Bike Finished - What We Will Live On

Here is the bike ready to tour. Almost all the weight is over the rear wheel and the centre of gravity is somewhere just in front of the rear axle. Good for downhill braking, bad for uphills and rear wheel fatigue and spoke damage. Also, I couldn't get the peddles off my road bike (after all those miles they are practically welded to the crank now), so looks like I'm stuck with those stock ones until I hit a bike shop in France somewhere.

Duncan wasn't willing to spend as much money, so he's gone for a cheaper bike he got from the local Poundshop. Also, he likes his home comforts so he's packed a little heavier.

This is the Brooks B17 saddle which I'm a little nervous about. It's brand new, as hard as carved wood and totally unforgiving. Still, the titanium model is a third the weight of the steel one, and also is far more flexible. We didn't go for sprung saddles due to the energy loss as you power down on the peddle, trading speed for comfort. All the research we've done says that this thing will be as comfortable as hell, after a month.

These are our Schwalbe Marathon Plus tyres. These cost almost a hundred quid for the complete set, but they are apparently almost totally puncture proof. They have over doubled our spun weight on the bike so they'd better be worth it, or those slow starts at the traffic lights will all be for nothing. They are also wider than the stock tyres, so a lot of tweaking was needed to fit the mud guards around them. They just about spin now, but really we need to get some miles on these things to make them a bit smaller. 700x28C.

Here is the attachment for the handlebar bag. This thing is absolutely solid and the bag fits really well, dead chuffed with this. It'll hold snacks and maps and maybe some pepper spray to deter dogs!

This is my road bike for comparison. The geometry is quite different, the groupset is a mix of 105's and Ultegra depending on how important the part is, and it weighs about half as much! Really I should have just fitted a rack to it, but I'd be paranoid about smashing this up. The bike up top is almost disposable for this tour.

Here is our planned route, it unfortunately misses a few countries due to visa issues or dodgy access (Syria, Lebanon, Libya, Algeria, Jordon). I, frankly, was keen to check out some of Israel but it turns out cycling into it is a bit tricky, some of the borders aren't so fluid as we're used to in Europe! I'll try and work in an image on the title to illustrate how far we've gone each update.

Equipment and Route

Welcome to Duncan and Geoff's blog, which we'll update as we go along our tour each week or so, whenever we can get internet access. Some details about the trip:

1. We are going on a cycling tour across Europe and around the Mediterranean Sea, which will be about 10,000km long and take approximately 4 months.

2. Neither of us have done anything so large-scale before. This trip covers twenty countries.

3. We planned this trip in a week, and we're camping almost every night (once a week hostel for washing, internet, and charging electronics). In fact, everybody we spoke to from bike shops thought we were insane, most people plan for ages.

Today, Duncan and I have just finished assembling and tweaking our bikes. We have a few initial observations:

1. The brand-spanking new Brooks B17 saddle, which takes months to break in apparently, is actually already fairly comfortable! All that leather treatment was a good idea, and those beasts will last us well! £100 well spent, lets hope the titanium rails weren't a waste of money, they better soak up those bumps, because nothing else will.

2. My cheap panniers fit like a glove, and I get the feeling they'll be weatherproof to boot.

3. The light, almost racing, bikes we bought are very quick and should be better than the traditional steel tourers, as long as the carbon forks don't shatter on us on a downhill (I've taped mine up to help prevent scratches).

We are finalising the equipment lists for each of us, and plan to depart on Monday 30th. The first few days will average a mere 60km, but we're hoping to double that up after 10 days. Total rolling weight (excluding us) is under 30 kgs each, so it's fairly light for such a long trip.

You can look forward to some quality photos and, if we're lucky, maybe some quality banter too!
Geoff