Introduction Issue #1 of this fanzine covered riding from Leeds, where I was living at the time, to my parent's house in Dorset and then on to France and Spain. After returning from Spain earlier than planned due to injury, I had to rest whilst my wounds healed. Luckily the burns I had sustained on my leg healed quickly enough that I didn't have to change any future plans. So in April I headed north, back to Leeds to visit friends and to prepare for both the inaugural Cycle Touring Festival and then heading to mainland Europe. The plan was to get the ferry to Rotterdam and then cycle north-east through Germany to Scandinavia. Dependent on the speed at which I travelled and how much money was in my pocket, where I went was at this stage largely to be confirmed. First though I had to cope with being back in Leeds...
The Blues I hated the world so I tried to change and deconstruct it. I did a good job. As I sat in the park, I looked at the wreckage and pieces around me and they broke down further under my gaze. I couldn’t comprehend and failed to relate to everything around me. From the forced nature of this environment to it’s apparently happy go lucky inhabitants. This was why I ran away and I am pleased that my return was only temporary. The metaphysical wreckage I have created still fills me with anger and hate. My analysis and deconstruction have only further distanced me from my previous surroundings. The upshot: both society and sobriety have become difficult for me. I sit in uneasy surroundings - and self-medicate to feel ‘normal’ within them. The unintended positive is creativity. Good for me, perhaps not anyone else. I remember happy years. A happiness that was more numbness of being, an ostrich with my head buried, desperately ignoring my feelings. Those years were barren though for the production of words, thoughts and ideas. I like thinking and I like writing. Which puts me into an odd dualism, I like being depressed. I enjoy the train wreck I become, this character I form and act out. It is interesting - to me at least - even if it makes me hard to live with. I don’t like the feeling of isolation though, ultimately born out of selfishness and an inability to make sacrifices. So I wrap myself in my blanket of loneliness in an effort to keep warm - which is ultimately futile. Then it becomes easy to give in to hate. The perceived differences, the wish to shake people in the street. The huge chip on my shoulder. The presumptuous feeling that ultimately I am right. In moments of drunkenness I enter the world I wish to flee and seat myself among it. Mentally judging, ticking off the negatives. Keeping score. It becomes a list, don’t try, it won’t work for these reasons, give up now. So then I wake up and stare in the mirror. The first few grey hairs by my ears, receding temples and alcoholic thread veins on my cheeks and nose. For all my lofty ideals, my political and philosophical posturing, I see through the mask I wear. At the true individual. The selfish person, the hollow burnt out shell, the empty vessel with no hope. At that point it is clear, transparent, obvious. Most of all I hate myself. Writing that depressed tirade on the website caused a few friends to naturally send me concerned messages. I’ve re-read what I wrote and yes it is melodramatic, but to me it is not overly unhappy. It was a reaction to leaving somewhere and then feeling the jarring shock of returning to that same place.
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Sticking to my plan and not wanting to out stay my welcome anywhere, I moved to staying with a friend in the suburbs of Leeds. Instantly there was less ‘hustle and bustle’, less people and I felt calmer. Nothing really changed though. It was the same environment, just less in your face. However easier to block out. Blocking things out is almost as dangerous as caring too much. I dislike apathy but it is a natural psychological reaction to the world that presents itself to us. Orwell is cited with saying ‘happiness can only exist in acceptance’. So personally I find myself treading a fine line between unhappy and discontent because I can’t accept the world I was born into and yet trying not to become exceedingly depressed because ultimately I can’t change that world. So writing is a pressure valve for me. Draining a bit of fluid from the wound to ease the pain and discomfort. It’s been my companion and outlet for a long time. I have been criticised and commended for it but I’m afraid that I write for me, when I need to. There is a Tim Barry lyric I can relate to about how he hates songs about writing songs, so I apologise for having resorted to the literary equivalent. Hang in there, I hear there is talk of riding bikes to come.
The Cycle Touring Festival 1
So the first bank holiday weekend in May was the Cycle Touring Festival in Clitheroe and it was frankly incredible. I had been in a bit of a funk, if I’m honest, since coming back from my last trip, but the festival left me feeling reinvigorated and buzzing. It prompted so many thoughts in my head that it inspired me for a long period afterwards to write more positive words I want to publicly say thanks. Thanks to Laura and Tim for all the hard work in making the event happen and for giving me the opportunity to be involved. Thanks to everyone for being friendly and nice. Thanks for all the kind words, especially after my open mic story - apparently being a bit drunk and sweary somehow worked. Whilst riding back to Leeds after the festival I also ordered my thoughts on the sessions I was involved in, which dealt with the kit required for cycle touring. In my head there appeared to be some common themes that jumped out at me. Firstly everyone has an opinion on kit and there are no right or wrong choices, but what really matters is your personal piece of mind. For example, people might tell you not to carry the weight of a tool to fix problem X, but if carrying that tool gives you piece of mind then carry it. Maybe you’ll never need to use that tool and it will literally be a talisman - but if that makes you feel more comfortable touring then it is worth it. Everybody has their own definition and level of comfort, so what is the right amount and type of kit required to meet that will vary from person to person. What you need to carry to feel comfortable does change of course, but clearly start with what you need to get you out the door and off down the road and then discard anything when you feel it isn’t needed any more. Secondly, there will always need to be compromises. There is no perfect touring set up, probably because the bicycle has definite limitations for carrying everything you feel you need to survive. However, it does provide a very good, if imperfect solution, and importantly it’s driven by your own effort. So, based on monetary constraints and the desire for comfort and peace of mind as outlined above, we have to make compromises. The solution we produce, our personal touring set up, is therefore the product of these choices and should be right for us.
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https://cycletouringfestival.wordpress.com/
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If you have never been touring or have never been to a particular country or environment, it’s difficult to know what kit you will need to give you piece of mind or what compromises you will face. The beauty of an event like the Cycle touring festival is that it gives you the opportunity to meet and listen to people who have experiences you don’t. Based on these you can then make a more informed choice. You still need to run this information through your own personal filter as the kit that they used may not be perfect for you - but it gives you somewhere to start. Lastly, I think it was mentioned that someone had commented at the festival it was nice to feel ‘normal’. Well personally, I’m not a big fan of ‘normal’ so I think it was nice to meet lots of people who were equally weird. Long may we all stay that way. I definitely feel like I made new friends that weekend and look forward to connecting with them and meeting them again in the future. Roll on next year?
Germany I cycled from Leeds to Hull and boarded a ferry to Rotterdam. From there I finally made it to Hamburg. In the process I turned a 310 mile ride into a 370 mile one. I know that there was 20 miles out of the port of Rotterdam I hadn’t accounted for but I’m not sure about the rest. I think following bike routes rather than roads meant I had a few unnecessary scenic detours. I say unnecessary, as most roads in Germany have a wide shared separate pavement for pedestrians and cyclists. So I think I could have navigated mostly using signage designed for cars. It was nice to have a day off after that as 70 and 80 mile days weren’t really in my plan. It was also nice in Hamburg to stay with a friend from Leeds who is living over there and just spend some time relaxing and exploring. I had been there before in 2007 (I think) but that was a bit of a whistle stop tour involving a gig and a football game. This time I had a really nice cruise up the river on the ferry which you can do with a day travel pass train ticket. I then wandered some familiar and less familiar streets and sat in the park in the sun and read. It’s weird, I had my usual big city misgivings - the anxiety of too many people flooding by me - but I also felt strangely at home. It set me thinking that I am getting used to location and friendships being fluid and often fleeting. I may see some of my friends who I used to see regularly less, but I am seeing other friends in other towns more and making new friends as well. This feels good, I do like being sociable and it’s nice to create my own personal network of connections which is independent of geography and so adapts to my itchy wandering feet. It all makes me hopeful for the future that I don’t (yet) have to put my flag in the ground anywhere and can use my privilege to roam, to connect with people, enjoy their company and learn from them. If anything, I’m not sure how I would feel if something or someone presented themselves that made me think about staying in one place for an extended period of time. It’s now almost a scary thought, but as they say - we’ll cross that bridge when we come to it.
Resisting The State Through Withdrawal And Avoidance As the pedals turned my mind was whirring away too and my thoughts turned to the UK election. The Conservative party getting back in to power was not ideal but it could be managed in terms of impact on my life. This led to some thoughts in more theoretical terms and I currently can see broadly three types of ways people relate to government. The first is that people actively want to be controlled and have the boundaries of their lives dictated by order or decree. It doesn’t require too much thinking and offers a certain security that must appeal to some people. The second is the idea that some want government by representation, voting and, to a degree, consensus. Those people require the feeling that they are
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involved in the decisions affecting their lives. Finally there are clearly some who feel government is unnecessary and that we can organise and live our lives without an outside system of control or governance. Now looking at the UK system we probably have something that encompasses a bit of the first and a bit of the second. With the emphasis on one or the other depending on who you talk to. It’s worth mentioning that the government aren’t evil. I’m sure they genuinely think they are doing the right thing for the greater good of society. The issue is that the lives they have led mean their view of society is skewed to an elite world many of us will never see and this colours their ideology and actions. Personally, I’m probably one of the people who would opt for option three with perhaps a smattering of option two if it a) was consensus driven and b) was small scale and locally/community focused. The other thing that crossed my mind when considering how we relate and wish to be governed was that the impact of that government on our lives varies. If you as an individual or your community is removed from seats of power and clusters of population the impact of government is often delayed and sometimes lessened. A simplistic example: in the days of physical tax collection, if the government levied a £1 tax on all people, those who were geographically remote would find that the collection didn’t come around for a while as the tax collector physically had to reach them. Today this is still true to some extent, and actually recent austerity policies cutting outlying regional services mean it becomes even more so as remote communities have to be more self sufficient and less reliant on government. I know I’m being simplistic here, but I genuinely believe that if you don’t like the government learn to live without it and shut if out of your life as much as possible. This doesn’t necessarily require geographical remoteness or isolation. To a degree, I’ve been working on the premise of ‘hiding in plain sight’. These ideas aren’t new and I can’t take credit for them but I am applying them in my own way as you would expect. The first thing I realised was that involvement with the government goes hand in hand with involvement in the capitalist economy and some aspects of wider society. At a base level if you enter the housing market with its currently inflated prices you are then also forced to enter the labour market. This then ties you to government through taxes e.g. income and council and you are at the whim of their decisions. If you can establish a way to meet your housing need (essentially shelter) outside of the standard housing market or with as little involvement as possible then you take a step towards freeing yourself from government. Now clearly, even if you have shelter you also need food. I’ve written elsewhere about the liberating effects of growing your own. Dig for victory over the Tories! In my current mode of meeting my shelter needs by transience and cycle touring, it’s not appropriate to grow my own food. So the limited financial funds I have are used to buy food. This isn’t ideal as its willing participation in a market and my current methods of funding this aren’t sustainable long term. The long term solution is one of finding a stable shelter outside ‘the market’ in one place and work towards self sufficiency, or using the following strategies whilst mobile. Strategy one is short term employment either as labour exchange e.g. ‘woofing’ or a limited participation in the labour market. If it’s the latter, then this needs to be - as I said - limited and stay beneath the tax threshold. Strategy two would be to learn the art of foraging and try to meet some of my food needs from nature. Not an easy task and it does have clear dangers resulting in an ‘Into The Wild’ style scenario. The third strategy would be parasitic activity. Now parasitic activity needs some explaining. It’s not a new concept but there are ways and means to live off the waste of modern society. Yes I’m talking dumpster diving. However there are other methods that can yield food through the kindness of strangers. Personally, I think that this is
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really only an adjunct to other strategies if the opportunity presents itself. It needs to be done positively as well - it’s not cool to empty someone else’s fridge, but if someone leaves half their meal in a cafe then intercept it before it goes in the bin. Those who have read some of the books and zines published by anarchist group Crimethinc 1 will notice I haven’t mentioned shoplifting here. This is deliberate. I am not against stealing from corporations, but personally I prioritise my liberty over the reward in this instance. I just think the risk is too high if you are repeatedly stealing food from supermarkets, and you’ll get caught eventually. So I could get pissed off about the Conservatives being back in power or I could look at my life and say actually it doesn’t really affect me because I refuse to fully participate in their system. The actions of the government do need to be monitored and if you are a vulnerable member of society you will come off worst. Equally, we need to be vigilant because if enough people realised the futility of pushing for change and withdrew from the system I’m sure that the goalposts would be moved to combat it. I'm also sure that at a personal level, if enough people actually listened to me and so these words had a concrete impact on the system, my liberty would evaporate pretty quickly even if I was innocent of any legal breach. So the balls in your court - are you going to let the government dictate and control your life or are you going to work out how to limit their impact on you and your community? Let’s maybe learn a lesson from the Zapatistas here. If the government insist on cutting the support services in our society, learn to live without government intervention and create your own community based support services. If we don’t need the government they are powerless over us. Disclaimer: I have no formal training in politics or philosophy these are just my thoughts. If you think there is something I should read so I’m better informed then let me know.
Denmark I put in one more big day of cycling after leaving Hamburg before catching the ferry to Denmark. In Denmark, I was the most organised I’ve ever been and had a route that was kindly created for me by a twitter contact, @bikeAlottle. I also pretty much knew where I was going to camp as the country has designated wild camping areas. So the days were - as all went to plan - definitely shorter. It wasn't all organised in advance though as I failed to find somewhere to stay in Copenhagen. It felt like I covered the distance from Rotterdam to Denmark really quickly, and I guess I did. Despite the fact I had issues with the comfort of my well used saddle, I mostly enjoyed ploughing through the miles. It did feel a struggle at times – but every day, after four o’clock in the afternoon I just couldn’t seem to stop and so I continued on into the light evenings, stretching the daily mileage total. Copenhagen didn’t really stand much of a chance. Cycling there on a Saturday morning I was already in a ‘funk’ and didn’t know why. The weather was grey, with rain inevitable. Upon entering the city, I didn’t see much to endear it to me. There are a lot of bikes and bike lanes but actually the infrastructure is pretty confusing. There’s pretty much no signage, and turning left at a large crossroads from one bike lane to another takes some practice so you don’t end up blocking a bike lane or a road. Although I had sent out a lot of messages, I’d failed to find anywhere to stay in the city. A quick
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http://www.crimethinc.com/
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look at hostels showed they were either fully booked or way out of my price range. It looked like my best bet was my fall back option of cycling back out of town to somewhere I could camp. Copenhagen to me is a bit schizophrenic. On the one hand you have this town of new offices, shopping malls, gentrified flats and modern development. All things that do nothing for me. The other side of the city is the ‘normality’ of modern Europe, people just getting by however they can. Trying to rouse my spirits, I went to Christiania, an area of the city which attempted to declare itself an independent state using an old Danish law in the 70’s. It was partially successful and despite attempts to gain control of its prime real estate – it still persists. It’s an odd place to me, it’s like every squat and punk house I’ve ever been to all being in one place. Industrious, enterprising but not the normal society. Smoking of hash and weed is pretty open in the area and the beer is cheap. It’s actually a huge tourist magnet and groups of hip looking young people wander around trying not to engage too much with the locals. So what about me? I'm self-aware enough to know I’m a tourist too. Well, I ended up sitting, chatting to the local drunks in between them yelling at each other and everyone else. They were nice enough but I decided the offer of one of their floors probably wasn’t for me. I then had a few beers with an American called Joe who busked in the area and later another old American hippy called Pete. It was pretty fun despite the rain having started by this point. They were interesting people who had come to Europe years ago and never left. Eventually as time got on I realised I needed to get to where I was sleeping and cycled the 6 miles or so out of town to the Sneppen shelter. If you are ever camping in Denmark then download the ‘Shelter’ app. It’s in Danish but the icons are pretty easy to understand. With this app you can find a network of shelters and wild camping spots. At Sneppen there were already three guys with their kids and a homeless guy - but it’s a big shelter, so there was plenty of space. When I woke up the next morning I realised the reason why I felt so low the previous day. I was sick, feeling almost like I had flu and running a temperature. Today was planned as a day off, but instead of going back into Copenhagen, I decided to stay at the shelter and try to rest and get better. The three guys with their kids left in the morning and in between periods of sleep I chatted to the homeless guy about his life. I never got his name but he seemed genuinely happy and alternated between living with his mother - trying to repair her decrepit house in another part of Denmark - and living in shelters on the outskirts of Copenhagen. His brother had had an accident in which he had broken both legs and hips. Living in the shelters meant he was close enough to visit him in rehabilitation. Being sick on tour - and especially running a temperature - isn’t good. Essentially, you sweat into your non-cycling clothes and your sleeping bag without the means to easily get them clean. This then gives you the choice of wearing cycling clothes that smell of sweat or non-cycling clothes that also smell of sweat until you can find somewhere to wash them. Not the most pleasant experience. The next day I left Copenhagen and took the train to Malmo. Even that wasn’t great, as it also serves Copenhagen airport and was packed. I still wasn't feeling 100% but I was getting there. I did have somewhere to stay lined up here- which meant a warm shower - but sadly no opportunity to do laundry. Malmo was nice, the bicycle infrastructure was equally as good as Copenhagen but with signs! I mean, it’s still a city of monuments to excess but these were smaller so my brain was more able to process it. With that in mind, I feel like I’m being harsh on Copenhagen as it does have a lot going for it especially in terms of counter-culture. I guess I’ll definitely have to go back in the future and give it a second chance when I’m not sick.
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Sweden I literally couldn’t seem to slow down. Even when I rode a short day, it was still 49 miles. The reason: a broken spoke, so I had to stop early to fix it. The unpaved farm tracks and fire roads that were part of my route in Sweden didn't diminish my appetite for mileage, despite sapping my energy and probably causing that broken spoke. I know that cycle touring should be about enjoying yourself, I know it’s not a race but a part of me likes pushing myself. 62.5 miles (100km) in 6 hours of riding was now the ‘normal’ target day. A long daily target also worked well at that moment… because Sweden is big! It’s fairly populated in the south where I was cycling, but I covered 255 miles in 4 days and yet was still 150 to 160 miles away from Stockholm. Putting all that into perspective, in the 16 days I had been on the road for this second trip, I had covered almost half the distance of my entire 7 weeks in France and Spain. I wasn't planning on slowing down anytime soon. Sweden is expensive and I didn’t manage to find somewhere to stay in Stockholm through Warmshowers. My plan changed to getting the overnight ferry to Turku and then pressing on to Helsinki. I hadn’t appreciated the ferry was a 12 hour crossing and only leaves early in the morning or late at night - however that was almost a blessing in disguise. I did consider heading up the east coast of Sweden to Umea, but another 6 nights solo in the tent on top of the 6 to Stockholm didn’t appeal. I hadn’t had a proper conversation in 4 days and I don't think I did for another 4 after that. It was sending me slightly mad. Now don’t get me wrong I’m usually in favour of a bit of solitude. However I think my route across Sweden may have been a bit crap. It seemed to follow the motorway so the wild campsites at night, as well as being visually nothing to shout about, also had a soundtrack of traffic noise. Add to that the mosquitoes which forced me inside the tent once eating was dispensed with and it was a bit uninspiring. I did see a few interesting daytime sights but to be perfectly honest, northern Europe all starts to look the same after a while. So I kept pressing on and hoped my body would hold up. From leaving Malmö, I averaged 62.5 miles per day for 8 days, with a slightly shorter day into Stockholm to break it up. This was the longest distance and time I’d ridden on a tour without a day off. Luckily there was a shower on the ferry or it would have been a new record for not showering too!
Finland I whizzed through Sweden as planned and enjoyed the east of the country a bit more as it started to grow hilly with more impressive views. However I definitely liked Finland more. Much more lumpy but more wide open vistas because of this. Also, as a country it looked more ‘lived in’ and wild which appeals to the ‘reverse snob’ in me. I stayed with a Warmshowers host in Vantaa which is I guess part of the ‘greater Helsinki’ area. This gave me an opportunity to do some much needed washing and actually take a day off the bike. Finland is still expensive - but uses the Euro so you can more easily gauge just how expensive! Having been speeding through countryside most of the time but also having visited two capital cities, I realised that I definitely appreciate a good sunset over urban architecture. I don’t think I can live in a city anymore, which to be honest is something I think I already knew before I left on my bike last year. I started having a few thoughts that amounted to ‘what the fuck am I doing’? It had crossed my mind that this is some type of mid-life crisis. Instead of buying a Ferrari or entering an Iron Man in some vain attempt to feel young again, I’m just riding. But the way I see it a mid-life crisis is about
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the shock of realising you are halfway to the age at which most people die and so it’s a reaction trying to regain some lost youth. It is a product of the anxiety of dying. My drivers are similar but definitely different. I am acutely aware I could die at any moment and fairly comfortable with this, acknowledging my finite existence. My touring is more about living life whilst you have it and the opportunity is there. Yes, I am growing older but I don’t desire youth - just an opportunity to exist as fully as possible now. Living in the now is hard though, and a definite skill. There is a balance between planning and forward thinking where necessary, and just going with the flow. I wrote this on the boat to Tallinn. I had a certain level of anxiety as I had nowhere to stay in the city but needed to pause there. My rear wheel desperately needed some TLC and I wanted to find some paper maps for the Baltic states. In addition my next Warmshowers stay in Riga wasn’t until 6 days later so I was in no rush. With no Warmshowers responses for Tallinn, I had the options of hostels which should be affordable or riding out of town to camp. My anxiety was that arriving in Tallinn on a Friday night all hostels would be booked or have nowhere to store my bike. I could have planned and tried to book somewhere but, using the internet, it's quite hard to work out which hostels are bike friendly. Equally I realised that I may have to ride so far out of town to wild camp that it wouldn’t be logical to then ride back again. So I had to manage my anxiety and chance my arm. Realistically, I knew it would be fine but there is always that worry at the back of your mind you have to suppress.
Estonia I finally took my foot off the gas. Knowing how much time I had on my hands, I decided not to take the most direct route through Estonia. Sadly, this meant declining the option to ride with two people who were at the cycle touring festival, but they were taking the faster coastal route. I decided to sort of follow ‘Eurovelo 11’. Estonia has fully ‘realised’ their section of this and it’s well signposted. It might not be cycle paths and quiet roads for all of it, but you can still follow a coherent route. Naturally, I followed the ‘general idea’ of the Eurovelo route. I have a tendency to cut corners and go my own way on occasion. In fact I actually seemed to be on national route 6, the ‘Tour de LatEst,’ a lot of the time. You can get a free map of that route from the tourist information in Latvia and south Estonia. Most roads aren’t scarily busy and some small roads are unpaved. Road works on the other hand are chaotic and ‘interesting’! Estonia is great though. Once you get away from the artificial inflation of Tallinn’s capital prices, it’s pretty cheap. In addition the landscape is beautiful and full of wildlife. As I wrote this there was a woodpecker on the tree right in front of me. The people are relatively friendly and if you make the first effort to strike up conversation they will happily talk to you as best they can. I tried to overcome my shyness and interact as much as possible. There are also loads of ‘wildcamping’ sites. At their most basic they are a fire circle, a bench and usually a wood store. Others have shelters and long drop toilets. No water points though so make sure you carry enough or have a filter. There are two ways to seek out the sites. Either search on the Estonian equivalent to the forestry commission’s website3 (I’m assuming that’s what this organisation is) or look out for big map boards located in towns, villages and other places. These will usually show where there are ‘tenting’ or camping sites. It’s worth mentioning that a lot of the sites are by lakes, so make sure you take mosquito spray! My route took me southeast before then turning back southwest towards the border with Latvia.
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http://loodusegakoos.ee/where-to-go/search-options
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My drop in speed was also influenced by a strong headwind from the south/southwest, which made me realise how much I was blown across Scandinavia. The weather was also odd. Most days were hot and very sunny (sunburn, again!). As the day went on the wind increased and clouds started to build. This meant late afternoon showers, which faded in to clear evenings. Most nights it then rained again. It couldn’t make up its mind. Very English, although warmer than the UK. I remember thinking that I would like to be writing profound thoughts and big ideas at this point, but frankly I was just enjoying myself. I was thinking about the future but nothing crystallised of worth. Instead I just wrote travelogues and extolled the virtues of the surroundings I was travelling through. I remember spending lazy evenings gazing out across a beautiful lake, listening to music on my phone or just the birds chattering, the smoke from the fire keeping the mosquitoes at bay. It was a hard life.
Thinking About How To Meet The Future Need For Shelter I had started thinking about the future. At this point, roughly 4 1/2 weeks into my last tour, I was already planning the next one and I may have even have bought the ferry ticket. Although this tour was longer I couldn’t help but think of plans after my return to the UK at the end of July. Apart from a few weddings it was a bit of an open book. I do have some ideas for other tours and adventures but having learnt that planning around favourable weather is a good thing to do, these won’t come to fruition until at least spring 2016. That gives me 6 to 8 months of spare time. My rough guess calculations estimate that the cost of my year, from leaving my job at the end of last September to the end of September 2015, should stack up to approximately £3000. I don’t know if that sounds a lot or not, I know I haven’t budgeted much. In this spare period, it seems logical to enter the labour market and earn a similar amount to give me ‘touring funds’ for next year. In order to limit that involvement to as short a period of time as possible, I still have no wish to enter the housing market. This gives me a number of distinct options for meeting my needs for shelter during the British winter. Option 1 is to continue camping. The cold doesn’t scare me but the wet does. In addition, if I’m located in one place I think I would exhaust the wildcamping options fairly quickly and returning to sites increases the risk of discovery. A ‘base camp’ would be preferable where, with permission, a larger tent could be placed that not only would make quarters less confined but enable cooking in bad weather. Option 2 would be to buy some form of van. This gives a wider range of night time options for siting it. It also includes an initial cost probably beyond my means and ties me in to tax and insurance. A static location for the vehicle on private land would enable me to declare it SORN to avoid the last two. Option 3 would be the provision of somewhere free or very cheap to live that sits outside the normal housing market. I’m thinking sheds, boats etc. These things are out there. My friend Greg once lived on a canal boat in London for free. He did hate it, and the boat sank, but that free shelter is possible. Mod-cons are not required. Option 4 would be ‘sofa surfing’. I’m not too keen on this as it is bound to lead to over staying welcomes and strained friendships. Whereas the above option utilises unused shelter, ‘sofa surfing’ almost says “you participate in the market, so I don’t have to”. Not exactly fair.
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Option 5 is a return to ‘Woofing’ to meet food and shelter needs. In order to also add money to the touring fund some form of part time job would be required too. It would take longer to generate the magic cash figure, also inevitably leading to long days and tiredness. I can see it being less than fun. Option 6 would be squatting. I need to do more research here, especially as I believe the law has changed. I also need to talk to some current and ex-squatters I know. Now is the time that I am most prepared to seriously use this option, having learnt to live with very little. Option 7 is the ‘easy’ option. Move back in with my parents. It’s a testament to my cultural indoctrination that the thought of doing this somehow feels wrong. It shouldn’t, in many cultures extended families live under one roof. My aunt also lived with my grandparents well into her forties. I need to gauge how my folks feel about this as that is going to impact how pleasant living at ‘home’ would be. I can hear some of you saying “just rent somewhere you fool”. However I don’t want to get sucked back into the rental market. Entering the church of work just to pay bills - that would be failure. When I wrote this, I couldn’t do anything about it - it was just some brief musings. It still stands as a statement of intent though and I am still searching for options. If you can help or point me in the direction of appropriate shelter… please do.
Latvia There is a school of thought that completing hard things is more rewarding. My time in Latvia definitely fits with that ethos. Where Estonia was easy and handed me things on a plate, Latvia made me work but the reward was discovering an incredibly beautiful and friendly country. The first difficulty in Latvia were the roads. Most of the roads I rode on were ‘regional’ roads. This type of road at worst is unpaved, an often corrugated sand/gravel track. There are the occasional ‘drifts’ which want to send you sideways and you invariably end up covered in dust. They do the job though. Slightly better are the paved roads. Only slightly though. They are a patchwork of cracks, old surface and potholes. The Latvian technique for filling potholes is to put some tar in the hole followed by gravel. Over time traffic compacts this. The roads appear to have had so many of these fixes applied that on occasion they’re more patch than anything else, leading to a bumpy uneven surface. In fairness, I did come across some newly laid roads and the main roads are better. However the appeal of the minor roads is the lack of traffic. What traffic there is will fly past you on the ‘best bit’ (i.e. the middle) of the road at seemingly insane speeds but this will happen only once or twice every 30 minutes or so. Naturally, on a gravel road you will be engulfed in a cloud of dust. The major roads though, which all focus on the capital Riga, have much more traffic but still the apparent lunatic speed. I didn’t go to Riga because of the second difficulty I faced which was an increasingly strong headwind from the south west that I had turned into in Estonia. After crossing the border at Valka, I spent two days battling into the wind until Cēsis. There I threw in the towel, checked into a campsite and had a day off exhausted. From there, I decided to give up on heading southwest to the capital and turned south. Now this route was fairly logical except for the fact I didn’t realise there is no way across the river from Skrīveri to Jaunjelgava. This meant a diversion east to cross at the hydroelectric dam at
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Aizkraukle. An extra 15 to 20 miles to ride, but not without its sights. The final difficulty was wildcamping. Wildcamping in Latvia is legal with the law being similar to Sweden apparently. That means cultivated land is a big no. Into the woods I went. However, I found a lot of the woods dense with lots of undergrowth and virtually unimpregnable. There needed to be an existing trail into them to follow. Most of these though generally led to a farm or a house. On day four in the country - frustrated with the lack of anywhere to easily wildcamp - I randomly had one of the best experiences of my time in Latvia. After looking at a few less than ideal wildcamping locations, a sign by the road for a campsite looked very enticing. I rode down to see how much it would cost me and I was greeted by loud music and people having a party. A man (who turned out to be the owner) approached me and I checked I was in the campsite. I was, he said, but did I speak German, as he didn’t speak very much English. I speak about four words of German, so said I didn’t. No problem. He rang an employee of his in his other business laying brick pavements who lived on site - and John came to translate. It was my lucky day. I could stay for free in a hut on the site, use the facilities and join the party. So after the guided tour by John to see where everything was I showered and set about being sociable. I joined a table and tried to strike up conversation. At this point, a woman called Linda appeared with a beer for me. Linda also worked at the campsite and was due to come down at 7 but, after a phone call, had come down earlier to be my interpreter. Her English was spot on. It also helped that one of the party guests, Vincent, who I was sat on a table with, was actually French and could speak English too. My friend in the UK had said she used to manage a Latvian in her job and that they don’t do small talk. In the conversation at the party, it was also suggested that they could be quiet and not forthcoming with conversation until drunk. This sounded like me! If you ever go to Latvia, don’t be afraid to start conversation, I feel like you get back what you put in and people are actually very friendly. At some point the guy sat next to me - who just referred to me as 'English man' - started plying me with shots of vodka. I learnt a lot about Latvia that night. The people are proud of their country but surprised that anyone else wants to visit it. Also many people leave to go to other parts of Europe, because, it was suggested, the minimum wage was very low but housing costs still fairly high. This explained the large number of abandoned houses I had seen - but I couldn’t fathom how the cost of housing still stayed high. The birthday party finished around 7 and myself, John, Linda and the owner (whose name I didn’t get) drove to the ‘neighbouring’ village for an outdoor rock concert. I say neighbouring - it was a good 20 to 30 minute drive at lunatic speed! It all started to get a little hazy here as the vodka kicked in but I declined the offer to stay out partying late with John and got a lift back to collapse into a drunken slumber in the hut. I can highly recommend Camping Forsteri 1 near Madliena. The next morning it was the most peaceful and beautiful place to nurse my hangover before setting off on the road again. If you go there, say you heard about it from the cycling English man called Ben. So Latvia, at times, was hard work but also incredible. I would highly recommend getting off the beaten track. People will stare at you on a touring bike, but what do you expect? Make an effort and the people are friendly and interesting. The landscape is varied, with the real jewels being the rivers, which give beautiful views and some great swimming spots. I’m definitely going back.
1
http://www.forsteri.lv/
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Death To The Concept Of Middle Class Ok, so what can I say about Lithuania? The north and south were alright but the middle was far too populated. The cities to me were generic and depressing. The drivers were crazy, with better roads than Latvia to speed on and there were more of them on the roads. It wasn't my favourite country. However it did seem to stir something in my brain. I may have not have enjoyed the country and my surroundings but I was still enjoying myself. Either riding or thinking or just knowing I’m not having to get up every morning and go to work. This was a key thing about my journey, it was an opportunity to take back my autonomy and be in charge of my life. I had just finished the anthology of fragments “Two Cheers For Anarchism” 1 by James C Scott. Scott argues that the petty bourgeoisie have been reviled in left wing political discourse but at least they retain their autonomy. They may in some instances find themselves shackled by long hours and a lack of security but the shopkeeper and the smallholder alike own the means of production, which gives some security. Most of us these days think of ourselves as ‘middle class’ but what does that actually mean? We could define it as having gained some elevated status through the ownership of material goods or by attaining a certificate of educational achievement. However, on a base level we are no different to the working class in that we do not own the means of production. We are interred within offices as structured and stifling as the factory and with tasks as repetitive and unfulfilling. We have no autonomy for our actions and day to day lives. Instead, we are sold a meritocratic dream that if we work hard and succeed in a career, then autonomy will follow. Or failing that, our freedom will be granted to us on retirement. These arguments worked for my parent’s generation, able to afford to own property (eventually) and often gain enough status and experience to set their own terms for work in their fifties and sixties. For my generation and those that follow, there is growing evidence that these rewards have been removed. But we are still told to play the game and the rewards will be bestowed upon us. Reality bites. The ever increasing gap between rates of pay and the price of land and housing has firmly put the reward of home ownership out of the grasp of a large chunk of the middle class. An English man’s castle is no longer available to all. We’re told we should be more like our European neighbours where home ownership is more rare, which sounds plausible, until you realise that even the rental market is now increasingly unaffordable and that our European neighbours often rent in urban areas where they work but own property as a family elsewhere e.g. summerhouses. We are told that everything is ok. Twenty years of long hours and sacrifice through our twenties and thirties will see us launched into managerial or consulting positions where we enjoy freedom and autonomy, where we are valued for our knowledge and experience. As our parent’s generation retire, we will fill their shoes. This would make perfect sense and does work for some. However if the average ‘baby boomer’ had 2.4 children and mostly (yes this is a generalisation) only the father worked, this leaves 1.4 children with no shoes to fill. To compound this, endless ‘rationalisation’ by companies and sectors as they realise that they’ve created massive bureaucracies of ‘bullshit jobs 2’ reduces the opportunity further. 1
https://libcom.org/files/James-C.-Scott-Two-Cheers-for-Anarchism_-Six-Easy-Pieces-onAutonomy-Dignity-and-Meaningful-Work-and-Play-Princeton-University-Press-2012.pdf
2
http://strikemag.org/bullshit-jobs/
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What future is there for the middle class? A lifetime of boredom through office work. No autonomy in a world of repeated tasks that can be rationalised as somehow ‘better’ if they’re not physical or on the factory floor. The engagement and level of skill required in the endless writing and filing of documents, the hours of email and meetings or herding the numbers swimming across spreadsheets are little different to that required to fit part x to point y on the assembly line. In my eyes the worst part is that, in clinging to the idea that they are somehow better and not working class, the middle class has created its own cage. If the definition for being middle class is owning certain material goods (e.g. a car) or attaining a particular educational certificate (e.g. a degree), then this creates the bars to hold the middle class firmly in its office chair with no escape. Those bars are built of personal debt, the levels of which are increasing year on year. The cage forms from owning status-providing goods: the house for a lucky few, the car or the latest electrical do-dad. This ‘keeping up with the joneses’ to maintain a class status inherited at birth outstrips incomes - which in real terms are falling - so people drop into debt. We are also encouraged to continue studying in higher education. This is amid increasing tuition fees and costs of living which propel us into levels of debt our parents did not have to deal with. All of this, to maintain the myth we are a more wealthy, better educated portion of society irrespective of the fact that in terms of the necessary things for living we have nothing to show for it. Most people I know who did not attend university but instead learnt some form of trade, or have become part of the petty bourgeoisie by starting businesses, have more autonomy and often in purely monetary terms, wealth than those who work in traditional middle class occupations. Let’s put a stake through the heart of this false notion that enslaves us. The middle class is dead. The UK is a nation of landless peasants - we do not own the means of production and are forced to sell our labour cheaply in the factory or the office. Until we identify how personally we can (possibly fleetingly) break out of those environments then we will never experience autonomy and true freedom in our lives.
Poland Warsaw was exactly what I needed. Now you may be scratching your head at this point. I have professed to not being a big fan of cities and especially capitals. My experiences in Poland, with busy roads pretty much from the border to Warsaw and having to negotiate the urban sprawl of that city to reach the centre, should suggest negative feelings. However, Warsaw (and to a lesser degree Poland to that point) was redeemed by two main features: The first was its history. It definitely has the most interesting recent history of any city I visited. I was a ‘proper’ tourist for a bit and joined a free ‘orange umbrella’ tour of the old town on my day off. Most of the city was destroyed during the Second World War and was rebuilt in the last 40 years. It is a glowing example of why authoritarian regimes should be resisted at all costs, having suffered at the hands of both Hitler and Stalin. The second thing that led to me enjoying Warsaw were the people. I stayed with a Warmshowers host called Anna. She was great, friendly and hospitable. It was good to swap stories and discuss cycle touring, languages and experiences of different countries. I found possibly my favourite bar I’ve ever drunk in too. It’s in the old town and called Same Krafty. The bar serves great Polish craft beer and plays great music, thanks to Katka who works behind the bar there. She also
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furnished me with some much needed conversation about beer, music, life and language. I already knew that people really make places, but I was definitely suffering a bit from loneliness and in need of some human interaction. Warsaw really gave me a boost. Heading south, I was back on slightly quieter roads feeling refreshed and re-energised. Passing the half way point for this trip, and noting geographically where I was and how much time I had left, there were lots of options for routes to get back to Rotterdam. I knew that none of them needed be very direct. License to explore!
Falling In Love With Countries Love - by all accounts and personal experience - is a strange and often illogical feeling. The love of countries can be even stranger, based on a feeling or sense more than rational factors. Luckily, being polyamorous with countries is socially acceptable. So I can love Spain for its overt and visually vibrant left wing politics as well as its breathtaking landscapes. I can love Latvia for its people, it’s simplicity and in the areas I visited, lack of the curse of modernity. Now, strangely, I felt like I also fell for Poland. Let’s look first though at the rational and the negative. Poland has some clear things which grate and I do not like. There is an obvious sexism in advertising. The bus stops display an ongoing graffiti war between competing but all apparently far-right wing football fans. There are clear displays of invasion from ‘Western Europe’ lke Lidl, Tescos and other familiar supermarket brands. Plus the armies of foreign tourists being wooed by guides and restaurants in Warsaw and Kraków. But for every familiar high street chain there seem to be ten independent shops. The cities are especially full of small bars, cafes, bookshops, food shops and clothes/shoe shops. Not all are to my taste but it is nice to see this spirit of independence. It reminds me of the vibrant independent business scene that has emerged in Leeds. The smaller towns by their nature are more limited, but bar maybe one or two chain supermarkets, they are also populated by independent businesses. Poland appears to me to really be ‘a nation of shopkeepers’. This gives the county a very different feel to the ‘identikit’ vector graphics of many other places I’ve been. This is borne out in how a new house being built looks. Thanks in part, I believe, to lax planning laws, new houses are all sorts of designs and shapes even if the construction techniques themselves are fairly standard. The best example I saw of this was a house with a completely separate circular tower at one corner. What purpose these two slightly impractical rooms were meant to serve I have no idea but I liked how crazy it looked. Reading between the lines, I can easily identify why I love this country. It’s familiar enough to be comfortable but crazy enough to be interesting and exciting. Even the language, of which I learnt about six words, is hard but appeals to my thirst for learning and knowledge with its complexity. Of course this is all new - maybe when you are travelling and a tourist you can’t really love a country. Surely its lust at best, a quick fling before you leave for the next one. These thoughts were penned with two days left in the country before crossing into Slovakia. As much as I loved Poland, it hadn’t forced me to stop moving and pinned me down. My long term route included coming back into the west of the country for a while so at this point in my trip there was still time. As with the other countries that fight for the attentions of my heart, Spain and Latvia, I definitely want to go back again in the future and experience it more, test and explore our fledgling relationship.
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Slovakia & Austria The mountains of southern Poland and Slovakia were beautiful. They reminded me of the pain and joy of cycling up hills but also the rewards of descents and fantastic views. People in Slovakia were friendly too, including the random gift of half a watermelon. In Bratislava I met Vinny, who also set off on a tour from the cycle touring festival. It was nice to spend a day relaxing and enjoying food and beer with a fellow terrible tourist. It was also good to talk to a native English speaker for the first time since leaving Hamburg. Although most people I met have spoken fantastic English, there is always a slight language barrier in every conversation. Parting ways, Vinny headed east along the Danube towards Budapest and I set off west to Vienna for a whistle stop visit to the city, before heading north to the Czech Republic. Vienna seems nice but a Warmshowers stay in a shared flat reminded me of parts of my old life I don’t want to return to - the stress of rent, bills and possessions. You can also see how different people deal with the problems and enact solutions around shared space within shared houses/flats. I know I’ll have to learn to live with others again and I think after so much time alone it may be tough. Hopefully my communication skills may have improved on this trip.
Touring Changes Your Way Of Thinking My mind has also been wandering and thinking about other ways you change by cycle touring. You definitely start to see things differently and I have found I very rarely see things as absolute. The world is awash with new continuums that either didn’t exist or were very different before touring. For example, cycling in the rain and spending long periods outdoors has made me realise that wet and dry are not absolute states. Now, in my brain, even the mid-point state of damp is not enough. I can and will mentally categorise things as dry, slightly damp, very wet or variations on this theme based on a personal and highly subjective continuum. I am more scientific when it comes to another new found continuum. Nothing is now just clean or dirty. The lack of regular access to washing facilities or even just running water has led to there becoming variations in cleanliness. I have found myself categorising items of clothing on a ‘day scale’ around how many days they have been worn. This then enables me, when everything is dirty, to select the most worn items for washing. Sadly it’s not a perfect system as not every day’s wear produces the same level of dirt. It may be hot so you sweat more or dusty on the road. Also I have a rather bad habit of forgetting how many days I’ve been wearing something! My favourite cycle touring continuum is not new but rather a change to something that existed in my mind already. Bicycle parts are generally new and then become worn before finally reaching worn out. Worn out is the point where, in any good bicycle shop, they will tell you it should be replaced. When cycle touring with little money, this continuum extends beyond the point of worn out. Bicycle parts get used for more miles and just seem to keep going. That is of course until they don’t - the continuum is finite and reaches a stage where something breaks or is unusable. The state I would label ‘totally fucked’. As I headed off to the Czech Republic it was with excitement about what lay ahead but also what new things I would learn about myself and how my view of the world might change.
Czech Republic It took me about 6 days to pass through the Czech Republic and back into Poland. The Czech Republic reminded me of a cross between Poland and Slovakia. There were parts I liked and some I didn’t. It was the first place where not speaking any of the language was a hindrance. I met
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few people who spoke English which made me feel a little isolated. This meant that when I took a day off in Kutná Hora, I longed for a conversation all day. Then when I returned to the campsite and should have spoken to the other people staying there, I couldn’t summon the energy to try. The Czech Republic is fairly cheap, especially as I decided not to go to Prague where campsites were over double the price of those in other towns. Despite this, my money did seem to disappear quickly which is probably due to my terrible budgeting and spending habits. It was the first place where I managed to leave the country with exactly zero of the local currency in my pocket.
Embracing Noise After being in Bratislava, Vienna, Znojmo and Kutná Hora all in quick succession I decided I needed some time away from civilisation for a bit. My route back into Poland deliberately went through the mountains to give me some ‘space’ as well as challenging cycling. It definitely did the job and the views were at times breathtaking. There is nothing quite like a six mile long descent down a winding mountain road. However, I’m in central Europe so there isn't true wilderness. It’s hard to fully escape from civilisation and even when wildcamping, it is all around you. On my first night back in Poland, I could hear a nightclub pounding away somewhere despite being four or five miles from the nearest town. As I’m cycling on the road, most nights you can hear the noise of traffic, which I’ve grown accustomed to. In addition, the noise of trains and aeroplanes at times seems to be everywhere and also unavoidable. None of this bothers me - it’s just an ever present reminder of humanity over the horizon. It's worth noting that nature itself is far from silent. The woods, at that moment in the seasons, seem to literally hum with the sound of flies. I have to say I prefer this to the whine of mosquitoes - and most flies don’t bite. Larger animals in the woods tramp past the tent on occasion, leaving me wondering what they were. Sleep is bookended by the birds singing and calling away as the light fades and again as the sun rises. It makes me realise how much our homes with double glazing and insulation cut out the sounds that are present all around us. I’m not sure if this is good or bad. I’m someone who sleeps pretty much all year round with an open window due to getting too hot and finding that central heating dries out my throat. I think I like the noise, the constant sound that connects me to the world outside my room or tent. I am happy that it will never be quiet - to me it's a good thing because a silent world is a dead world.
Fragments For some reason, as I crossed back into Poland, I felt like writing something completely different to normal. The following paragraphs were the result. The west of Poland was good. Some quiet roads, some busy. Lots of woods to get lost and camp in. Morning. You pull on the bib shorts you were wearing yesterday and the day before that. They’re sopping wet, yet you haven’t seen a cloud - yet alone rain - for a week. You wonder at what point this results in untoward consequences. At least you know they’ll dry before becoming wet again. Some consolation. Pedals turn. Your mind wanders. Random fantasies. You write presentations you’ll never give. Slides, words and pictures. Talks on philosophy, politics and life all loosely woven together with cycle touring. I should write this down, half your brain thinks, what’s the point, the other half counters. Stalemate. Pedals turn. Your mind wanders.
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Rest. Sit. Watch the world go by. Some of it though stirs thoughts, feelings, impulses. You think about the last time, a drunken fumble. The time before that, seemingly eons ago. More measured. Better? A wave of emotion washes over you. Loneliness. Conditioned mental reaction triggered by hormonal response. Biology. Push it down. One hand on your phone you drink from your glass. “Fuck you Huxley, I’ll never be an intellectual”. Pedals turn. The mind wanders. Future thoughts. Thoughts of the future. Plans. Peel back the layers and examine motivation. Consider outcomes but also drivers. Not just the pros and cons but the real reasons your mind is throwing up these ideas. Run them through the filters. Political, do they fit with the plan, your worldview, are they a valid deviation? Personal. Why? No that’s bullshit, dig deeper, why? What do you have to sacrifice? What do you gain? Realise that thinking now is irrelevant as no real action can be taken for weeks, months. Pedals turn, your mind wanders. Push the bubble under the skin until one end hardens. Insert the point of the knife. Slowly. Carefully. The skin breaks the yellow fluid starting to run down the shin. Quickly wipe the knife on your shorts and pick up the toilet paper. Watch the toilet paper darken as it soaks up the puss. Push the skin again from the other end of the blister, draining it. “Should I be doing this?” You wonder. “Is this a problem?” No reason to worry, nothing else you can do at the moment. Feet move. You wander. A sea of faces float past you as you cross the bridge. How many faces have you seen in your lifetime you ponder? How many of those will you see again? As they pass, some catch your attention more than others, either by similarity to others or something else. People you’ll never communicate with. You feel small, insignificant. Is subjecting yourself to this experience healthy? Feet move. You wander.
Germany & Belgium I crossed from Poland into Germany, to stay with a friend in Berlin that I hadn’t seen in possibly 10 years. I decided to take two days off in a row. The first time I had done this on this trip. My body needed it but I still struggled not to spend too much money in city, mostly on food and drink. From Berlin I continued west across Germany, mostly wildcamping but also with a couple of Warmshowers stays. Despite resting as much as I felt I could and enjoying myself, I was starting to feel like I was struggling and having to resort to a day to day routine to keep me moving. I crossed through part of the Netherlands and then through Belgium to Geraardsbergen so I could watch the start of the Transcontinental race. It was a really good spectacle to witness and I am glad I made the effort to go there. However I had far too late a night. The race starts at midnight and I then ended up drinking with my friend Tim's work colleagues. They had made the journey with him from the UK to cheer him on and wave him on his way. So the next day it felt like burn out had been achieved. I was sat in a yurt in Belgium watching the rain teem down outside. I was allowed to sit there for another three and a half hours before I had to move. Moving was the last thing I wanted to do. My body was just about capable, but I wasn't sure about my brain. My bike was also not in the best of conditions. The rear wheel now had a pronounced wobble. Despite truing it the day before, the tyre was so worn that its lack of shape was causing most of the movement. The bike still rumbled on though. My brain on the other hand? I don’t know if it was thoughts of returning to the UK, the post tour blues arriving early. Or maybe something else. I started this whole year of riding due to a level of general malaise and it’s been
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brilliant. I could escape and forget about everything. Now reality was, perhaps, starting to bite. I needed a rest but stopping was going to involve answering the ‘what next?’ question. People had already started asking it. It just made me depressed. Trying to stay positive and mentally plan more tours and trips wasn’t helping. The bit I need to pass through to get from here to there. The reality. The norm. A job? All of that was feeding the black dog. So coping was via routine. Wake up, pack up, cycle. Stop, pitch tent, sleep. That routine though would soon be at an end. A new coping strategy required. I was looking forward to seeing my friends and family - but I didn’t expect to feel like being the life and soul of the party for a bit, and wanted to avoid the dreaded questions about the future. Eventually I left the yurt when there was a break in the rain, hoping the weather would improve. It didn’t until I reached Gent so I decided that I would treat myself to a hostel for the night even though it was insanely expensive.
The Blues (Reprieve) So after completing the circle and riding back to Rotterdam I was back in the UK and it was actually fairly nice. My fears of post tour blues didn't come to fruition. Even after completing the 160 or so miles to ride to the Midlands to attend my cousin’s wedding, followed by returning to my Parent's house, it all seemed to be ok. It was nice to enjoy some familiarity and catch up with friends. If you read my writing or know me in real life, you will know that I have ongoing problems with my mental health and depression. Depression is a complex issue and is not just 'being a bit sad' - it includes feelings of helplessness, self loathing, guilt, anxiety, isolation and boredom. I know there are many people who are in more stressful or worse situations than myself, who suffer serious physical and mental health issues or injustice and poverty. That feeds into the guilt element when I suddenly find myself down and struggling to cope. It makes me feel like I am malingering but I have seen how my brain can consciously and unconsciously pull apart my life. I don’t ask for sympathy or special treatment, just that people try to understand that those with depression can be inconsistent on occasion. The positive thing is that I am better than I used to be. Sometimes my brain runs off into dark places but I am more self aware now than ever before and can spot the warning signs that this may happen. This enables me to then do things to catch any downward spiral early. It flags up the need to eat and sleep well and cut back on caffeine and alcohol. Having this early warning system in place is a comforting feeling and for the first time, even if I don’t understand why I get depressed, I know the triggers for dark thoughts. Those triggers are my reasons for cycle touring. I struggle to accept the society around me - the fundamentally flawed life it provides us all with causes dark clouds in my mind when it invades my space. Equally, the loneliness I have felt because of my inability to apparently form long term nonplatonic relationships causes occasionally bouts of negative thinking. The worst part of that is that the two triggers work together to create a feedback loop. The first causing depression, which I know strains relationships. The second stemming from that and removing some of sources of support that would help cope with wider society. The best treatment I have found for all of this has been cycle touring. The space and autonomy it provides has helped me cope and removed a lot of situations where triggers are present. It has enabled me to have time to critically evaluate my thoughts and behaviour and work on my early warning systems. It gives me the opportunity to step partially outside the society that makes me depressed.
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In theory cycle touring should make loneliness worse. I can say that is true to some extent, but it actually has two positive effects. Firstly I have learnt to enjoy my own company more, I’ve learnt to be on my own and cope. To - in essence - be less lonely. Secondly it removes the pressure to have a relationship. I could at this point say this pressure comes from society to be in a normal stable relationship, or it stems from inside and is biological. I don’t know which of those is true but cycle touring - at that time - gives a reason (or excuse) to not have to form a long term relationship. I am well aware that this is all coping by avoidance rather than facing any particular problem head on. It’s all an evolving strategy and there are things about myself and the world I am powerless to change - so avoiding issues is the only path currently. Cycle touring is here to stay as the best medicine. I need to cope without it for a short period while I try to raise funds for the next trip. Lets see if I really can avoid the post tour blues and stay positive in the long term.
Some Statistics It appears stats are the new kit lists when it comes to cycle touring blogs and books. Here is a round-up of the ‘scores’ for my recent travels. It’s all fairly approximate so don’t hold me to it! In the period from leaving Leeds on 26th November 2014 to ending up back with my Parents on the 9th August 2015, I’ve visited 15 different countries and cycled a total of 6086 miles. I’ve actually cycled more than that but that’s the recorded miles on the touring bike. Over this period, I cycled ‘on tour’ for roughly 119 days which means my daily average was 51 miles per day. The total period of time was 256 days. The breakdown of where I slept is as follows: Wild camping – 71 nights Family – 57 nights Warmshowers stay – 44 nights Friends – 43 nights Campsite – 17 nights WOOF7 stay – 11 nights Hostel/Hotel – 9 nights Ferry – 4 nights Tim Moss has a really good blog8 about how he funded his adventures. The breakdown for my ‘funding’ is very approximately as follows: Selling bikes/bike parts – £1500 Tax rebate – £570 Selling records – £400 Gift from Parents – £400 ‘Buy me a coffee’ gifts – £100 I had (and spent) a rough total of about £3000 in the period. If you work out how much I spent a week, at £83 you can see that I am terrible with money/budgeting! You can tour for much less than the amount I spent. I made a conscious decision to not stress about money whilst I still had it
7
https://www.wwoof.org.uk/
8
http://thenextchallenge.org/how-fund-expeditions/
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and just went with the flow. Luckily my funds stretched until I reached home. The good side of not budgeting is that I drank approx. 200 plus different brands and types of beer from all around Europe! During my cycle tour I wore out, broke or totally destroyed the following things (some weren’t new at the start ): 3 zips 3 chains (I’m not sure they were all completely worn out but I carried 2 on each trip which I swapped periodically) 3 tyres 2 sets of disc brake pads 1 pair of cycling shorts 1 cycling jersey 1 cycling cap (snapped the peak in two places and it’s heavily faded!) 1 pair of knee warmers 1 Garmin (currently ‘fixed’ with tin foil) 1 tent pole (‘fixed’ with a bit of another tent pole cut to length) 1 complete tent (huge hole burnt in the outer – see Emergency Exit #19) 1 frying pan (fixed with a match to replace the pin part that fell out of the folding handle) 1 chainring (the middle, the other two look like they still have some life left) 1 spoke 1 bottle cage 1 set of rear hub cones and bearings Touring can be hard on you physically and mentally at times but it’s really hard on the kit/bike you are using. I’ve had a tendency to push things on this tour just to see how far they will go. In future I think I will try to be a bit more diligent on the maintenance front, especially if I end up going somewhere more remote. So now it’s time to lick my wounds (well, continue putting Aloe vera gel on them) and sew up the holes in my base layers again! I need to somehow put some money in my bank account. I think I should be able to see out the rest of the summer but the winter months are sadly going to involve the dreaded act of ‘work’ to try to save up funds for the next trip. I have ideas and big plans which hopefully will come to fruition. All going to plan that will mean future editions of this fanzine, until then... Ben Smith Winter 2015 Punk Rock Bike Club - punkrockbikeclub.com Editors Note: This is the second issue of Emergency Exit I’ve helped Ben publish. The idea of me editing anything is slightly ridiculous since my own spelling and grammar is appalling, but there you go. I had a crack. Whilst I might not always agree with Ben, I do think it’s vital that the stories of those at least attempting to live differently are recorded and shared. In doing so, maybe there are insights that can be passed on - ideas that might be read at the right moment and provide inspiration, a new direction or just a sense that whatever the reader is feeling, they are not alone. Hopefully, zines like Emergency Exit give some sense of what is possible as many of us struggle to work out a new way forward in difficult times. Phil Chokeword New Year Eve 2015 (Fuck New Years) b/w&read small press - bwread.blogspot.co.uk
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http://punkrockbikeclub.com/2015/02/watch-it-burn/
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