In younger years, traveling by bicycle was my prefered way to travel, as I enjoyed cycling in general, in particular road-cycling and mountainbiking. I started my first trip on a bicycle in may 1998 in Vancouver, British Columbia, riding all the way up to Alaska and back. One year later I cycled 2 months in Ireland before I started a trip of almost two years, when I was riding my bicycle from Vietnam through South-East-Asia, around and through Australia und covered the North- and the South-Island of New Zealand, before finishing this trip in Tasmania. Some years later, I was riding from Mexico-City to Argentina.

Things, I considered to be advantages of traveling by bicycle:

• athletic activity
• very close to the country and its people
• cheap mean to travel
• gear is easier to carry than by the use of a backpack

If someone does not enjoy cycling too much, it is very likely, that this person will not enjoy bike travel either. For experienced cyclistst it is hard as well to ride long distances every day in all different weather conditions.

However, I would recommend every active traveller to try traveling once.

I always considered it to be very important to carry camping equipment in order to be flexible even in countries, where accomodation is very cheap. In these asian, central- or latin american couintries the use of a tent gives you more freedom. Beside discussions with car drivers I never had to face any kind of trouble while traveling on a bicycle. According to expereinced travellers, you can avoid problems by staying away from bigger cities. Though, I always tried freedom camping completely unseen.