Thorn Cycles Forum
Community => Cycle Tours => Topic started by: richie thornger on October 18, 2014, 12:06:18 pm
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I don't know if anyone else keeps a log of where they stay each night, kms done etc etc. I'm sure some do.
I was just looking back through mine which goes back to my very first trips.
On my first proper tour, a 70 day trip from Liverpool to Istanbul, the stats of where I woke up each day were very easy to digest.
Tent 53, House 13, Hotel 3 (only 1 paid for), Airport 1, Potato Shed 1
I started to tot up my last tour and had to stop pretty quickly as I ran out of descriptive columns.
New places included : A coach, A School, A Security Hut, The Headquarters of the Yazidi religion, Petrol Station Prayer Room, Police Station in a Forest and of course an Iraqi jail.
I'm looking forward to go through the rest of the trip to see what other crazy places I've slept in.
What places have other people woken up in?????
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none of the above ;D ;D
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I was only thinking about this the other day, and yes there have been a few strange places. I have found if I am reasonably dry, warm and horizontal I can sleep anywhere!
So that's, caves, bushes, mountains, mountain huts, mud huts, snow hole, snow drift, shrubs, trees, door step! trench, shell scrape, barns , dry stone wall, Guard room cell, (Guard Commanders privilege) 90 minuet flight on a Boeing CH-47 Chinook and dead to the world for the whole flight, on, in, and on top of tanks, trucks, trailers and shipping containers. jungle, rain forest and deserts. Had a power nap on the fore deck of RFA Sir Bedivere (L3004) (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/RFA_Sir_Bedivere_%28L3004%29) waiting to enter Liverpool docks in a force 6 gale. Airport lounges, train stations, park benches, bus shelters all on many occasion, and after one very very long night in corporals Mess in the N.A.A.F.I. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Navy,_Army_and_Air_Force_Institutes) a roll top bin at the back of the cook house in full dress uniform! My comrades in arms were helping me back to the accommodation block and dropped me of en-rout as I was a bit heavy, so they claimed. Luckily it was full of dry waste in polythene bags, more by luck than judgement. But the best one is always your own bed at home.
Andy
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Interesting list Andy I may be wrong but I meant whilst on a bike tour :o
Of course you may well be referring to that??? I thought getting a lift on the back of a Peshmerga troop carrier was cool, but you've really raised the bar if you hitched a lift on an Aircraft Carrier ;)
I don't think this is the correct platform for "other" places I've woken up ;D
Yes Bushes on the little Islands in Vienna. I haven't done much snowy cycling yet. It's on the list. I don't think I've camped in a cave either which is pretty poor. These are all going on the list of MUST SLEEPS :)
So to add to my list :)
A Military Base at the Iran/Iraq border for a few days (not my choice). The house of a Peshmerga Officer who's boss had just interrogated me and a month sleeping in the store cupboard of a soon to be demolished office in Tehran.
Like you Andy I'm pretty happy most places :)
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Sadly not from a bike richie mostly from my army service and climbing and mountaineering before that. I will be putting in some miles on touring the west coast of Scotland late spring before the midges become too biblical. Well that's the plan.
Andy
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For me, many places similar to those listed above, plus snow,elevated rock ledges just wide enough for my one-man tent or a bivy and many, many abandoned houses and structures. Yes, the occasional cave as well; a few pictured below. Can sometimes be a bit difficult to get the loaded bike in...and out again, but well worth it.
Variety -- especially in sleeping places -- is the spice of life!
Best,
Dan.
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So glad I started this...I've been filling in the gaps of my daily log by cross referencing against my gps/photos/hand written diaries.
I've just found out my Police appointed bodyguard (Jamal) slept in my room two nights in a row in my traditional house in the Kalash Valley on the Pakistan - Afghanistan border.
The Kalash wine had wiped those particular details from the memory banks. Always keep a diary :)
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What places have other people woken up in?????
Here are some pics of places I've got some sleep while touring.
The first shot was taken in India, near the border with northern Bangladesh, on a street outside a shop. I arrived late at night and was dog tired. I really could have slept anywhere.
The second photo is at a school yard in Taiwan - that's my wife packing up.
The third shot is also my wife packing up. We camped in a village market in Taiwan's mountains.
The blue skies in the fourth photo are in Morocco, where I pitched my tent beside a shallow river. It was a damp night.
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Cycladelic I'm really pining to be back on my bike now:) Enjoying looking at and hearing about other peoples sleeps so much :)
The first ever travel blog I read was a guy on a 1950's British Triumph motorbike riding to the factory that now makes them in Chennai, India. **Edit Royal Enfield motorbike. Considering I rode one round India myself on my trip I really should have got that right :)
The feeling I get when I think about reading when he camped at a mosque in Iran still gives me goosebumps, it sounded so unbelievable to me, so exotic, and exciting.
It was such a massive kick up the bum to get me out of my comfort zone. My ex girlfriend (now best friend) loves to point out to me all the time , before I met her in 2006 I had only ever camped at music festivals.
Just having that idea of something different put in your head is all it takes sometimes.
Edit 2**
Having written this I felt the need to go and find that man on his Enfield and thank him for planting a seed in my head.
It turns out since then he has ridden a BSA bBntam to Egypt and is about to set off on another Royal Enfield adventure to South Africa :)
http://www.overlandtosouthafrica.co.uk/index.html
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Enjoying looking at and hearing about other peoples sleeps so much :)
Just having that idea of something different put in your head is all it takes sometimes.
Ritchie - here's another photo of a camp spot.
This one is a beach on India's west coast, not a million miles from Goa. Get out there...
And the other photo is of my tent pitched in Norway, on the country's fjord-lined west coast . Not a bad place to wake up in.
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Fantastic. I need to go and reduce the size of my photos before I can put them here.... I'll be back :)
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Iran. Shoe shelf of the local mosque. Suggested by the locals :)
Iran. Met these Iranian guys whilst cycling, split with them when I was tired and they said I wouldn't find a good place the direction I was going. An hour later they found me camped up at another mosque :)
Iraq. I'd asked to sleep at the Police Station but they turfed me out. Not far up the road was a petrol station. Most of them have prayer rooms. As last prayer had finished I was allowed to camp inside :)
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In fat Linda's caravan in the back of a working mans club in hurworth.
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She still there ;)
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Sometimes a situation presents itself and you just have to take advantage. All over Iran restaurants have these raised carpeted platforms for eating or smoking the hubbly bubbly. I just knew I had to convince someone to let me stay the night.
The grate thing is with this is you can have a good old smoke and then just roll into bed :)
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She still there ;)
She was absent before my arrival. It was just what I needed. A heater to dry my clothes, electricity to charge phone. No shower or washing facilities other than a sink in communal toilets.
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Sometimes a situation presents itself and you just have to take advantage.
Yes - that reminds me...
About 25 years ago, in northen India - heading into Kashmir - I slept on the floor of a cafe in a ramshackle village. The owner gave me permission.
After crossing south from Loas into Cambodia in 2005, and riding for a few hours in the dark on an unmade road, a wide river blocked the path. I ended up sleeping outside on a market vendor's bench/display.
Another one from back in 2005. It was a national holiday in Italy and all accommodation was full, so we found the small, local train station and slept in the waiting room. Luckily there were some long benches inside the place and we had it to ourselves.
Then there was the first time I went to Norway, almost 30 years ago. I'd booked a room, but after having a few drinks in town and meeting a young blond, I ended up at her place. Probably the worst night's sleep ever.
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1985 Hollow Mountain wind caves in the Grampians.
(http://i1327.photobucket.com/albums/u666/petesig26/Stray%20shots/68HollowMountainlookingoutofcavewindow_zpsa1e13dbe.jpg) (http://s1327.photobucket.com/user/petesig26/media/Stray%20shots/68HollowMountainlookingoutofcavewindow_zpsa1e13dbe.jpg.html)
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Rock and ice ledge, 2900m Steens Mountain, taken from my sleeping bag. Bike behind me for obvious reasons.
Best,
Dan.
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There is a definite theme going on here, two camps as it were.
The beautiful & natural
and the dodgy/hilarious/bizarre urban
I must say I've revelled in the latter and it's been fun too turn a "nowhere to camp" situation into "that will make a great photo" situation.
I would never of dreamed of sleeping in some of the more bizarre places pre bicycle touring and now it's as much a part of the fun as the beautiful ones.
Camping is strictly forbidden in urban parts of Dubai/Sharjah in the UAE. Big signs at the front of every park and public space telling you what you can't do. They read like a tick list of a bicycle tourers requirements.
So knowing this and having heard a few horror stories about the UAE Police with foreigners I did what I would recommend to everyone. Go to the Police Station. Explain you have a tent and no money for a hotel and ask if you can sleep in the Police Station. If they say no it's then their responsibility to deal with you.
The Policeman in charge of Sharjah station gave me his mobile number and sent me to one of the man made beaches and told me if anyone gives you any trouble get them to call me :)
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Sorry for no pics but here are a couple of my more memorable nights while on tour:
A. Concrete floor of a garage in Turkey...they were having a party next door.
B. Top of the roof of an abandoned post office at the bottom of a wadi in Jordan.
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Yes - that reminds me...
About 25 years ago, in northen India - heading into Kashmir - I slept on the floor of a cafe in a ramshackle village. The owner gave me permission.
After crossing south from Loas into Cambodia in 2005, and riding for a few hours in the dark on an unmade road, a wide river blocked the path. I ended up sleeping outside on a market vendor's bench/display.
Another one from back in 2005. It was a national holiday in Italy and all accommodation was full, so we found the small, local train station and slept in the waiting room. Luckily there were some long benches inside the place and we had it to ourselves.
Then there was the first time I went to Norway, almost 30 years ago. I'd booked a room, but after having a few drinks in town and meeting a young blond, I ended up at her place. Probably the worst night's sleep ever.
Did you ask for your money back?
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i slept under a haystack so there :(
jags
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Did you ask for your money back?
;D
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;D ;D ;D now now sam be kind ;)
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One Easter tour that I organised with my cycling club, we booked on an overnight train to a nearby town. Should have arrived there at midnight, but being Easter we were on an extra, later service. We arrived in the town at 2am (2am in rural Victoria EVERYTHING is dead). I organised for the railways clerk to unlock the waiting room door and eight of us stretched out our sleeping mats across the floor for four hours kip.
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oh train stations.
must've been 1978 or so, I was living in Philadelphia. A friend from Princeton told me that the photographer Frederick Sommer was leading a seminar and that I really should come participate. Well I must say it was a pinnacle experience! But I hadn't really looked at the train schedule to get back to Philadelphia. There was a "dinky" train that shuttled folks from Princeton to Princeton Junction, maybe four miles. I walked to the station & apparently had missed the last dinky. So I walked to the Princeton Junction station in hopes of catching a train. I remember being stopped along the way by the police and being asked to show ID & explain my behavior. Yeah, forget any trains that late! Passenger trains, that is. Oh yeah the freights run past all night. It was plenty cold and no heat in that place. Lucky I found some newspapers to sleep under... I caught a wicked cold from that night as it was! And those freight barreling through every hour or so, the ground shaking.
Life!
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Several years ago doing the Welsh 3000's bivvied on the top of Snowdon in foul weather. We couldn't find anywhere flat for all of us so broke into the building site where they were re-building the cafe and kipped on the newly laid concrete slab. 'Woke up' in a couple of inches of slurry/water.
Utterly unpleasant.
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Did you ask for your money back?
No. The funny thing was, I had met a Dutch couple who were also touring. They were super cheap. They only drank tap water and were carrying their own breakfast cereal with them from home. I told them that they were welcome to come and wash in the room I'd booked, and they did. There was enough room for them to sleep on the floor, and we later went out for a beer. After meeting the blond in a nightclub, I gave them the key and disappeared. They they were slightly worried when I didn't turn up until 8am the following day.