Australia (all)

I'm at one of those grave intellectual impasses that have been known to bring even greater minds than my own to a standstill. I have an orphan sock. Trivia, you say. Ha! I think not.

The cause of this problem is surely the work of that Slovakian KGB Agent, foolishly disguised as a laundress in Svolen. She stole it, I'm sure. Probably for a DNA sample to impress her superiors in Bratislava. They've been following my every move since the kustoms agent in Warsaw asked me the purpose of my visit to Poland. When I answered ``vacation'' the disbelief on his face gave him away. What, doesn't anyone go to Poland on vacation?

But back to the real problem, the orphan sock. The purists among cycle tourists would say, ``Throw it away, it's excess baggage. And while you're at it, cut three inches off that over-long toothbrush handle.'' But the Calvinist in me says, ``Save it. It's a good sock, nearly new.'' I've already reduced the weight of my baggage by losing its mate. Maybe I'll lose another and be back to even and lighter still.

Dopo Patagonia, Toascana, Sicilia e Corsica ecco la cigliegina sulla torta: la Nuova Zelanda da Auckland a Christchurch in bicicletta. Due mesi e mezzo e 4500 km (almeno credo, il tour deve ancora finire!) tra laghi, vulcani, alpi e splendidi paesaggi costieri.

Here is a trip that takes me to places I have dreamed about for 35 years. Mountains, Glaciers, Volcanoes and Easter Island.

Now includes my 2007 tour of Australia.

In May 2004, after having worked for 18 months in China, I decided to hit the road to fulfill my dream of a lifetime: to travel extensively in Asia and Oceania without the pressure of time and the necessity of airplane travel. My idea was to travel mostly overland and give myself enough time to get to know faraway countries and different cultures by living as close as possible to the local realities.

Having met Fred during my last months in China and finding his ``RTW by bicycle'' a very stimulating way of traveling, I planned my journey in such a way as to be able to join him in the Philippines and spend 6 months on the road with him. The experience was a success and when Fred took the road to Europe from India, I decided to continue traveling by bicycle on my own in South-East Asia and finally Australia.

Planète D. is our volunteering and filming world tour on the tandem bike. It’s that simple.

We cycle.
We film, edit and share videos.
We volunteer for NGOs.

A world tour on a rather odd bicycle.

Sono rimasto stregato dalla bellezza della Terra durante le lunghe camminate effettuate nelle ``mie'' Alpi o i brevi sentieri percorsi tra le migliaia di cascate del parco di Plitvice in Croazia. Ho avuto la sensazione di poter rallentare lo scorrere del tempo nelle interminabili giornate in sella alla mia amata bicicletta, percorrendo le strade sterrate nel mezzo della pampa patagonica così come salendo e scendendo per le dolci colline toscane e siciliane. Ho anche imparato ad apprezzare la capacità, l'ingegno ed il genio artistico umani, visitando alcune splendide capitali europee, la vivace Rio de Janeiro, le caotiche San Paolo, Buenos Aires, Los Angeles, la surreale Las Vegas e la inarrivabile New York.

Tutto questo cerco di raccontare nelle pagine del mio sito web.

Read about my adventures by bicycle around the world,taking in Europe, the Near East, India, South East Asia, Australasia, and the USA on Route 66.

For something a little less ambitious, I have prepared details of a three-week tour of the beautiful landscapes of central Portugal.

Or if you prefer a central base and some day rides, read about my routes on the Spanish island of Mallorca - a cyclist's paradise, with warm weather, flat hinterland, stunning mountain climbs, and huge ice-creams!

As I came to the sign ``Perth 46 km'' I become a bit sentimental. I remembered a moment on the opposite side of time and space, the end of the first day (Day 0) just outside of Darwin. I was at the kitchen of a caravan park and a young fellow asked me where I was going to. ``I'm cycling to Perth'', I said. I had a sum total of 41 km under my belt at that time. The other camper, preparing the meal at the kitchen, looked at me bewildered, thinking probably ``What is this lunatic talking about?''.

Just a simple compilation showing some photos of my solo, minimum preparation/planning, fast, travel light, using only my vacation allowance rides across the continents. First ride was with road bike, all other rides on Orange P7 rigid mountain-bike with semi-slick tyres.

Welcome to the Wish Tour!

Below you will find the photos and journal from a two-year, 20,000-mile bicycle journey around the world.

Starting in July 2005, this journal will take readers across the United States, Europe, Turkey, Uzbekistan, Kyrgystan, China, Tibet, Nepal, India, Bangladesh, Thailand, Laos, Vietnam, Cambodia, Malaysia, Borneo, Indonesia, Australia and New Zealand.

The journey began more than 20 years ago, as the seeds of a dream to circumnavigate the globe were cultivated from a deeply personal and painful experience.

[Absolutely stunning pictures.]

A three month bicycle journey through both islands of New Zealand. It begins in Christchurch in January 2008 (south island) and ends in auckland (north island) in April 2008. This is a Live-blog that already contains a lot of information...and during the trip you can track my route and read fascinating reports with amazing pictures!

Our trip began in Wellington at the southern tip of the North Island. After a day to adjust to the time and date differences, we took a ferry across Cook Sound to Picton. From there we made our way to the coast and biked along side the Tasman Sea to Haast. At Haast we turned inland to Lake Wanaka and Queenstown, the adrenaline capitol of the world. After taking a week off from biking to hike the Milford Trek, it was back across the island to the Pacific Ocean and Dunedin, where we stopped cycling and used wonderful New Zealand public transportation to make our way back to Wellington.

Mal & Lee on a world recumbent cycle tour of the world.

Just completed a cross continent tour of Australia and circumnavigation of Tasmania.... Off to the UK now :-)

We are Sarah Erck and James Welle, two 27 year old ex-Microsoft employees who decided to get married, quit our jobs, sell all of our material possessions, and travel around the world on our bicycles for one year...or more!

It all began innocently enough in 2005 when Sarah's mom gave James the book Miles from Nowhere on his birthday. Sarah, being the bookworm that she is, read the book immediately and fell in love with the idea of riding a bicycle around the world. James was a little more reluctant at first; he was an avid cyclist but was worried about quitting his job and spending a lot of money on a trip like this. Sarah persisted and in the end she was able to convice James to take the plunge and in September of 2006 they decided to officially do the trip after James finished his work on Windows Vista. The fall of 2006 was spent furiously planning and preparing for our departure date of January 2007!

Having sold all our belongings; paid all our debts; having said goodbye to all our friends, we will be looking forward to a five year cycling adventure. It will take us around the world and through five continents.

During our travels we'll keep you up-to-date via this site with travel stories via our diary; photos in our slide show; and we will even try to put some film in as well.

On the road, we stopped at a fruit and vegetable stand owned by Maoris natives, the first peoples to inhabit New Zealand. They gave us a warm welcome and soon the whole family, aunts, uncles, and children, was buzzing around us. They showed us their craft centre and took some pictures. Thinking we were missing something, they made us a Baby on Board sign. We fastened the sign to Marjolaine's bike, over-thanked our hosts, and were back on the road an hour and a half later with 3 tomatoes, 1 avocado, and 10 kiwis.

A 40,000 km. 3 year ride through 30 countries, from far eastern Russia (Siberia) in winter, to London England, via Australia. Trying to cover the whole route by bicycle and boat only. I have encountered plenty of good times and a few tough ones, noteably in Siberia (camping at minus forty), Papua New Guinea (pushing my bike down a beach as no roads) and Tibet (in winter).

The author is selling a book on his tour around the world, but has made several chapters available for free, in PDF format. Espcially the chapters on Ethiopia and Siberia are fascinating to read and among the best stories found on Trento Bike. This is true adventure. Here are two short paragraphs:

• Ethiopia How can two sides of one village be so different? One hundred metres from Sudan and I had left behind Islam and North Africa and was into the continent's heart. The buildings, people and attitudes all felt different. The red dirt road was busy with pedestrians. Barefoot people and donkeys easily outnumbered the few fume-spewing, rattling vehicles. Women walked shaded beneath golf umbrellas, a strange sight in the African sun. Men bore a stout staff across their shoulders, their hands hooked over like wings. In Sudan the ladies flowed in colourful loose robes and men with bushy moustaches glided around in white galibayahs. In Ethiopia the men wore tight little shorts and tattered T-shirts, repaired many times, with a blanket draped over their willowy shoulders.

• Siberia We rode on and on through a frigid emptiness of low hills white with snow or black leafless woods. The white road ahead on the wooded hillsides stood out like a photo negative. The horizon's high mountains looked enticing and I felt happy to be here, to be at the ends of the earth with my bicycle. ``I'm out here a thousand miles from my home, walking a road other men have gone down. I'm seeing a world of people and things,'' sang Dylan in my headphones.

Also check out the expedition advice.

We are now in Cambodia, after 10 months of cycling thru New Zealand, Australia, Malaysia, Thailand. Our site is bilingual.

Our web site is about the trip that we are now realizing. We have gone across the world to go back to Canada. We already crossed 5 different countries in 10 months. We will keep biking for around 2 more years. The subject treated by the web page is mostly about our trip (story, pictures, organisation) but we added a lot of other stuff like recipes, rock climbing, and small articles. We are French-Canadian, so our web site is belingual.

It was hardly a cycle tour. There was no relaxed pottering along quiet roads admiring the scenery and no stops at the café in the town square for a cup of strong coffee or a glass of pastis. This was a challenge ride. Two hundred and twenty kilometres from Melbourne around Port Phillip Bay.

Alan and David travelled to Melbourne to join 7,000 other cyclists on Bicycle Victoria's annual ride. Starting at the inner city suburb of St Kilda on the shores of the Bay, riders had a choice of riding clockwise or anti-clockwise around the bay. Unfortunately, it wasn't a case of turning up in the morning, checking the wind direction and then choosing which way you wanted to head. The choice had to be made at the time of entry and the carrying capacity of the ferries across the entrance of the bay meant that there was a limit on the numbers which could go in each direction.

Named after Sir Douglas Mawson, one of Australia's greatest Antarctic explorers and geologists, the Mawson Trail is a mountain bike touring route extending nearly 900 kilometres from the outskirts of Adelaide, South Australia to Blinman in the Northern Flinders Ranges. The trail uses a combination of gravel roads, farm access roads, forestry tracks, fire tracks, roadways which were surveyed but never actually built and short stretches of sealed road. It passes through forests, vineyards, grain farms and sheep and cattle properties to reach the arid and semi- arid country of the South Australian outback.

James Esmond was not the first person to find gold in Victoria but his discovery of alluvial and quartz gold on the Clunes ``run'' triggered the great gold rushes of western Victoria in 1851. When the rushes ended and the gold ran out, a number of towns and cities struggled to adapt to being country farming towns or faded away into insignificance. The gently rolling countryside and attractive old towns of the western goldfields provides the perfect opportunity for cycling touring. Seventeen cyclists from South Australia and Victoria accompanied Alan, Mary and David on Adelaide Touring Cyclists third bicycle tour through this region.

Tony was recuperating from major surgery to replace a faulty valve in his heart and felt the need to be some place warmer than Adelaide in a cold and wet winter. It had been nearly twenty years since David had returned to Far North Queensland where he was born and where he had spent his early life. These two old farts left their partners in the cold and flew off to the tropical paradise for a few weeks of sun and relaxation.

This is a website by Michael Stumbles and Jodie Gunns about our Cycle Touring adventures together. We are Australian and have completed numerous cycle tours throughout Australia. Our biggest tour is 6 months in Europe (start May 2006).

The Route:

Americas: Venezuela, Brazil, Bolivia, Chile, Argentina
Atlantic Traverse: Azores Islands [Portugal]
Europe: Spain, France, Italy, Greece, Turkey
The Middle East: Iran
Central Asia: Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan, Kyrgyzstan, China, Pakistan, India
South East Asia: Laos, Cambodia, Thailand, Malaysia, Indonesia
Australasia: Australia

Welcome to the Brink Expedition!

Imagine attempting a global traverse that would take you 50,000 kilometres through some of the most difficult terrain and extreme weather on the planet, all the time attempting to use only human power and the natural elements.

Starting deep in the heart of Amazonian South America the Brink Expedition will encounter unforgiving Patagonian winds, snowed over Himalayan Mountain passes, monsoons on the sub-continent and the oppressive heat of Australia's Red Centre.

So while the clock ticks, the seasons will turn, making this a full-throttled Race Against the Elements!

This webpage is intended to provide information for cycle tourists who may be considering tours in the countries I've visited. For more information, journals and pictures leave a message in my guestbook or send me an email.

`` Yes, it's hot. But we've seen worse haven't we my friend. There was that day east of Warnambol when the chip seal melted and the chips stuck to the tires. A few revolutions later we had flats front and rear. So we pushed for a mile seeking shade to repair the punctures. And the flies Ah! And there was that time in Zamorah. Ah! But not now.''

``The Great Heart Travelers'' promote the blood donation riding around the world. They made a Europe tour of 5400 km in 2004, and a tour in New Zealand in 2005.

In 2001 vanuit Nederland vertrokken en nu okt 2005 meer dan 65.000 km en al meer dan 40 landen doorgefietst.

Ja, hebben jullie het al gezien, we zijn meer dan 4 jaar onderweg. Wat een tijd en toch.... we genieten er nog elke dag van. Nu zijn we in Jujuy, noord Argentinië. Via Chili gaan we binnenkort naar Bolivia, waar we een tijdlang niet zullen kunnen internetten. We zullen op grote hoogte gaan fietsen, hoogtes waar we nog niet eerder waren. Of dat prettig is.. jullie zullen het later lezen.

In March 1996, I sold my home to fulfil a dream I'd had since my childhood. At age 46, I'd always wondered if one day I might realise my ambition to ride horseback the length of the beautiful country in which I live - New Zealand. So I did it.

It took almost a year but my trip was complete, and this is the story of my journey. It's not just my story, though. The journey was more than a physical one - it became a mental, emotional and spiritual journey as well. And not only for me, it affected (I hope all positively!) the lives of so many other people.

I hope you enjoy my story as much as I enjoyed living it!

Reports and pictures from various mountains of Europe, America, and Australia. Partly in Dutch.

A trip from the Netherlands to the USA - over Asia and Australia. The European part goes through Germany, Czech Republic, Slovakia, Bulgaria and Turkey.

Leaving home for a trip like this is not something one does from one day to the other. Along the way I joked often, saying: ``Yeah, one night I went out, got pissed and I am still trying to find my way home.'' In truth I had no foreign experience; well, none on my own. I had never been to an embassy before, I knew nothing about what's out there. Still I wanted to go, and with some hard work I managed to get my trip sponsored too! Getting ready to leave is always something special. Packing for a holiday, going out for a long weekend... Packing for a trip is even more emotional. Because I wasn't only packing my bags, I was packing all my belongings. Most of them went to storage, some of them into my bags. And with what I packed in my bags that 31st of may 1998, I lived for almost 3 years. What an adventure I was heading forward to... What a story you are about to read!

A photo collection of many great images with the subject being a loaded touring bicycle. It's fairly tough to get a bike into this gallery but that's the way viewers want it. Aside from the photo page there's a page full of submission requirements and cycling related links belonging to those with images in the collection. Read the submission requirements, study the gallery and bring a winning shot home from your next tour! Tailwinds!!

For all those going abroad - or searching for advocacy-advice from other countries - here is a list of the 48 most important bicycle groups around the world. These groups specialize not only in bicycle advocacy but also in tourism, consumer issues, hpv-matters, etc. The list includes e-mail and homepage addresses where I have been able to find them - and a word of introduction (explanation) about the nature of these groups.