So why did I decide that touring on a bicycle was something I wanted to do? I can pinpoint exactly when the thought initially came to me. It was when I went out exploring the local area on my ‘gravel bike’ it just seemed a lot more enjoyable than just ‘training’ on the road bike.
I started cycling, the second time, around 7 years ago. I say ‘the second time’ because I make the assumption that just about every person in the world rides a bicycle during some period of their lives. My ‘First Time’ was from around the age of 8 or 9 on my Raleigh Chopper to the age of around 18 or 19 when my racing bike was entirely a mode of transport. So 7 years ago my ‘Second Time’ began.
Within the space of six or eight months around 6 of my colleagues and I had bought ourselves shiny new racing bikes using the Cycle to Work scheme. I was at a slight disadvantage in that apart from one other I was the eldest by around 23 years! I trained hard because I enjoyed the competition with the younger guys and really enjoyed the rides we had around Warwickshire and the Cotswolds.
In 2016 my partner Nicola and I moved to France and I cut down my work hours, only traveling back to the UK for a week each month to work so that we could afford to renovate the house. This gave me the opportunity to ride with the guys in work regularly. We even rode from London to Paris for the British Heart Foundation in 2017 arriving in Paris in time to see Chris Froome ride into Paris in the Yellow Jersey to win the Tour de France finish for the 4th time in his career.
I booked a trip to Mallorca with a cycling friend in March 2018 so I trained hard all winter to get strong enough to ride the mountains. The cycling was amazing and despite the unseasonably cold weather we had a fantastic holiday.
Then later in 2018 I finished work all together. Plenty of time on my hands but now lacking any motivation to get back on the bike after Mallorca…I needed to find something to help me get my cycling motivation back!
I did some road cycling towards the end of the summer but my heart wasn’t really in it. Looking back I did actually cover 538 km during the month but one ride really stood out or me. It was only a 34.5 km ride on my Shand ‘gravel bike’ but I called it ‘Off Road!’ on Strava and it made me think about adventure! I just went and got myself lost, taking lanes that led to an unknown place (or nowhere) got stuck in mud and had to carry my bike. Not exactly an epic ride nor was there anything particularly special about it…BUT, it got me excited! It got me thinking and researching.
I read 19 Bicycle Touring books between September and the end of December. Authors included Andrew P. Sykes, Tom Allen, Chris Pountney, Tom Bruce and Alastair Humphreys amongst others. I was HOOKED. Armchair Adventure Cycling at its best!
Now…I am not an adventurer, I have no plans to be riding a bicycle in Iran or Africa, not that I have anything against those countries but the thought of doing something like that has no appeal for me, at least not at the moment. So my first trip would defiantly be a European one, more ‘Baguettes and Bicycles’ than ‘Thunder and Sunshine’ for me!
My research said that La Velodyssee would be a good place to start…
