The Harsh Realities of Bicycle Touring ( + Tips on How to Deal With Them )

Hi everybody, I'm Erik. We're now here in Wales. We're in an improvised set in an Airbnb while on our new tour. And what I thought I'd do today is bring you a video about the things we don't like about bicycle touring. With everything fun in life there are downsides too. And I think it can be beneficial to address the 10 things we dislike the most and have a better understanding of how they influence us and keep the negative effects to a minimum. Starting from number 10 and working our way up to the number one thing that influences almost anything else here on this list. Missing a deeper level. One of the biggest joys is meeting other people and experiencing up close that humanity is almost the same anywhere in the world. A roof with a comfortable temperature underneath. The sharing of food, caring for loved ones and strangers. Curiosity are all common and profoundly similar. Culture creates its own magic dressing for each. And it's in that we can miss a lot of complexity by not being able to speak the local language. You probably know about Google Translate. It's a super handy tool and we use it all the time. But it's limited in unravelling the nuances of the specific aspects of a culture. Many deeper stories remain hidden under the veil of the inability to question and express the subtleties of the social, political and religious life people lead. While you will get a decent enough sense, not speaking a common tongue will keep you guessing about the real feelings people would like to express about their way of life. Keeping healthy routines. Cycling makes you fit and you can eat all you want and become or stay lean and mean. While that's kind of true, riding a bike is a limited form of exercise. You're sitting down for hours in the same position. A lot of bigger and smaller muscles are not triggered and a complete body workout is something to be working on while out bike touring. We use bodyweight exercises and some resistant band work to add to our cycling fitness to have a more holistic workout routine. Not always easy and convenient as the road throws you fascinating curveballs on a regular basis. Adapting and coming back to a stable routine is always a challenge and a work in progress. The same can be said for a healthy diet. Certain supermarkets will carry expected sources of macro and micronutrients with which to build a firm basis for daily needs. A changing country can bring difficulties finding quality and our trusted staples. But that can also be a great exercise in adapting and getting to know the local culture, one of the reasons to be cycling in the first place. Knowing the basics of cooking and our personal needs helps us to find the food sources we need quickly and are able to cook a decent meal almost anywhere in the world. Roadkill and stray animals We never saw so much roadkill as on our bicycle tours. Foxes and birds being the most run over animals we encountered. The ever-growing infrastructure and cutting down of natural habitat is making life for all kinds of animals a real survival problem. Many of them need a certain territory to hunt or gather their food. Roads cut off these areas and a crossing is an unasked for need with a danger attached to it. It's a difficult problem with lots of political angles and only a small voice for the animals. In some countries more than others we see a lot of stray domestic animals, mostly cats and dogs, kicked out, neglected, searching for a scrap of food and a place to lay their head at night. We have also seen great efforts by people taking care of them in dedicated animal shelters. Individuals creating a welcome stay in their home and even some incredible cyclists who adopt animals while out touring. The fear of missing out Life is full of surprises, twists and turns while riding towards new horizons. Every day brings a vast array of fresh experiences, unexpected situations and reflections on what just happened. One thing keeps us bothered a bit though and that is what's going on back home. As an ordinary human we feel the need for a home and a place to shoot some roots. There's a certain fear of missing out on the opportunities choosing a regular stable life can offer. Also while out touring we miss other passions such as hiking, crafts and DIY projects, going to the movies and you name it. We just like a lot of things. That slight fear is helping us though to project our future selves in a more stable situation than living a life out on the road with our small earnings from YouTube. It's an absolute blessing to be able to keep on riding because of our earnings through this channel. But we plan on growing and find our own base camp, a jumping off point for the future and a place to plant some seeds. The harshness of the elements Don't get me wrong, being out facing the elements is one of the big reasons to be out in the first place. We love the moodiness nature has in its temper. Sudden swings in temperature, sunny with dark clouds forming on the horizon, wind gusts around the ears and then silence. We have prepared for the worst but encountering the worst isn't that much fun at all. Days of miserable rain, blasting sun scratching everything in its way, headwind that is nearly impenetrable, wet freezing cold. It doesn't happen all that much but when it does it's a bit of a battle. A mental balancing board that enables growth in resilience and an appreciation for the amenities that society has given us. There are actually some big challenges of discomfort on our bucket list. Personal growth is in our opinion the most valuable yardstick to measure life. Discomfort now and again gives contrast, enabling to differentiate between the opposite aspects like hot and cold, bright sun and darkness, wet and dry and all the other opposites in life. Wild camping in urban areas Nature is always the best place for relaxed and scenic camp without many hassles. On the longer tour it's sometimes inevitable to avoid urban areas and with that an easy and quiet place to pitch camp. We always sleep that bit more alert when we're not far from a road, track, house or even closer to a city. The only place we felt really safe in urban areas was in Japan where camping in city parks is possible. Of course with respect and without leaving any trace. We try and avoid staying in urban areas overnight as much as we can. If it's just unavoidable we spend a lot of time finding a secluded place where we both feel safe. If we can't find a place that feels good we might ask somebody or even go to a hotel for peace of mind and for the all-important bonus shower of course. It hardly ever happens but we feel it's necessary sometimes and rather than punishing ourselves we will enjoy the comforts and security of the roofed four-walled enclosure. Diseases Flying and crawling insects are plentiful when they are at the height of the season and can be relentless companions while being out and about camping in nature. From stinging and biting flies, mosquitoes and other airborne irritants that leave itching and or painful bumps to the potential hazardous spiders, snakes and other dangers from the animal kingdom that can leave very serious diseases. We spend many hours every week doing tick checks. One of the most widespread little crawlers that carry diseases that can lead to different detrimental illnesses. Lyme's disease probably being the most famous. The time consumed and the uncomfortable feeling it leaves makes it an annoying chore. We do however find them regularly, mostly somewhere on our legs and sometimes higher up which justifies doing the checkup in the first place. Overly aggressive animals can be found in certain countries. Grease and turkeys spring to mind in our experience and can give a cyclist a good scare. Rabies is the thing to look out for with aggressive dogs but also other animals can harbor this horrible disease. Unfortunately I had a dog attack me from behind in Tajikistan. Having had the basic rabies shots back home, the treatment only lasted one week in the field instead of a whole month. The dogs are not to blame as it's mostly their owners putting them into the position of aggression or abandoned dogs not taken care of at all having to find scraps in a world not built for them. Traffic One of our least enjoyable experiences is the traffic that we have to share the road with. A horse and carriage or other slow moving vehicles are often fun and interesting. I'm talking about the speeding cars and big trucks in particular. Most drivers are quite careful we noticed when it comes down to driving safely with more vulnerable users sharing the road. Too often though a hasty driver rushes past you or a massive truck just misses you about an inch or so. Exhaust fumes don't smell like they benefit your health and the constant noise of thick traffic can make a person fatigued with roadbus. Avoiding dangerous situations that are often steering wheels in the hands of other road users is a great step in taking safety into our own hands. While it's almost impossible to avoid a longer bicycle tour we do try to seek out more and more backcountry cycling experiences. The fresh air of the countryside invites us to push and breathe a bit more and the song of the birds rustling of the leaves, the wind blowing over our ears and the low rumble of our tires is like a subtle soundtrack to our own adventures. Missing family and friends We love bicycle touring. Experiencing the ins and outs of the world and being able to discuss our feelings and findings of the days past and coming. One of our biggest gripes however is missing our wonderful family and friends. The calling of the wider world is strong enough to pull us away from them but not being able to have a regular one-on-one or a get-together is an emptiness we feel on a regular basis. Luckily nowadays things like FaceTime are wonderful solutions It's really strange to realize that we used to have to write letters or an email that would take days, weeks or even months to be replied to. While nearly not as good as giving a loved one a hug, sitting down for a conversation over dinner and drinks, modern times has given us the possibility of the direct verbal and visual experience of togetherness like nothing else previous before. It isn't a substitute but it helps us to dispel feelings missing our loved ones. And at number one, bad night's sleep. It's the single most important factor that influences our mood and consequential experiences with all the above points. Taking up roughly one-third of the day and often even a bit more, this is on our minds all the time. A bad night's sleep can lead to feeling unmotivated. Questioning what it is we're doing, flare-ups and arguments, getting easily fatigued, hiding in our personal bubbles and thinking about anything but being out and about on our adventure. In the long run, bad sleep will be detrimental to general health, another very important reason to take sleeping away from the comforts of a reliable home situation seriously. Up here I will link an in-depth video of how we go about wild camping and try and get a good night's sleep. A lot of time and budget is spent on figuring out the best sleeping gear. We try what we think will work the most optimal and we don't hesitate to upgrade if something isn't working that great. Everybody is different so what will work for one person might be uncomfortable for the next. At the moment we are closing in on a very good system that is built around comfort rather than being lightweight and small. For us, long distance touring requires extended times wild camping and we scale up to meet that challenge. If you're interested in seeing an in-depth video about our current but ever-evolving sleep system and setup, leave a comment down below and give the video a like while you're down there. It really helps to support the channel and bring you more content like this. Bicycle touring is one of the most amazing ways we've found to explore ourselves and the world at large. Downsides will always exist and as long as they are manageable and only play a minor part in the grand scheme of things, we are happy to face them with open arms. We would love to hear from you in the comments down below. If you agree with the things discussed here, maybe you have things you don't like or a completely different take on this matter. For now I would like to say thank you for watching and I will see you in the next video.