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Article du Mardi 24 novembre 2015
02h27 - Interview in english Today I have received an email from a German cyclist met in California. He asked me to answer to an interview for his travel blog. It was a pleasure to answer to him and I have decided to post the interview on my blog because I never write my blog in english...I hope you will find it interesting, and, in advance, sorry for the errors in english.
When did you start your journey, and what was the initial intention?
I started january 2013. I wanted to cycle all Europe during 2 or 3 years. I did shortest tour in the past (a Tour de France of 3 months), and that is something I trully enjoy.
At what point did you decide to make this a longer term project to
travel the world?
After 18 months I was in Iceland. The price was the same to go to the UK or to go to Canada. Canada was better because it was exciting to go to Quebec (french speaking people), see New-York, and have good weather for the end of the year in Florida. After a change of continent I had to change the name of my tour (which was first 'Europe Tour'), so I changed it to 'World Tour'.
What were the most important things to take with you?
My bike! lol. My little computer is important for many reasons.
What did you miss most?
The good french food! (cheese, pastries, bred, french cooking,...)
What about your emotions on the way? Happiness, loneliness, freedom, exhaustion?
I live my dream, the emotions are positive every day :-)
I never feel lonely because I meet lots of people every day. If one day I start to feel lonely I will go to meet people and it is very easy to do because people are respectful, curious and impressed when they see me and my bike.
Travelling by myself on a bike gives me a huge felling of freedom and makes me happy.
How did you earn money while travelling?
By renting my appartment in my city, with adverstisement on a popular free math website (Google Ads) and by working during the winters.
Were there any major mechanicals or accidents? (you mentioned a car
touching you when it overtook you at some point, right?)
Lot of mechanichals problems the first year because I had not a good bike, it was a racing bike with a trailer and it was too heavy for the bike.
I had two accidents, the first in Lubeck, Germany, because of me. I was watching my GPS when a traffic light turned to red...The car in front of me has suddently stoped and i have crash on the car...My fork was completly broken (I join the photo). I had to wait one week at Lübeck to wait for a new fork. Thankfully no serious injury on me, just pain on a finger during a few days.
The second one was in Georgia, USA. Narrow road, no space to pass, and an idiot driver who was driving too fast touched me...I didn't fall but that was strong enough to break my table (which was on my big bag) and the rear-view mirror of the car. I was shoked.
What were some of the most memorable (both good and bad)
experiences on the way, in terms of nature but also people you met?
In term of nature it is mostly in North America : I saw a bear, an alligator, lot of vultures, pelicans...An eagle. In Europe I saw beautiful mountains in Canary Islands, Norway and Iceland. The most memorable people for me are the people who have health problems (one was slowly becoming blind, another one had recently survived to an hearth attack) but of course people who gave me an increddible hospitality are also very special and i will never forget them.
For the bad side, i had two weeks of heavy rain in northen Spain, one week of horrible storms/tornados/flooding in Texas, seven weeks without sun in Iceland...I have not meet very bad people yet.
Did you at some point think 'this is crazy' or I can't do it; if
so, how did you overcome this?
No because if something is very difficult I can just stop, sleep at the place where I am, and go on the folowing day. It is always possible to slow down. I always carry a lot of food. People think that travelling by bike is difficult, but i find it easy because it is freedom : I never have a certain place to reach at a certain time.
What would you recommend other potential world travellers planning
to do a similar journey?
Be safe, have at least always one yellow safety jacket on you or on your bike/panier. Have strong ligths. Stop to let the cars go first if the road is narrow. Use cycle lanes as much as possible. I often ear stories about traveling cyclist killed on the road and that it always very sad.
Take a lot of staff to be cumfortable, the weight on the bike will not affect your body, just makes you going a little bit slower, but if you travel by bike, you should have time...And having a huge tent, a chair, lot of clothes, a large choice of good food is so enjoyable after a cycling day! You also can carry a bottle of wine!
Commentaires (
cacher) :
De
Gérard MARTINEZ, il y a 9 ans : 幸运的是有一个谷歌翻译 Bon je ne vais pas te donner du travail en plus, il y a écrit en chinois: "Heureusement qu'il y a Google traduction!"...because my English is very bad. Portes-toi bien, ce qui suppose que tu guérisses vite. A bientôt Gérard
De
Florent, il y a 9 ans : Merci!!! Si c'est pour me faire aller en Chine, ce n'est pas une mauvaise idée, il parait que c'est très joli! On verra! A plus.
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