Ultracycling

Would like to not fly

There's a sleeper from Paris to Vienna now

I know a guy riding in this, Steve Watson, who organises Terra Australis. He's near the back, but doing OK considering he's well into his 70s.

ISTR they usually get some epic weather on this.

Ah yes I was looking at this. I need to dig around in Seat 61 and find out more

As ever, the weak link is Eurostar. Still need to box for that. But not sure if you can take boxed bikes on Nightjet (OBB sleeper).
I've seriously looked into getting a Rinko-style bag and taking the forks out to package it up in a cube. At that point it is just a big bag and can go on any train.

Yeah, prospects don't look great for it changing any time soon either.

If I rode TPR again which I'm quite tempted to do, I think I'd possibly explore the ferry down the west coast of France from Portsmouth and just try and work from the ferry a bit to save some annual leave, given it's 24+ hours. Means bike can travel unboxed and I'm not giving money to Ryanair as a bonus.

I think this is the way to do it. Even for flying perhaps, then avoid the extra fees.

No good for bikes with hydro lines. Unless you did something silly like run them externally.

Trains in France are complicated with bikes... trying to get a proper answer from SNCF about availability is a pain in the arse.

Nightjet say this:

You can take your bicycle along on the following routes:

NJ 490 / 491 Vienna - Hamburg (3 bicycle parking spaces)

NJ 40420 / 40491 Innsbruck - Hamburg (3 bicycle parking spaces)

NJ 464 / 465 Graz - Zürich (3 bicycle parking spaces)

NJ 470 / 471 Zürich - Hamburg (3 bicycle parking spaces)

NJ 466 / 467 Vienna - Zurich (3 bicycle parking spaces)

NJ 408 / 409 Zurich - Berlin (3 bicycle parking spaces)

NJ 402 / NJ 403 Zurich - Amsterdam (13 bicycle spaces bookable in IC
60402 / IC 60403, Bookable at an SBB or NS ticket counter)

Yes, that's the biggest challenge. I'm not a big fan of routing stuff internally for looks rather than genuine aeroz.

For this reason, I did deliberately run my front brake outside the fork rather than through it so I could potentially just snip the cable ties and take the front caliper off. Then the bars can be packed so that the rear hose going into the frame is OK. But I've not looked into the practicalities yet.

Good that they have any at all but 3 spaces sounds risky - just need a family to wipe it out...
Book early I guess.

I agree about France and the TGVs, but I always thought that it will be ok if you stay off the TGVs, no?

We should all chip in a buy a LFGSS van so we can #vanlife our way over to the EU

Need a driver as well as we all want one-way trips!

I've used the slow trains in NL and Spain before, in order to avoid bagging my bike. They are damn slow though and it adds complexity to actually booking and doing the journey. It's no wonder everyone just flies and drives.

We need to find some euros coming over to do stuff like HT550. waves at @skinny

I think the slow trains in France are a bit better. They are in Germany, I've got around by train fairly easily there. You can even generally blag on to ICEs with no bike spaces left if you take wheels off and put your bike in a bin bag. I've seen people doing that on the platform in France too - just it's different rules for each TGV line.

But flying is 100x easier to plan. And forget trains if you want to go east of Slovenia.

Yeah, I've used trains in Germany too, way back when I was touring in '05. They were very cool, with lots of space like the NL double decker ones. But yeah, if you wanted to do the Lost Dot new gravel thing over east, you're in for a long ride or flying.

Having seen what Americans do, I feel like my few flights a year are fuck all, so I'm not feeling guilty about it. The planet is already fucked and I spent 40 years dodging cars commuting so I've done my bit, fuck you all, humans. :D

Yeah I know a few people who travelled back through France with their bikes unboxed from TPR via the TER trains. I think it was 2-3 changes from St Jean La Luz up to one of the ferry ports, and only an hour or two more than the TGV would have been.

As well as trying to not fly short haul, the sheer reduction in stress by

a) not having to travel to Stansted with my bike in a box and;
b) not having to disassemble put my bike back in a box on very little sleep in a cramped hotel room with 4 hours until my flight

would have been priceless.

Would have of course meant 1-2 days extra annual leave doing it that way, but I'd forgotten about all that crap with liquids etc on flights as I'd not flown short haul in years, plus my set of Wera allen keys were nearly confiscated as dangerous weapons after a schoolboy hand luggage packing error.

the Lost Dot new gravel thing over east

I've completely missed that, what is it?

Last year I looked into getting back from Tarifa by train and it didn't look like it would be easy. I dropped out of the event before it got to the detailed planning stage, but going beyond Barcelona seems to add an extra day.

One person came to lesperit de Girona from London on the train, to Griona. Said it worked well. The just took their bike apart and boxed it.

The Accursed Race.

https://www.instagram.com/p/CyjDw61vdoy/

Lost Dot’s first fixed route, off-road race exploring the heartlands of The Transcontinental Race. The Accursed Race is the result of years of knowledge built up by Lost Dot in this breathtaking corner of Europe — exploring Albania, Montenegro, Bosnia and Herzegovina, and Kosovo. Born from a longstanding fascination and romance with the hidden tracks and passages through these enchanting regions, it is finally time to invite riders along to challenge themselves on this rarefied and meticulously crafted route, named after and inspired by the mythical Accursed Mountains.

If a free route event is like poetry, a fixed route event is prose. Our free route races, @transpyrenees and @thetranscontinental, use subtle stanzas of parcours to tell their stories, leaving the imagination to fill the profound gaps between each line. Using a fixed route format for The Accursed allows us to tell the narrative of the Race, the region, the terrain, and the topography in gritty, glorious detail. It’s the story of the Dinaric Alps and, within them, the Accursed Mountains.

We launch this new race, standing on the shoulders of Lost Dot’s founder, the late Mike Hall. We are committed to upholding Mike’s foundational legacy of fair and self-sufficient racing, championing integrity, equality and inclusivity, and creating opportunities for unique and beautiful journeys of self discovery to share with as many people as possible. We are only too aware that we will never be able to replace the genius of Mike — the TCR and the bikepacking community as a whole will forever be the poorer for having lost such a leading light. We can, however, ensure his hard work and vision are kept alive. Our vision is to ensure that Lost Dot races remain as grassroots events, the way Mike Hall envisioned: run by racers for racers.

Guided by the spirit of the race — a commitment to autonomy and self-reliance — the tales of the inaugural TAR are yet to be written, as the mountains wait for riders to answer the call of the Accursed themselves.

We will open applications to ride #TARNo1 in late 2023. Follow @theaccursedrace to stay informed.

I did message they and say lol at calling themselves grassroots. They didnt reply.

Looks interesting.
Nothing on their website. Why do people put things up on social media and not on their own sites?

"The Accursed Mountains are on the whole the wettest area of Europe"
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Accursed_Mountains

anyone can post on IG, lots of people don't know how to edit their website themselves. Even if its squarespace