Category Archives: Bike Touring

The 3 Month Honeymoon By Bike

Posted on July 14, 2015 by josh| Leave a comment

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The Megamoon tour of the Great Divide Mountain Bike Route. Photo via maiamedia.co.uk.

When Hannah Maia and Patrick Taylor-Bird got married, they decided to go big with their honeymoon: a three-month bike tour from New Mexico to Canada along the Great Divide Mountain Bike Route. Maia is a filmmaker and documented their trip with this fantastic short film. It does a remarkable job of capturing the joys and challenges of bike touring. Awe, exhaustion, thrill, the need to sing out loud to distract yourself on a seemingly-endless climb. The film reminded me of past trips and got me day dreaming about future adventures.

Megamoon from Maia Media on Vimeo.

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Henry Gold: Enabling Expeditions Around the World

Posted on July 9, 2015 by josh| 4 Comments

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Henry Gold, founder Tour D’Afrique. All photos courtesy Tour D’Afrique.

Most people facing unemployment at the age of 50 would turn towards the safety and comfort of what they know to get back on their feet. When Henry Gold was in that position, he decided to lead a four month bicycle expedition from Cairo, Egypt to Cape Town, South Africa and organize a race on the same route despite having never bike toured or raced a day in his life at that point. Gold thought his adventure was going to be a one-time thing. Instead, it gave launch to his bike touring company, Tour D’Afrique. Twelve years on, the company offers 10 expeditions and races on six continents. I spoke to Gold about his history working with NGOs around the world, the African bike-manufacturing project he tried to start that helped inspire Tour D’Afrique, the joy and challenges of leading multi-month bike expeditions, and much more.

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Eszter Horanyi: The Power and Goodness of Bikepacking

Posted on June 17, 2015 by josh| 1 Comment

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Eszter Horanyi and Scott Morris at the start of their 4,000 mile Continental Divide Trail ride. Photo via topofusion.com.

The Tour Divide is a 2,745 bikepacking race from Banff, Canada to the Mexican border in Antelope Wells, New Mexico along the Great Divide Mountain Bike Route. When Eszter Horanyi set the women’s course record of 19 days, 3 hours in 2012, she did so by averaging over 140 miles each day and sleeping just a few hours each night. Doing so on repeat for the better part of a month is a brutal challenge that pushes athletes to their mental and physical limits. It turns out Horanyi is really good at it. Over her years of bikepacking racing, she’s held or still holds records on the Tour Divide, Arizona Trail Race 300, Colorado Trail Race, Arrowhead 135, and plenty more. She stopped racing in 2013, but continues to explore mountains and valleys and remote roads by bike. I spoke to Horanyi about her entry into mountain bike racing, her bikepacking racing “career,” the self-empowerment the comes from adventuring alone, the growth of bikepacking, and more.

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Mountain Biking to Bothies in the Scottish Wilderness

Posted on May 1, 2015 by josh| 1 Comment

Adventurer, author, and filmmaker Alastair Humphreys just produced this excellent short film about mountain biking to Scottish bothies, old abandoned farmhouses now used as shelter by hikers, climbers and bikers. Part ode to adventure, part history of the bothey, the video is well worth a watch. Learn more about Alastair in his fall 2014 interview with The Bicycle Story.

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Posted in Bike Touring, Cycling Media, Everything Else, Mountain Biking

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Erick Cedeño: The Nomadic Life of a Bicycle Traveler

Posted on April 8, 2015 by josh| 1 Comment

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Bicycle Nomad Erick Cedeño in Puerto Rico. Photo courtesy Erick Cedeño.

Whether one night or one week, the end of a bike tour always leaves me wanting more. It’s something I’ve heard from other bike travelers as well, including ones who’ve done far longer trips than I’ve yet managed. A tour’s end is anti-climactic. You might celebrate the arrival at your final destination or your return home, but the rhythm of life on the road–eat, pedal, sight see, pedal, eat, sleep, repeat–fades with shocking speed as you go back to normal life. For some, the solution is to just start planning next year’s trip. For others, such as Erick Cedeño, the solution is to maximize bike travel and make it an integral part of their life and career.

Known to some as the Bicycle Nomad, Cedeño fell in love with bike travel five years ago and parlayed his passion into a business of speaking gigs and merchandise that support his trips. We spoke about his evolution from one night trips around Miami to multi-month adventures around North America, what drives his passion for bike travel, the Bicycle Nomad business, and much more.

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