So meine Radreise wäre geschafft. Verschafft euch ein paar Eindrücke von meiner Tour auf diesem Blog.
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Die letzten Kilometer sind die schwersten Kilometer :( |
Fahrrad verpacken am Flughafen von Malaga. Dank der Familie aus Weinsberg ohne weitere Probleme:) |
Ich hab ein Video geschnitten von unserer Reise durch Korsika. Ziehts euch rein!
https://vimeo.com/126261525
Vorher Nachher Vergleich :)
Vorher: mein erster krasser Vollbart |
Nachher: nach meinem längsten Friseurtermin. Man beachte das bescheidene Wetter im Hintergrund, ich vermiss dich Sonne! |
Ich hab einen kleinen Teil meiner Reise zusammengefasst. Ist aber auf englisch, da eine brasilianische Bekannte ein Buch schreibt und der Aufsatz einen kleinen Teil beitragen soll. Aber jeder der Interesse an meiner Reise hat, dem erzähl ich gerne mehr darüber.
At the end of 2014 I was sitting nervously in front of my
boss, waiting for either a confirmation or rejection of my sabbatical year
proposal. I´ve made plans for a long time and at the end of March 2015 I put
them into action. I split my sabbatical year into three parts. Part one: A
three months european bike trip. Second part: Will be a six months internship
in South Carolina U.S.A. The third part: Will be, well I don´t know it yet.
The days had felt very long before I finally could ride
off. However a journeys always begins with the planning
My name is Steffen Teufel. Born 1988 in Heilbronn and I
just have ridden my first awesome bicycle trip within 11 weeks. I travelled
through Germany, Austria, Switzerland, Italy, French and Spain.
I felt like an adventurer by starting my plannings of my
bicycletrip.
Eagerly I read books, blogs, forums and spoke to experts
to get the right gear for my trip. My equipment should be appropriate for the
europeon conditions. That fact saved me the money for special survival stuff,
because I knew I will pass stores for this stuff and if I´m in need of
something I could buy forgotten things on my way. But before you are about to
start the trip, you should get yourself some essentials e.g.
-Repair Kit: provide tools which suits to your bike and
make yourself comfortable in using them.
-Waterproofed tent with aluminium stakes and solid tent
pegs
-suitable sleeping bag, know the comfortzone
-an appropriate navigation system: Navigation devices,
cell with offline maps, maps
-spiritus or gasoline stove
As a state certified engineer I definetely wanted to set
up my own bicycle. I found a Surly Ogre bike on ebay for 600€. Bought a
complete new Shimano XT powertrain and racks from a mate who is working in a
bicycle shop and assembled everthing. As my bike was finished I developed a
strong binding to it and looked forward to hit the road finally!
I started the trip with my buddy Marius on a Sunday after
a last breakfast together with the family. Especially the first days I felt
like Indiana Jones chasing miles on the street. We have had a feeling of
unlimitled freedom, that we´ve never felt before. From this day on we had the
privilege to do what we want to do.We felt free like a bird for the next three
months. No thoughts on business life, dominating schedules and meetings. Just
life, nature, and bike riding. The first steps are always the hardest, you may
thing. But feverything ran smooth. I had doubts about my knees. But no problems
at all. I didn´t have a special fittness training before. I just rode with the
bike 10km to the job like every day.
Marius and I slept the first night by a friend of mine in
Stuttgart. During this trip we used many varieties of accommodations. Our
equipment included a tent. This kind of housing was the cheapest and the most
flexible. You nearly can stop at any place, put up you tent and rest the nigt.
But before you do, you have to inform yourself at which places it is legal to
camp. The rules are different for each country.
The disadvantage of tenting is, that it takes a lot of
time to put up and break down the tent. I distinguish between wild camping
(there will be no wifi and sanitary installations J) and the campsite camping with little bit more of
comfort. But they will charge you from 8€ up to 20€, most common was 12€. I
recommend to do a mix and use the advantage of both. Use the campsite to
resotore yourself and use wild camping to get in touch with the magic beeing
alone in the nature.
A very good alternative is couchsurfing.com or
warmshowers.org. Here you have the bonus of socializing. You start a request
through these pages and the host decide if they host you for one day or a
couple of days. Warmshowers.org is exclusively from bicycle riders to bicycle
riders. So the guys know indeed what a bicyclist needs after a long day. I like
espacially the life journey histories oft the hosts und their view of life.
That was often the base of a good conversation. And you leave the house with
new tipps and tricks e.g. How to get on the next beautiful, low traffic track.
One disadvantage is that there are little hosts in remote areas and the need of
a cell or laptop plus internet is required to get in touch with the hosts. Only
on view day trips you can in advance organize the accommodation from home.
On my way to Spain, my hosts were mostly students,
freelancer or employees. But I had one awesome stay aswell by a 300 people
collective in the mountains. I got very excited about them. Each of them has
his own interesting histroy and some of them are only living from that what
nature provides.
In my opinion travelling makes people wise and sensitive
of nature, if you be open minded and ready to leave the overconsumption behind
you, you´ll discover yourself new. Expanding the mind will be an automatic
process supported by he
people you will meet on your trip. On my trip I met only very friendly and
helpful people. Except two grumpy people. One policeman who insisted that I
have to put one my helmet and a angry farmer who didn´t like that we were
camping on his meadow.
One thought I like very much ist hat you still have more
stuff with you on your bicycle than millions of poor people over the world and
you are able to see the world. That´s a privilege!
These are
experiences you dont only experience only on a bicycle trip. I also met people
which hiked through countries or even a continent.
But I want to quote
someboady why I chose the bicycle. He knows it right.
Since the bicycle makes
little demand on material or energy resources, contributes little pollution,
makes contribution to health and causes little death unjury, it can be regarded
as the most benevolent of machines.
S. S. Wilson
What I would like
to add is that it is just a pleasure to ride bicycle and you can ride 100km a day,
that means you can enjoy 100km in a economical way of landscape. Economic
because it is the cheapest way to travel.
Furthermore it is
the tremendous feeling when you have reached the top of a mountain and got a
beautifull sight and you feel satisfied and happy
All in all this
sounds everything like a huge adventure and everybody has got a good time. But
to start such an advernture you need time, which is very rare in todays
society. Most people in Germany are working 9 to 5 a week and use the 30 days holidays
for a trip. But for a long range trip you have to talk with your employer. And
on the other hand such a journey could quickly come to an end caused by an
accident. You have to keep in mind that you are the weakest on the roads.
One thing Corsica
burned in my head were the many steepy little mountains. In Corsica only the
plates are flat. Our daily way was to climb up the hills, we even climbed hills
on hills. The daily pace average was very low because up to the hill you´ll
need for instance 40 minutes ciclyng up and only 5 minutes to pace down. But
every minute was worth it!
Back home you will need a time to handle your stories and get used back
again to a normal life with its obligations. Why I like to bicycle in Germany
is that the car drivers respect the bicyclists. You have nearly to anywhere
signposted tracks on country roads which are not permitted for cars. You can
see an increasing trend are of E-bikes. For myself I will furthermore enjoy the
bicycle the to keep myself in shape and use its economical advantage. Go for
it!