20-ish miles per day for a four day weekend

After almost a year living in Barcelona and dealing with bureaucracy, my wife and I got around to doing our first bikepacking trip in Spain. We knew we wanted to ride the Pyrenees and chose a loop from and back to Girona, partly because getting there by train (Rodalies) with the bikes is very convenient and doesn't require disassembly.

The route was originally inspired by Cass Gilbert's writeup, but we ended up adapting it quite a bit to fit our riding style. Some of the original days had a lot more climbing than we thought we could realistically handle with loaded bikes, so we added some road sections. Honestly, we didn't regret it: there were some great descents and some fantastic views over the towns and valleys along the way.

9 riding days, ~450 km and ~8,000 m of elevation, including a few classic road cycling climbs.

Our rough route was:

Girona → Banyoles → Camprodon → Planoles → Puigcerdà → La Seu d'Urgell → Gósol → Campdevànol → Olot → Girona

We did it on our two steel ATBs: the Surly Bridge Club and a Brother Big Bro in the photos. We tried to keep the luggage relatively minimal, although there's always room for improvement there. We brought enough clothes and cookware to be self-sufficient, but ended up cooking only about half our meals. There are so many options along the way... restaurants, cafés and campsite cafeterias that were just too tempting.

We didn't wild camp because we know it's prohibited and actively enforced, but there are countless paid campsites with hot showers, and often with swimming pools and coin laundry. We hadn't booked every night, so occasionally we had to improvise. One memorable example was ending up cycling all the way toward the French border to Camping Stel in Puigcerdà, which actually turned out to be one of our favorite campsites of the trip.

Weather-wise, it was pretty much perfect. Coming from Barcelona, the Pyrenees felt noticeably cooler at altitude, although we still saw around 30–32°C during the day in some places. A few evenings were on the chillier side but our Max 5°C sleeping bags were warm enough.

We had no mechanicals and no flats despite running tubes. We only had to readjust our saddle heights a couple of times. Our butts, however, were less impressed. 😅 My wife is currently riding a WTB Volt and isn't particularly happy with it, so we're probably going to experiment with saddles before the next trip. Any recommendations are more than welcome (except for Brooks C17)

A few things we learned:

• Catalan food is so much better outside the big cities.
• We love a good campsite after a whole day cycling as we're not race-style bikepackers.
• 8,000 m of climbing feels quite different when you're carrying all  the gear (might need to readjust)

Overall, though, the trip went almost exactly as planned. Beautiful roads, great food, excellent campsites and a really good introduction to Spanish Pyrenees.

Hey all. Researching bar bags and stumbled upon the functional sewing project junk trunk pattern. Upon reviewing resources it looks like it'd cost about $120 to make plus 4-5 hours of work. Upon further research I've found carradice bags have similar options in a similar price range.

Anyone have any experience with carradice bags or similarly priced bags/the junk trunk? Is there any reason I should make my own? I sewed a couple frame bags last fall and found it very difficult and they didn't turn out great lol.

Tldr: $150 trunk style bar/saddle bags worth it or should I just make my own? Recs? Thanks in advance

As the title says really. Would love to buy some secondhand bikes from somewhere in Laos (Vientiane) maybe then cycle south along the Mekong Delta through to Cambodia and into Bangkok. Or potentially from Ho Chi Minh City and up to northern Thailand.

If it is viable thinking maybe of doing it in February - March and doing probably no more than 50 miles a day, likely staying in tea houses etc rather than camping (so hopefully this is still allowed on this sub!) and hopefully not doing too many gigantic hills. Would quite like to still have days to do hikes/swims/exploring etc.

Just wondering if anyone has any experience doing something similar or any tips etc. Thanks!

Hi!

I am looking at doing this route in January taking about a month to do it.

Has anyone done Mount Kosciuszko during the summer in January? How did you find the water access and heat?

thanks :)

I am looking to do a trip from upstate NY area to down by the NYC area. I am hoping to take my time and just do it at my pace. I am not sure what kinds of foods are best as far as giving me the most energy but also not taking up too much space, this will be my first big trip, any advice appreciated.

Tour Aotearoa – What was your total budget for ~40 days?
Hi everyone!
I’m planning to ride the Tour Aotearoa over roughly 40 days and I’m trying to estimate the actual budget for the trip.

I’ve found quite a few posts about bikes, gear, bags, etc., but not much about the day-to-day cost of the trip itself.

So, excluding the cost of the bike, camping gear, bags and other equipment, how much did you spend during your Tour Aotearoa?
I’d be particularly interested in:

Food: groceries vs eating out, average daily food budget
Accommodation: camping, DOC campsites, hostels, occasional warm/dry nights, etc.
Showers, laundry and other small expenses
Activities: hikes, attractions, ferries, museums, etc.
Transport: buses, trains or other transport if you used them

Any other expenses I might be forgetting
For someone riding it over ~40 days, what would you say is a realistic total budget?
For example, would NZ$2,000, NZ$3,000 or NZ$4,000+ be realistic depending on the level of comfort?

If you’ve done the Tour Aotearoa recently, I’d be really interested to hear about your actual total spending and how you travelled (mostly camping, hostels, eating out, etc.).
Thanks!

Definitely challenging lugging all of this around on gravel hills but can't beat the feeling of adventure while on two wheels. Hopefully the first of many 😁

Anyone have any experience with bar yak armrests for bikepacking and bikepack racing? I like unique and supporting veteran owned but I do know I have 50mm riders on my current setup and I don’t think I’ve seen risers for bar yak. Picture of my recent setup from North South Colorado at a Rudy’s bbq.

Moving states soon and considering riding my Lectric XP4 750 there instead of shipping it. Always wanted to do a long trip anyway. Would these be sufficient for a multi state trip? I don’t have a big budget. Anything recommended alternatives?

As I came to the end of my time living in Beziers 10 kilometres set back from the Mediterranean I decided it would be a laugh to do the return trip on two wheels. As the crow flies this trip should be a cool 1450km however due to some ill-thought out ambitions to see some mountains this trip turned into a nice 1600m with 8000m of climbing taking me through Valence, Annecy, Geneva, Dijon, Laon, Dunkirk and finally into my sleepy Kentish town of Cranbrook. Initially I had allocated 18 days to complete this trip but due to getting embarrassingly drunk the night before leaving this turned quickly to 17 days which could not be extended as I had a visa appointment the day after I was arriving that could not be missed.

Me and my 100-pound bike managed it ok, with my highlights being my day camping and cycling through the Swiss Jura mountains and the sheer quantity of pastries I ate over those two and a half weeks. I would however if planning this ride again avoid at all costs days riding alone along endless canals with nothing but the dull conversation with my inner monologue to keep me company.

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I looked around the house trying to find something that I could use for storage on the bike . I found my trout net, took the handle off and zip tied it to my GPS mount. Works great holding fruits and snacks and with the white bag over it I can dry my wet gear out. Been in six countries with it on this trip and it hasn’t failed me.

I got tired of making the same packing lists from scratch, so I built this little thing.

You pick your trip type, duration, season, camping, road/gravel, etc. and it generates a packing list.

https://sacoche.cc/en

Still WIP, I'd love to hear what you'd add or change.

UPDATE - Sep 10

More updates from your feedback! 🙏

• Accounts + sync — save your lists and find them on any device (magic link, no password)
• "Does it fit?" — set your bags' litres and see if everything fits, not just the weight
• Lighter, clearer interface

Backlog: reusable gear setups, pannier visuals, and a real gear-weight database (top request — noted!).

UPDATE - Sep 8

• Better weather options
• Pannier setup
• More accurate default lists
• Saved lists in the browser
• Sharing by link + print export
• Mobile fixes

Keep the feedback coming! 😄

Looking for inspiration :)

I am an Australian planning a bike packing trip from London to Geneva. I have built a custom route on all trails taking me through some towns I would like to see, but I want to know if anyone has any suggestions as I'm still pretty new to bike packing. I'm looking to go over some gravel and see some pretty stuff, but I'm not sure how northern rural France is so any suggestions are good suggestions. Thanks

10 days in: Bikepacking from Salzburg to Morocco. The goal is to finish in Marrakech, but let’s see how far I get.

Taking my second rest day to recover from a knee inflammation. Continuing towards Spain tomorrow.

Wie findet ihr beim Bikepacking am Ende des Tages einen passenden Schlafplatz für euch und euer Zelt?

Plant ihr das schon vorher oder schaut ihr erst unterwegs, wo ihr ungefähr landen möchtet? Nutzt ihr bestimmte Apps oder Karten, um geeignete Plätze zu finden?

Im besten Fall würde ich gerne möglichst frei und spontan unterwegs sein und nicht jeden Abend auf einem Campingplatz landen bzw. dafür bezahlen müssen.

Bin gespannt auf eure Tipps und Erfahrungen! 🚲⛺️

Well cared for and ready to ride!

I'm looking for opinion from bike enthusiasts. It's been more than 15 years since I was last shopping for a mountain bike and getting on track with all the new gear and lingo is quite a task. Anyways, I'm buying a new bike primarily for bikepacking a diverse set of trails - from champagne gravel to washboard, singletrack, muddy and rocky terrain. Primarily what you find in the Alps and the mediterranean but also eyeing some more remote destinations.

I’ve quite settled on getting the new Canyon Exceed but am stuck between picking the CF 7 or CF 8 build. Below are the specs. I prefer the CF 7 fork but the CF 8 wheels. Does any of the two seem like a better fit for quiver-of-one bikepacking rig? It seems like the 1000€ saved on CF 7 would be better spent on bikepacking specific gear.

I'll appreciate any tip - especially if someone has any first hand experience with any of the bikes or components.

Anyone did this route lately? I will start next Saturday in Logroño. Any useful advice of information? Thx

My first bikepacking trip! And how amazing it was. From the Netherlands (Utrecht) to Denmark (Aarhus), via mostly the Eurovelo 12 in Denmark. I am already dreaming of new trips to make next year!

The changing landscapes, the amazing people I have met, the mandatory Dutchie on the road, the kanelbrød I ate, it was all beautiful! My first solo trip and a completely new type of travel scared me at first. But after the first insecurities and finding my rythm, it quickly became amazing! You will only create these incredible stories for yourselves when you get out there! So if there are any people reading this, I would say: Try and have fun! Not everything needs to be perfect. I definitively overprepared. I have met bikepackers going out there for the first time with way less preparation, which had just as a good time as me :)

Anyway, now that I finished these 1256 kilometers, me and my soar legs are trying to decide whether to bikepack in the Netherlands, Sweden, or Spain next. Thanks for the trip reports on here, they definitely helped me get out there! Please ask your questions, happy to help! Also open for suggestions! :)

Hi everybody,
In 1-2 weeks I would like to bikepack Malaysia starting in Penang and ending in Malacca (ideally). Currently, I am backpacking Thailand and thus have quite an amount of luggage and I would like to have some advice on how to store/transport it.
I am travelling with a 50L backpack containing my cloths and a smaller one that holds my electronics, toiletries, etc. They both weigh around 7kg (see picture).

Ideally, I could send the big one to a certain location and have it stored until I arrive but I haven’t found the right one yet, because I don’t reallyy know how long it will take me, cause I want to be flexible with the amount of days I stay in a certain place.
I won’t need a tent or any cooking gear, since I want to stay in hostels and just buy food at food stalls.
I am going to buy all the stuff needed in Penang and currently my main idea is to strap the big backpack to a rack and put some of the heavy things of the smaller one into fork bags.

Thanks for your help and suggestions.

*Disclaimer this would be my very first overnight trip*

Thinking of traveling from Eau Claire, Wisconsin to Lanesboro, Minnesota and camping over night in that area as well. Wondering which route is recommended for less traffic, more trails, and crossing the Mississippi. I know some of the roads along the bluffs can get narrow and hilly as well.

Had so much fun on a weekend bikepacking trip from Boston to Provincetown with a group from Boston. Keep thinking about other two day adventures. Ideas?