Category: welcome

It was absolutely the best day so far, had the best french lunch yet, and met some very cool locals

Managed more 100 miles today (from a small villeage near St Dizier to Langres)

The ride was relatively easy, because the scenery is perfect – small villages, massive green fields, forrests, rivers and cows etc, perfect for cyclig and driving.

Had amazing 3 courses french lunch at friendly resturant in a small villeage, felt really good after the food.

Climb a massive hill/mountain to Langres! Probably steeper han those in the alps, the city was amazing, so we decided to stay there.

Meet friendly locals and invited us back to their house, tried french wines and cheese.

It was a mixed nightmare and really good day. Managed around 80 miles (from a village called Lor to Pargny-sur-saulx)

Start very early, the morning view was beautiful on the long stretched french roads. Went to a very posh McDonald’s, you can only order from the self checkout and internet.

Sam had a puncher when we were in the middle of nowhere on a countryside lane, we have to repair the inner tube in the middle of rainstorm, because we didn’t bring any spare inner tubes with us!

The sun come out afterward and the Champagne countryside is amazing, massive green or yellow flower fields and blue sky, very hilly roads – perfect driving condition.

Found a beautiful campsite right next to river, but we thought going for a beer first and then come back picth the tent. The pub landlord offered us camp behind his garden after knowing our trip.

We decided cycle on yhe countryside roads instead of main roads, because its less traffics and harder to accidentally get on the motoway!

Start off with a very long hill outside Cabrai, it was very windy as well – good warm up for the day, it was worthy for the views

Me

Sam

The view was amazing when it was sunny, but there were many many long and steep hills, unfortunately rain was pouring down a bit as well.

Managed to get a camping spot near a village called Lor on the D966

And Sam doing his regular stretch

Had first taste of strong wind and a bit of rain, which we need to get used to very soon.

Packed up the tent and had some food, we on the road again, the morning was relatively easy, pretty much followed the road.

Stopped at a supermarket for food, an old French lady thought we need help and ask us to walk to other side of the car park talk to her husband, they’re shock after we told them where we going and point out where the next bike shop is.

Outside the Simply supermarket:

Was a bit slow in the afternoon, because we spent a lot of time look up the map on the phone and make sure we don’t end up on motoway again!

The wind started to pick up by the late afternoon, unluckily it was side wind, so it make it very difficult to cycling uphill. Then it start to rain as well, so we decided going to Cambrai centre look for food, its a bit weird most of the food shop doesn’t open later, but managed to get some food for the bread shop which opens all the time, then we went to a pub wait for the rain to stop, the guy at the pub was excited about our journey and gave us free beers.

The rain doesn’t seems to stop, so we asked the guy at the pub where we can stay, he pointed to Hotel F1.

We had a quick pit stop in Hotel F1!

really good days ride although I have learnt to hate strong winds, and the fact that every food shop is shut for the majority of the day.

We had to stay in hotel because there was a bit of rain. Tomrrow we will be faster a stronger. I predict we will be in montreaux!

It was hard to say good bye, can’t believe we actually doing it, was very emotinally exhausted.

The ride was fairly easy, we got off the ferry at Calais, pretty much followed D943 all the way.

There was a lots fairly steep up and down hills, which wasn’t easy for a steel touting bike loaded with stuff. A dog was barking loud and try catch us.

By following D943, we accidentally cycled on the D942 which is like motoway, the police stopped us and escorted us off the motoway. Fallen off the bike, but was fine.

Managed to find a perfect camping spot – its next to a river and hidden from roads, also able to see last bit of sunset. Went straight to sleep afterward.

Finally got the bike ready

And we’re off

Start to pack my stuff and found out that I have too much stuff I don’t need, some of them only used once, this remind me the quote from Fight Club

The things you own end up owning you

we need buy stuff, trading of stuff make this world go around/better place – like the silk road 🙂

Note to myself:

• Only buy what I need.
• Always prefer buy experience over things.

With only 5 days left, I should really be doing other things like pack my stuff etc, but I found the connectivity issue very interesting, so I did a bit research and try to work out the best solution to stay connected via mobile network.

As with all the technologies, there are many standards in the world.

• 2G – this is the good old GSM network originally designed as voice only
• 3G – there are all based on CDMA (code division multiple access), WCDMA/HSPA is more widely spread than CDMA200/EVDO, also there is TD-SCDMA in China.
• 4G – based on LTE (long term evolution) standard

First is to find out the mobile operators within each country, luckily there are wikipedia pages for it

• List of mobile network operators of Europe
• List of mobile network operators of the Asia Pacific region

Since I only interested in the on route countries, so I scape those lists to produce the following one:

From conventional wisdom, its better to go for networks that own by the same company, Looking from the spreadsheet, I think I’m going to go for the following solution.

• 3/Three – For France, Switzerland and Italy, because I can use my unlimited data without extra cost.
• Vodafone – For the Balkan countries and Turkey.
• Beeline – *stan countries, VimpelCom owns largest network and provide cover for most countries, Beeline is the one to go for.

Currently I’m on Three, just in case anything happens and for backup purpose – ordered pay as you go sims from Vodafone, O2 and EE/Orange/T-mobile.