Touring - From Spain To China

Hi friends!!!
I'm planning my next bike journey from Spain to China next 2003. Any road or cities to recommend me? Perhaps there is any special road for bikers who go from Spain to Moscow.

May I declarate my bike when I'll be in Russia, Mongolia or China?

Any kind of idea or experience will be great.

See u friends!!!

Maximus

Maximus.. once we ran into a woman on the Camp Pendleton bike trail. She and her husband just bought 'Waterfords' and she was getting the feel of the new bike. They had bought a GPS, labtops, solar cell, & were about to take off to circle the world.. Seemed like she said it would take about 18 months...
She remarked they had trouble routing themselves through the countries with the suffix 'stan,' in them.. So much trouble there. The 'stan's north of the Caspian sea are equally troubled'
Are there decent roads getting you through central Russia.. Get there the right time of year- might be good cycling. Roads are bad I think? Might need wide tires..
ps- need a partner, can I come along..

Hi, Maximus.

You might find some useful information on Trento Bike Pages' Russian section (http://www-math.science.unitn.it/Bike/Countries/Russia/). Enjoy your trip and please keep a travelogue here, if at all possible!

--J

I hear the Khyber pass is breathtaking

Originally posted by rat
I hear the Khyber pass is breathtaking

Yes, it is! I rode my bike from Portugal to Korea as the 2nd year of my round the world tour a few years ago. Of course, the world was a different place then, but even in lubby dubby times you are gonna have risky areas. I suggest the following itinerary...

Portugal/Spain&pyrenees/France/Switzerland/Austria/Balkans/
Turkey (do NOT MISS ISTANBUL).

From here it gets dicey, as it did for me. I went thru Iran, Pakistan and crossed into India via Lahore. The latter route is not likely to be very safe these days, though you should go by how you FEEL ON THE ROAD, not by what you see on CNN.

Thus the alternative is to enter Azerbaijan and that group of 'Stans south of Kazakhstan, enter China from Kyrgyzstan, I believe, and go thru Tibet into nepal and enter india that way. so..

Turkey/Azerbaijan/the 'stans/China/Nepal/India and from here you have to fly over myanmar to get to southeast asia...

Thailand/Laos/Vietnam/China and I finished in Korea, landing at in'chon while doing a MacArthur imitation, which my chinese hosts on the ferry jeered me endlessly about!

I have scads of pictures and stories about these sections of my tour on my website, humbly and modestly called:


http://www.cyclingscholar.com

By the way, you may decide to cross Russia, as you suggest. I lived in Siberia for a few years and certainly don't want to discourage you from going that way..but you are missing a hell of a lot! If you go thru Russia, do not miss Irkutsk, near lake Baikal.

roughstuff

We did the trail from india to jordan in 2000, on motorbike (enfield) so we were about as slow as a bicycle:D
I think everywhere around this route is great.
Karakoram highway was fantastic, we met a lot of bikes there.
People in Iran are great.
Syria must be great for biking as well
look for pictures on our homepage (text is in dutch)
www.travel.to/aziereis

and go for it!

els

Look at www.kepairibarren.com and www.bigfoot.com/~rctc

Good luck!

too late to see this thread. have you been here?

Hey check out www.centralasiabikeride.com these guys rode from Turkey to China as well is info on a previous trip from Russia to China.

Also try the St John Street cycles links page for some England to Australia rides through Asia.
Cheers Steve

thank you bikeguru