support tethering).
• We will have an extra phone with us in case one of ours has a problem.
• I’ll maintain a single phone number anywhere in the world, which is important for 2 factor authentication, not to mention making it easier for friends and family to reach us.

There may still be times where it makes sense to get local SIM cards, but it’s hard to beat $10/GB and the convenience this will offer us.

We all have that box or filing cabinet filled with paperwork. If you’re like me, you dread going anywhere near it. Every time you open the box or drawer, you shove in papers into a space they shouldn’t fit and sit on the lid to close it, hoping that nothing breaks. Tax returns, bank statements, you name it… They are bursting at the seams…

When you expect to give up your apartment, though, this box finally becomes a chore that you have to address. It’s too heavy and bulky to store or move, so the best bet is to scan it all and shred the papers so you can finally leave it behind. Digital storage is almost free, but taking the time to scan all this shit is a huge undertaking.

For the last few weeks, I’ve been filling my spare time with digitizing and sorting all of this junk. After struggling with my horribly slow and buggy scanner, I finally broke down and bought a dedicated document scanner. It’s about 10x faster, and I’m hoping I can sell it easily when I’m done with it, but at least it’s cutting down on the time to put all this stuff in the cloud. It feels like such a waste of time, but we’re all legally obligated to keep our important documents accessible, so it has to be done.
Just one box of files to go. Wish me luck!

It’s an unfortunate fact in this world that something as basic as your place of birth can limit your options in travel (and indeed in life). For Americans, this fact almost always works in our favor, and many Americans take this privilege quite for granted. Most of the world is open to us to freely travel, even if few take advantage of this unique ability.

I am admittedly naive in this regard, though I’m understanding it more and more as I travel. When I was in Thailand last year, I was struck by the stark difference in a US citizen visiting Thailand vs. a Thai citizen visiting the US. A US citizen merely flashes his passport and has a simple 30 second conversation and is granted a 30-day visa that can be extended fairly easily to up to 6 months.

A Thai citizen on the other hand, in order to simply visit the US, needs to prepare and present complicated paperwork complete with references, bank statements, etc. that can take months to prepare.

Americans do have some restrictions, though, due in part to our government’s activity overseas. In particular, the countries of Iran, Pakistan, and Afghanistan, are likely unsafe for a bicycle trip.

Now some may claim that our state department’s advisories for these countries border on overly cautious, or that there are indeed safe parts of the country to visit, and I’m sure that is somewhat true; I believe people everywhere are fundamentally good and welcoming, and probably we would be fine. But there are bad actors out there, and there are incidents targetting US citizens, so I feel that it would be foolish to flaunt our freedom in the face of these warnings simply to accomplish an arbitrary goal of our holiday cycling tour. I have read stories of other cyclists from western countries who have put security in those countries in danger so that they could cycle their chosen routes, and I simply don’t think that’s a good decision.

So instead, I’m trying to find an acceptable route from Istanbul, Turkey to New Delhi, India. A simple option would be to hop on a plane, and there are many flights available. But we’d skip a huge portion of Asia by doing so, and we’d also arrive in India during the monsoon season; waiting another few months would be much better. One other option I’m looking into is cycling north through Bulgaria, Romania, Ukraine, Russia, and some of the -stans to end up in Tashkent, Uzbekistan. This, apparently, is a popular place for backpackers to hang out while they work on getting their east Asia visas sorted out, and there are quick and cheap direct flights to New Delhi.

I’m warming up to this option, and I’d love to hear your feedback!