By Norman D. Ford
To prove that an adult can cycle across Europe in comfort and without exhausting effort, I recently bicycled 2,234 miles in 28 days without once having to get off and walk uphill or having to rough it.
Much of my success on this trip from Istanbul to London was due to the newly-developed multi-geared touring bike. Actually a racing bike designed with a longer wheelbase and built of feather-weight seamless tubing with alloy components, my touring bike also sported 15 different gears.
Using the lowest gear gave me a ratio so powerful I could easily ride up a 12 percent grade. By contrast, the highest gear would take me down a gentle slope at an exhiliarating 30 miles an hour.
My bicycle's zip and speed proved invaluable from the start. From Istanbul, my route first led for 50 miles along the Trans-European Highway, a heavily-travelled thoroughfare.
To avoid traffic, however, I cycled out of Istanbul early on a Sunday morning. By 11 a.m., I was 50 miles out of the city and on a quieter road that leads to Greece. Even so, my speed had scarcely exceeded 12 m.p.h., and I had ample time to view the city's famous mosques and Byzantine walls as I pedalled along.
Untroubled by parking problems, I rode on through the timeless Greek provinces of Thrace and Macedonia, stopping wherever I pleased. I lunched on a headland above the blue Aegean, listened to a "saz" (stringed instrument) orchestra in a Turkish village, and exchanged sign language with occasional shepherds and gypsies.
Whever I stopped, the bicycle would become an instant conversation piece, putting me in contact immediately with the country and its people. When I stopped at a village cafe, the patrons would immediately send for the local "American"--a Turk or Greek returned from the U.S.--to interpret and explain about my trip.
Despite its multiple gears, my touring bike did not run without some effort. To cover an average of 80 miles a day, sound muscles, heart and lungs are still a prerequisite. Burning perhaps 5,000 calories a day, I developed a ravenous appetite and I slept soundly for 9 or more hours each night.
By starting at daybreak, I always reached my destination well before sundown without having to hurry. This left time to select a satisfactory hotel and to explore the town I was staying in before dark. With rates at comfortable hotels in the Balkans averaging $2.50 - $3.75 a night, I did not attempt to economize.
At most hotels, I left the bike in the garage or baggage room overnight. At others, including several first class hotels in Yugoslavia, I was able to take the bike into my room. In one case, I parked it overnight on the balcony.
Brisk exercise in the open air in constantly changing surroundings gives one a new awareness of the countryside. And gliding along at an easy ten miles an hour, a cyclist can readily absorb all the details. He or she can hear, smell and feel nature while also having time to exchange greetings and pleasantries with passing cyclists and pedestrians.
Needless to say, every bend in the road revealed exciting new sights and scenery. Among the highlights was the ride up the terraced streets of Kavalla, a lovely Greek town perched on a mountainside above the Aegean; an almost-deserted 100-mile stretch of barely-finished freeway leading through the wild mountains and rugged gorges of Yugoslavia's Macedonia; and a cavalcade of over 50 horsedrawn wagons that I met in Kosovo.
Cycling Through Kosovo
Despite about 70 miles of cobblestoned roads (and seven broken spokes), my ride through Kosovo was literally spellbinding. In a single day, I saw hundreds of people in traditional costumes: muslims wearing red cummerbands and turbans; Albanians in white skull caps; Serbs in embroidered peasant costumes; and a score of large gypsy groups in colorful attire.
Horsedrawn traffic far outnumbered automobiles. Approaching Djakovica, I passed more than fifty four-wheel wagons, each drawn by two powerful horses. Each wagon was covered by oriental carpets and each was filled with men and women in brilliant Turkish costume. Many carts contained "saz" orchestras and the air was filled with Balkan music.
Farther on, towards Montenegro, the paved road gave out and I crossed the Globocica Pass--about 4,500 feet above sea level--by riding on a narrow dirt footpath at the side of the muddy road. Yet the hotels were good and towns like Pec, with its thronged bazaar, were full of oriental flavor.
Beyond Pec, a 40-mile stretch of deeply-rutted unpaved road crossed the 6,000-foot-high Cakor Pass, a formidable barrier that I by-passed by "ferrying": my bike on top of a bus.
Next day's ride, through Montenegro, was the grandest of the trip. Seeing only 18 cars all day, I coasted downhill for much of the wildly scenic ride, corkscrewing in a breathtaking descent down the Crna Gora Alps and winding for hours between the rocky sides of the Moraca River Gorge.
Eleven days out of Istanbul, my bike and I crested the Dinaric Alps. Far below, through drifting cloud, I glimpsed the blue-green Adriatic. By midday, I was down at sea level and pedalling around the fjord-like shores of Kotor to the ancient town of Cavtat where I stayed in a 400-year old B&B.
For five days I cycled beside the Adriatic, climbing innumerable brown headlands with startling panoramas of aquamarine bays, far-flung islands and towering mountains. Walled towns like Dubrovnik and Trogir bore the imprint of Dalmatia's rich Venetian heritage and I could see crenellated medieval walls running for miles on some of the islands.
Between Paklenica and Crikvenica, the coastal rode climbed through a barren, moon-like landscape to a height of about 1,500-feet, and for a full hour I enjoyed majestic views of the island of Rab far below.
Although the weather was sunny and bright, the tourist season was over and Dalmatia's beach resorts were almost empty. Many hotels had already closed and those remaining open were often fifty miles apart. After noon, I would head for a destination only after positive assurance (from one of the many tourist offices) that a hotel there would be open.
So far, I had been cycling on main highways. But in Italy, France and England, I followed quiet, secondary roads. My route across Italy's flat Po River Valley led through dozens of villages and towns that still looked much as they did in the 13th century.
Cycling through one of these towns was often a rich experience. I would enter through an ancient gate in the city walls, grope my way through a labyrinth of narrow streets to the ornate central piazza with its churches and palaces, then make my exit throuigh another gate in the medieval walls.
As time was running short, and the Alpine passes were already blocked by snow, I took an easy way under the Alps. I rode by train across Switzerland to Vallorbe near the froniter with France.
Even there, the snow was only 300 feet above the road. And on the fast downhill run through the mountains to Besancon in France, I had to wear everything I possessed, including raingear, to keep warm.
France--A Cyclist's Dream
With thousands of miles of quiet backroads, France is a cyclist's paradise. Every backroad was smoothly paved ,and clearly signed and numbered, and many roads were completely free of traffic. Gradually, as I rode north, the gray villages of Champagne gave way to the red-brick coal mining towns of Artois.
Between the Marne and the Somme, my route led across the bleak battlefields of World War I. Cycling out in the open among the melancholy fields, one instinctively felt something of the death and destruction that had swept this land in the war, a sensation much less vivid from inside a car.
After six days spent riding across flat northern France, I crossed the English Channel on one of the frequent car ferries to Dover in England. Then, starting from the foot of Dover's white cliffs, I cycled across the rolling Downs to the edge of London. The final ten miles led through sordid streets of row houses that comprise much of London's Cockney East End.
At last, completely unnoticed by anyone, my ride ended outside St. Paul's Cathedral in the heart of the ancient City of London. Cycling from the Blue Mosque in Istanbul to St. Paul's in London in 28 days had proved, for me at least, to be the bicycle tour of a lifetime.
CAUTION: this report is given for historical interest only. The ride was made in 1967 and , for a variety of reasons, it cannot be recommended nowadays.
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