Touring - are you mentally prepaired to tour.

a lot of first time tourers come to this forum looking for advice on all things touring.
but you rarely see questions on the mental side of touring ,how to get yourself mentally prepaired for what could turn out to be a disaster and how to cope with it.
i had such an experience in france last month ,to be honest i was expecting blue sky's and sun all the way a hassle free tour, but alas it was not to be.
the first days rain was not a problem but on the second day one of the lads had a very nasty accident ,lots of injurys to his face arm's ribs neck you name it,his bike was a total rite off.
after that seems everything just got worse ,well cycling and camping wise that is.
no i was not mentally prepaired for the next part of the tour the heavy rain three days in a row diden't help and the taught's of my buddy lying in the middle of the road in a bad way really wrecked my head. so i called it a day and made arrangements to get back home.
i haven't toured since i got back home but that's due mainly to weather,i hate bloody rain.
don't get me wrong touring is proberly the best way to see a country no doubt about that ,but it's all not a bunch of rose's.
anyway rant over hope the weather picks up soon,or there's a lot of top cycling stuff for sale.

Oh, bummer! Is the first you've written of this trip, or did I miss it?

That really sucks about the bad accident. I hope your friend recovered. I dont' know what you could do to prepare for something like that.

Perhaps an attitude of calm problem-solving and acceptance of changing circumstances would be a useful tool in the mental arsenal. Sometimes you just gotta make lemonade.

As to the weather, well, yeah it DOES suck when it doesn't cooperate. All you can do is modify your plans as needed, and do the best you can before the trip to seek the weather you want and prepare for what you might worst-case encounter. I've certainly had pieces of tours when I did a LOT more hotel and hostelling than I planned, because rain-camping just isn't any fun for me. I've also taken many days off when the weather sucks.

There's no shame in just calling it if you aren't having fun. It's YOUR life, do what you want.

If it turns out touring isn't for you, that's fine. It certainly has its' share of tough stuff: rain, pain, accidents, illness, traffic, theft and most of all just plain physical exhuastion are just a few fairly common things that suck but can happen.

But, it sounds like you had a run of rough luck. Don't be in a hurry to sell your touring gear. Just let it settle for a while, and when the mood strikes you again, go for it.

My recommendation is to avoid cycling in the rain if you and your bike are not properly equipped for the rain (and I mean equipment equipped and not mentally equipped). You can hide out in your tent if you have a big tent or you can camp out in a hotel 'till the weather improves.

Parts of northern France can have summer rainstorms that make it sensible to head to the nearest village to enjoy ales and food all day long with little or no cycling that day.

It sounds like you had quite a spat of bad luck. I hope that your friend is getting better; it's rough when somebody has a bad accident while touring.

That said, this does not sound like an issue of mental preparedness. Everybody who tours extensively by bicycle will have negative experiences at some point: headwinds, rainstorms, freezing temperatures, mechanical problems, physical problems, ripoff artists, uncooperative border guards, canceled flights, campgrounds or hotels that are fully booked after an exhausting day, getting lost, getting sick, losing stuff, not being able to find food, and belatedly realizing that touring was not such a hot idea! My guess is that you had more than your fair share of bad luck. Things can only get better next time!

Not every trip is a good one. It is the nature of the beast. What is important is to remain flexible and change plans accordingly. Sometimes that means hopping on a train and going somewhere else, going home early, or lying low for a few days.

I have been thoroughly miserable on some trips; but on balance, most trips have been at least pleasant and sometimes fantastic.

Don't sell your equipment yet. Plan a weekend tour in your own neighbourhood, and be prepared to cancel if the weather threatens to be uncooperative. Bad weather is a real discouragement. By choosing a short tour with good weather, you maximize the chances of having a great time.

thank's for the reply's folk's,seems you guy's had bad days touring as well.my buddy is fine suffered no ill effects at all thank god.as a matter of fact he wants to go back to where the accident happened and start all over ,next year of course.no im going to tour here as soon as possible ,proberly diden't give myself a chance to calm down when things went belly up.but i suppose that's where experience come into it's own.but on the positive side i seen france well 500km of it,loved the people and the super smooth roads ,fantastic campsites when it wasen't raining,motorist's were only fantastic give you loads of room when passing and no aggro.maybe one day i'll return when i have loads of touring experience.

Hey I learned this thing on an adventure race:
If things are going badly and you want to quit, before you take action towards quitting, take care of your immediate needs. Rest, sleep, eat, do what you need to make yourself feel better RIGHT NOW without regard for what happens next. If you're thinking "i have to either keep going or quit right now" remember, there is another alternative - take care of yourself first, then decide. Quitting will still be an option if you still want to do it later.

As that applies to touring, if things are going to heck, just get a hotel room, eat a good meal, watch TV, sleep in a bed, take a hot shower, buy a new WhateverItIsThatYouNeed, wait for the storm to pass. Chill out for a while. When you have some time to get your head together, you can re-examine how you really feel about the situation and whether you need to end the tour, keep going, take some other form of transportation to remove yourself from the situation you don't like, etc.

If things are going badly and you want to quit, before you take action towards quitting, take care of your immediate needs. Rest, sleep, eat, do what you need to make yourself feel better RIGHT NOW without regard for what happens next. If you're thinking "i have to either keep going or quit right now" remember, there is another alternative - take care of yourself first, then decide. Quitting will still be an option if you still want to do it later.


+1

I've always thought the mental aspects of touring are at least as big as the physical ones. There will simply be days (or perhaps weeks) where things don't quite go right. Some of them you can problem solve your way through as part of the adventure. Some of them you can figure out enough to avoid or lessen in the future. Some will just happen and be part of the trip.

So part of my preparation for a tour is being mentally prepared as well as some advance planning working through potential problems and developing contingencies/mitigation or avoidance approaches for these problems. My own personality has a mix of being laid-back and willing to take things as they come - combined with some type-a planning/goal-directed behaviors so that also helps for me and perhaps one of the reasons I've come to really enjoy touring as well...

excellent advice thanks all, i hope first time tourers come across this thread they can learn so much from it.it seem's everyone touring for the first time me included,thinks of nothing only about what bike they should have and what gear .valygrl your advice is brilliant,but would you belive the things you advise rest eat sleep are the three things i could not do,looking back it would have saved my tour if i done just that.hemm next time i'll be thinking of those very things.

Hey I learned this thing on an adventure race:
If things are going badly and you want to quit, before you take action towards quitting, take care of your immediate needs. Rest, sleep, eat, do what you need to make yourself feel better RIGHT NOW without regard for what happens next. If you're thinking "i have to either keep going or quit right now" remember, there is another alternative - take care of yourself first, then decide. Quitting will still be an option if you still want to do it later.

And I learned that same thing during my years of Randonneuring. On randonneuring brevets, you don't have the option of waiting out the weather ... you've got to keep riding no matter what's going on out there. That really toughened me up for touring, and I highly recommend participating in a set of brevets as a way of preparing for touring. For one thing, the process of building up your distance and fitness to do the brevets will help make you strong for the tour, and for another thing it does wonders for the mental aspect.


But it's interesting that this topic should come up just now. I was just discussing something along these lines with someone yesterday.

A lot of people come here wanting to tour because they've read something in a newspaper or magazine, or seen something on TV about someone doing an extended tour. And it sounds wonderful. There are photos of the cycletourists posing by a mountain or beach or something on a bright sunny day, and the story talks about all the exciting aspects of touring ... meeting people, seeing the sights, the quiet hum of the bicycle along the road, blah, blah, blah. There might be some brief mention of challenges, but anything like that is glazed over quickly. No one wants to talk about the bad stuff.

And so they come here with this image of cycletouring in their heads, and want to buy their first bicycle since they were kids, gather a few pieces of equipment together and set off on an extended tour to experience the glory depicted in these articles, etc.

But here's the reality ... touring is hard work.

If you're used to waking up in the morning in your warm, dry house, hopping into your hot shower, plugging in your coffee maker, and getting into your warm comfortable car to head to your office job where you will sit at a desk all day in a climate controlled environment and have coffee and food available to you all day, at any time of the day, and then returning to your warm dry house in your warm comfortable car to make supper from a plethora of choices obtained from your fridge or freezer, and to go to bed in your nice comfortable bed ……… touring will be a shock. Like a culture shock. And a whole lot of work.

On a tour, you wake up in a cold tent (unless you’re touring Queensland, in which case by 6 am, the tent will already be boiling hot), and lift yourself off the hard ground, trying to stretch out the cramps and get your hips working again. You may or may not have a shower available to you. And even if you do, you might not want to use it for a variety of reasons. I found it very difficult to convince myself to shower when the temps were about 0C outside, and also in the shower block. You have to wait while your camp stove heats up your coffee, and then pack everything up to start your day.

Rather than a nice drive to your climate controlled office, your day consists of about 8 hours of physical labour … cycling. Cycling into the wind, cycling up hills, cycling in the rain and cold or blazing sun and heat. And not just cycling, but also cycling with a heavy load on the bicycle to make things just that much more difficult.

You’ll have to find your own food and water along the way, and sometimes you’ll make mistakes and you’ll go hungry because you thought that town would have a shop, but it didn’t. Nothing like that feeling in the morning when you ate an orange for supper because it was the only thing you had with you, and you realize it is at least a 20 km ride to the next town where you might find food for breakfast.

And then there’s that business of setting up camp, sometimes after dark because it took you longer than you thought it would to cover the distance, sometime in the rain or cold … and laying down in your cold, damp tent on a hard mattress to try to get some sleep before doing it all again the next day.


This is why I strongly recommend that all new cycletourists should do short tours … shakedown tours … more than just one, and in a variety of weather conditions, not just on a nice sunny weekend … to help sort out what you need to survive in all sorts of conditions … and if touring is really for you.

This is also why I strongly recommend getting outside … spend as much time as possible prior to the tour in the great outdoors. Cycle lots, in all sorts of weather … this helps with getting ready for the tour. Go for long walks, again, in all sorts of weather. Participate in other outdoor sports and activities.


Now, of course touring isn’t all bad. I personally have a lot of trouble with the time from when I wake up to about 2-3 hours into the day. I have a very hard time getting going. But if the day is nice, and I’m fairly well stocked with food, and the pace is comfortable, and the distance I’m travelling is comfortable, and I have time to stop and take photos, to chat with people, and to see and enjoy the sights, touring is great!! And if I’ve planned my schedule so that if it rains heavily one day I can take the day off and either curl up with a good book or catch a bus into the nearest town to see the indoor sights or something, touring is great!! :)

excellent advice thanks all, i hope first time tourers come across this thread they can learn so much from it.it seem's everyone touring for the first time me included,thinks of nothing only about what bike they should have and what gear .valygrl your advice is brilliant,but would you belive the things you advise rest eat sleep are the three things i could not do,looking back it would have saved my tour if i done just that.hemm next time i'll be thinking of those very things.

Thanks antokelly -- I did learn it the hard way - I DNF'd my adventure race, and then the next day, regretted it. Oh well, live and learn.

machka your a total genius that is a brilliant post,you guys are great honest.i know what you say is mostly common sense,but it takes finding out the hard way to find these things out does that make sense,anyway it's late over here so im hitting the hay .night night.

This is why I strongly recommend that all new cycletourists should do short tours … shakedown tours … more than just one, and in a variety of weather conditions, not just on a nice sunny weekend … to help sort out what you need to survive in all sorts of conditions … and if touring is really for you.

This is also why I strongly recommend getting outside … spend as much time as possible prior to the tour in the great outdoors. Cycle lots, in all sorts of weather … this helps with getting ready for the tour. Go for long walks, again, in all sorts of weather. Participate in other outdoor sports and activities.

This is basically what I was going to write had I replied earlier. The main thing you get in terms of 'mental preparation' from a short tour prior to the main event is confidence. Confidence that you are capable of handling the distances, confidence that your equipment is up to the task (or that you've replaced things that weren't), confidence that you can erect your tent easily at the end of the day, confidence that you can handle a fully loaded bike and that you know how to distribute the weight. Confidence that the rain really isn't so bad once you're out in it.

This doesn't mean that nothing will go wrong of course, there is always the possibility that something will come up that didn't come up on your short tour, or something else will go wrong. But the mental anguish experienced over these incidents will be a lot less if you have confidence in your ability to handle the basics.

Machka and Valygrl's advice is spot-on. Thanks, ladies, for posting it.

One aspect of the mental side of touring, for me at least, is being 'out of my element' for an extended period of time. My last tour was two weeks. I spent a week of it riding solo in areas I'd never been to, and while I enjoyed it, I found the sensation of not knowing anyone, not knowing the landmarks, the roads, the towns, etc, a little disconcerting. Either I shouldn't travel or I should get out more. :)

historian obviously you coped well enough when you were in strange places ,but how did you go about it.might seem a strange kind of a question i know,but what if your head is cabbaged and it does happen,have you a method of calming yourself down.machka is a great source of information on this forum ,i would love to hear more on how she copes with stress .i hope im not dragging this out ,but **** happen's does it not and knowing how to deal with it in a calm way ,could save the day.

Rest, sleep, eat, do what you need to make yourself feel better RIGHT NOW without regard for what happens next. If you're thinking "i have to either keep going or quit right now" remember, there is another alternative - take care of yourself first, then decide.

I might have to get that tattooed on my forearm so i remember it. ok, kidding about the tattoo, but it's a great piece of advice i wish i would have thought of/thought about in the past.

When things are going bad on a tour, I just think to myself, this will make a great story some day.

Mentally, the biggest challenge for me is not murdering a motorist. There were a few occasions where I could have wrung someone's neck with my bare hands. A few roads where I was expecting to be hit at any second. Tough on the nerves. Otherwise—I can generally put up with a lot.

...might seem a strange kind of a question i know,but what if your head is cabbaged and it does happen,have you a method of calming yourself down.machka is a great source of information on this forum ,i would love to hear more on how she copes with stress .i hope im not dragging this out ,but **** happen's does it not and knowing how to deal with it in a calm way ,could save the day.

I'm an expert at this kind of situation... the "dealing with the unexpected" thing that you find yourself faced with on occasion. Being able to deal with adverse situations in a calm and stable way comes from several factors... some that you can control and some that you can't. The first big factor is personality type... Are you the kind of person who reacts immediately and with great agitation to every little setback? My wife is the kind of person who runs around like her hair's on fire... while I calmly figure out what (if anything) I can do to make things better. I don't panic easily... but pay attention if I do. Our 22 years of marriage has taught my wife to read my body language for signs of stress or fear... because she knows that if I'm afraid or nervous, it's usually because there's damn good reason to be afraid.

As far as things that you can prepare for:

Know your limits. Most people don't because they've never pushed themselves far enough to see where they collapse. I've found that most folks think that the least little bit of discomfort will cause them to fall apart. Know what your limits really are... you'll be surprised at what you're capable of.
Know how to fix things. Be able to repair your equipment... that will calm you down more than anything when you're out on the road. But if you haven't the foggiest idea of how to fix a spoke or shorten a chain to bypass a busted rear derailleur, then of course you'll panic.
Be physically prepared. Don't go out for a tour to cover 100 miles a day if your longest ride has been 15 miles.
Be mentally prepared. Be willing to operate outside of your comfort zone. I live in Georgia, so I know that 100F heat will not kill you. Well... with some precautions and common sense it won't.

historian obviously you coped well enough when you were in strange places ,but how did you go about it.might seem a strange kind of a question i know,but what if your head is cabbaged and it does happen,have you a method of calming yourself down.machka is a great source of information on this forum ,i would love to hear more on how she copes with stress .i hope im not dragging this out ,but **** happen's does it not and knowing how to deal with it in a calm way ,could save the day.

I'm not sure I was ever "cabbaged", whatever that means, but I did find myself longing for the familiar. Spending the night in a different place every night isn't something I'm used to doing. I found a text message or phone call to friends helped me a great deal.

Also, when I visit a town on tour, I want to 'drink it in', so to speak. I guess I'm fortunate that I'm a slow rider; passing through a dozen towns on a 70 or 80 mile ride I would find an overload.

Touring is the exact opposite of what this site is all about. When you're touring it's all about "the now". This site is mostly about the future and also about the past.

People who are NOT prepared to live "in the now" are at a great disadvantage. The adventure of touring is all about unknowns that are happening or not happening at the moment. For example, the weather "now" is more relevant than the weather report. The fact that a perfect campsite is five miles away is not relevant if you can't make it there because of injury, weather, exhaustion, or road conditions. Being comfortable in the now is only way to deal with these unknowns.

Valley Girl and Aura have some of my thoughts on this issue. Touring is all about now. If now is hard and not enjoyable, then do something to make it better. antokelly's experience just confirms my thoughts on touring in the rain. I ride day after day until it is forcast to rain. Then I take a rest day on the rainy day. If it is going to rain hard for several days, I likely would stay and enjoy my rest. It is one thing to crash your bike on slick roads, but mostly I don't like riding in the rain because cars can't see you well enough. Each mile is added pressure as the odds rack up. If I am riding and during the day and it happens to rain, then of course I finish the day in some fashion, but as a matter of practice I don't ride in the rain. But then, I usually have all of the time I want when I am touring and am not pressured by deadlines. That helps as well in reducing the stress whenever something unforseen happens.

My last tour it took me about three days to get into my touring mindset where I no longer think of tomorrow, only the countryside that is unfolding in front of me. Where is my next turn, my next meal, where am I going to sleep tonight. All else is just a bother for me. When I get a flat tire, I look for a shady place that I can sit, relax, change the tire and enjoy the scenery.

Good post antokelly.

When I get a flat tire, I look for a shady place that I can sit, relax, change the tire and enjoy the scenery.


http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3663/3670756469_bea934b502_b.jpg

thank's lighthorse ,living in ireland we know about rain as i speak or type it's lashing rain at the moment.It's funny in a way, im cycling all my life and i came across nearly every situation from bad angry drivers to bad weather even accident's ,remember i broke my colar bone last year and i was cycling by myself that time ,but when your in a foreign country where spoken english is not to plentyful ,well the situation changes .a new chapter open's up how to deal with this one.But listen folk's there's some great advice here,yes it's true everybody has a story to tell but i would rather tell a good story than a horror one
edit..
great photo historian you certainly found a shady spot
oh and the sun has just come out, tomarrow im off to the cooley mountains 100mile round trip so i still love to cycle everyone.

On a tour, you wake up in a cold tent (unless you’re touring Queensland, in which case by 6 am, the tent will already be boiling hot), and lift yourself off the hard ground, trying to stretch out the cramps and get your hips working again.

As usual, Machka's comments are right on. However, Machka, I accuse you of making me angrily jealous of the weather in Australia! Surely it's not all paradise in the South Pacific! What about the giant spiders the size of dinner plates? What about the sharks that attack humans ON LAND!

As far as the hard ground is concerned I broke down and bought an ultraluxurious over-the-top Thermarest NEOAir (http://cascadedesigns.com/therm-a-rest/mattresses/fast-and-light/neoair/product) air mattress and Thermarest actual pillow. I have never liked that hard ground thing.

As a long time lurker and touring wannabe I think this is a great thread. With that said I now think I'm mentally prepared to do some short tours. Now I just have to work out the other pesky details like desination, equipment, time off from work, convince the spouse.....ya know the easy stuff.

good stuff stevemtbr, that's the hard part sorted the rest is a piece of cake ,expensive cake but i sure hope you enjoy all of it.

I'm not sure I was ever "cabbaged", whatever that means, but I did find myself longing for the familiar. Spending the night in a different place every night isn't something I'm used to doing. I found a text message or phone call to friends helped me a great deal.


Bingo, this is what happens to me. Sometimes I get so flipping lonely on the road. I can handle the unexpected, weather or mechanical breakdowns but sometimes while on the road I get a very deep feeling of loneliness. To combat this I have to either keep moving, find a familiar place, place a phone call or just look at email on my BlackBerry. This has also happen on a few longer brevets. I've often wondered if I should just pack it in and settle down.

As usual, Machka's comments are right on. However, Machka, I accuse you of making me angrily jealous of the weather in Australia! Surely it's not all paradise in the South Pacific! What about the giant spiders the size of dinner plates? What about the sharks that attack humans ON LAND!



My coldest night in a tent on a tour was actually in Australia. It got down to -6C and everything was covered in a thick frost at Thredbo Diggings in October 2004.

And right now we're in the middle of winter down here, and it's not exactly warm in the part of Australia where I'm living (the state of Victoria). Winter here is very chilly and wet ... much like a Vancouver winter.

machka is a great source of information on this forum ,i would love to hear more on how she copes with stress .i hope im not dragging this out ,but **** happen's does it not and knowing how to deal with it in a calm way ,could save the day.

A lot of my day to day stress, both touring and non-touring comes from feeling overwhelmed by the circumstances.

For example, if I've got 3 papers, 2 exams, and several other assignments all due in the next couple weeks ... as happened now and then when I was in University over the past 4.5 years ... I would feel a lot of stress. Or on a long randonnee (like any of the 1200Ks I've done), I might be 500 km into the ride with 700 km to go ... I'm feeling tired and slightly sick, I know that there is a lot of work ahead, and often bad weather ... and I feel a lot of stress. Or more recently, when I single-handedly sorted through all my possessions to decide what to get rid of and what to keep, and got rid of about half my things, and then boxed up the remaining half ... I felt a lot of stress.

But then either Rowan reminds me of the article (written by an acquaintence of mine) in the link, or I think of it myself ... and I specifically think of eating an elephant.

http://www.randonneurs.bc.ca/pbp/articles/eating-an-elephant_ron-himschoot_bc-stories.html

I quote two of the paragraphs in that article here, but the whole thing is worth a read:

"My third piece of advice is to not try to ride 1200 kilometers: psychologically, it is too daunting. I tell everyone: "I cannot ride 1200 kilometers, but I can ride to the first control". How do you eat an elephant? One bite at a time. The first control is usually around 80 to 100 kilometers. That's a distance you can get your head around. That's a distance you already know how to ride. Don't worry about getting to the second control until you get to the first control. If you don't think you can make it to the next control, concentrate on just making it the next 20 kilometers, or the next intersection if that is all you know you can do.

My final piece of advice is to never quit a brevet until you've had an apple fritter (or a pain au chocolate). When you bonk, and you will, it affects your spirit as much as it impacts your physical performance. When you get to the point that you just cannot go on, eat something before you make a decision to quit. If you fail to finish, it should be because the time expired: not because you bonked, not because you were dehydrated, and not because you were tired. Eat an apple fritter, drink a liter of water, take a 15-minute nap, then get back on your bike and ride. The agony of defeat is mild compared to the haunting memory of quitting."

This, of course applies to riding a 1200K randonnee, but can be applied to other aspects of our lives as well. How do I get through all those papers, exams and assignments? One bite at a time. I start in the most logical place or the place I'm most worried about, and get to work, one little bit at a time. How do I get through all that sorting & packing? One bite at a time. I start with the most sensible area or area I'm most worried about, and get to work, one little bit at a time.

Many things in life are impossible to deal with all at once right now, and yet our brains want them dealt with all at once right now, and that creates stress. But if we tackle our elephants one bite at a time, we are making progress, and eventually we will eat that elephant. :D

And sometimes on a tour we just need to deal with the situation we're presented with one little step at a time.

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Ron's second piece of advice - to eat, drink, nap, and then continue ... but mainly to eat is what both valygrl and I have already mentioned. In any kind of ultracycling, this is common advice, but I'll apply it to touring.

Rowan and I had a number of conflicts (grouchiness, irritability, etc.) when we first started touring together, and then we made a discovery. When we had these conflicts, we were hungry. When your blood sugar level starts to drop, that's the beginning of a bonk, and one of the first symptoms of a bonk is irritability. This irritability can exhibit itself in the form of ... feeling like your jersey suddenly doesn't fit right (I've got to stop, something's not right here), hearing your cycling partner's bicycle squeak repeatedly (can't you do something about that?), taking everything your partner says wrong (what do you mean by saying we won't make the camp site by 5 pm, are you calling me slow?), etc. etc.

Fortunately a bonk is easy to fix, especially if you catch it in the early stages ... all you have to do is eat. Rowan and I have begun to recognize each other's patterns and know when to suggest that it's time to stop for something to eat. We eat, and life is all rosy again. We also discovered that when we get into camp in the evening, the first thing we do is set up the tent (quietly so as not to snark at each other), and then Rowan breaks out the crackers and cheese while he starts to get things ready to cook supper which can sometimes take a bit of time. The crackers and cheese take the edge off the hunger and we can have a pleasant evening ... such a simple fix. :)

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Sometimes stress on a tour can happen when the weather is bad for several days or when I'm faced with neverending hills or wind. To help alleviate those situations, I try to prepare in advance. I ride in all weather and have collected the equipment to do so. I've ridden in torrential rains where I felt like I was going to drown, I've ridden in bitterly cold temps, I've been caught in a microburst (sort of like a tornado clocked with 100 mph winds), I've ridden in (and hidden from) marble-sized hail ....

Never assume you're going to have sunshine all the way on a tour. It has never happened to me. Ever. And I doubt it ever will. Prior to a tour, don't be afraid of going out and riding in all sorts of conditions. Take precautions, of course ... dress for it, ride carefully, etc. but get used to it.

When it comes to nature, you've just got to prepare in advance as much as you can ... and then roll with it. Nature is always going to be the winner.

Plus those experiences make great stories!! Go read some of my Brevet Stories: http://www.machka.net/brevetstories.htm ... especially the Coldest Century, and the 2005 600K, to name a couple good ones. :D

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Sometimes stress happens when there is something sudden and unexpected dropped in your lap ... again, this happens in touring and non-touring life.

So far the worst of this sort of thing that has happened to me on a tour was when my freehub died in Hobart, right in the middle of my 3-month tour of Australia. Now if that had happened out in the middle of nowhere I would have been screwed, but as it happened it died a few km away from the place I was staying, and so I just stayed there an extra day ... and got to know my friend there a bit better .... and about 4 years later, he and I were married. :)

Or maybe it was the crash I had a few weeks later up in Queensland. I tore up my knee so badly I could hardly ride, but I ate my elephant and rode the 100 miles out of the jungle to civilization (that part was tough) ... and then I took a break from touring for about 5 days in a lovely hostel where I spent my days lounging by the pool under the palm trees, and reading books.

Or how about getting sick right after the 2007 PBP. We ended up having to spend a few days resting and recovering in a beautiful campground in Nancy where we met 3 very interesting people who camped next to us and ate supper with us. We'd sit around in the evenings and have long conversations, and then I'd sleep during the day to recover while everyone else went out doing tourist things during those days.

So sometimes bad situations can actually turn out to be not so bad after all.

One way to help deal with these sorts of situations is to put time in your schedule to allow you some down/off days. When I plan a tour, I have in mind that I'll ride 3 or 4 days, and then take a day off. Maybe I will, maybe I won't, but at least that gives me a buffer so that I can take some time off if something goes wrong, and I won't be way off my schedule.

Another way to help deal with these sorts of situations is to keep tabs on what alternate transportation there is in the area, and keep money in reserve for them. When I crashed, I rode 100 miles to a place where I caught a bus which took me about 300 km down the road to a lovely resort area. My cycling partner rode that distance.

In Europe, we were hoping to do more cycling, but because I got sick for a few days there we weren't able to do quite as much as we planned, and we ended up using the excellent train system in France to get where we needed to be.


As for dealing with stress in non-touring life ... I've definitely had my share in the last 6 or 7 months!!

Over the past 6 or 7 months ...

-- I lost a potential job, which was supposed to run through the summer, because of the recession. Rowan and I discussed it and moved my move date up.
-- I finished my last few classes in my final year of University.
-- Rowan lost his home and many of his things, because of the devastating Australian bushfires that swept through a large area here on Black Saturday (February 7th). He was one of the 2000 people in this area who became homeless, and he came close to being one of the 173 people who lost their lives. And I was in Canada, on the other side of the world, where I was completely helpless.
-- I completed a 9-week practicum, which I had to start 3 days after the fires destroyed everything, and while things were still in a very dangerous situation over in Australia.
-- My 16 year old cat, who I've had since he was a little kitten, had to be put down because he was so sick a couple weeks after the fires.
-- I developed a large nasty kidney stone, and had to go through surgery to remove it.
-- I graduated from University.
-- I spent weeks sorting and packing my things to get them ready for a potential move by myself. Lots of work. Lots of tough decisions.
-- Rowan had moved into a small caravan, and I was going to join him in that small caravan, but then just a couple weeks before I moved, we were given (rented) a small, extremely rustic cabin on the property where Rowan works.
-- I travelled to Australia, and moved into this very rustic cabin out in the middle of nowhere NE of Melbourne. Here's where I'm living now: http://www.flickr.com/photos/14302884@N04/sets/72157619719051119/
-- We've been working, since I got here, at trying to winterize and fix up the cabin. In particular, we've been insulating it, and trying to get a bit of running water going. It's very chilly and wet over here in Australia in the winter (now). So the whole move has been a bit of a culture shock.


I've just kept eating my elephants one bite at a time ... and occasionally sliding into a bit of disassociation in order to make it through the day ... especially during those extremely stressful early weeks of my practicum.

But I will say that I'm just not in the mood for a tour these days. It's winter for one thing ... but I almost feel like I'm living a tour. When you've got to do a lot of the typical camping things in everyday life, the idea of going and doing it all in a tent just isn't all that appealing. :D

I hate to be the one to point this out Machka (well, actually I don't now that I think of it), but in this part of Australia, it feels a lot more like Spring than Winter, and has done for most of the last three months or so. Now that the northerly winds have kicked in again, it's probably only going to get warmer in the coming weeks, and the wattle was already blooming last weekend. Bliss.

I hate to be the one to point this out Machka (well, actually I don't now that I think of it), but in this part of Australia, it feels a lot more like Spring than Winter, and has done for most of the last three months or so. Now that the northerly winds have kicked in again, it's probably only going to get warmer in the coming weeks, and the wattle was already blooming last weekend. Bliss.


A bit warmer and more spring-like down here would be wonderful. But it's cold and rainy again. Of course "cold" is a relative term when I think about Canadian winters ... and I haven't seen more than a skiff of snow on the mountain tops here so far. But still I went from a Canadian winter to a Canadian spring (which looks suspciously like a Canadian winter) to an Australian winter. It's been winter for me for 7+ months straight now.

I don't need temps in the 40s or anything like that, but daytime highs in the 20s would be great!! I could walk around the cabin without a coat on!

BigAura wrote: Touring is the exact opposite of what this site is all about. When you're touring it's all about "the now". This site is mostly about the future and also about the past.

People who are NOT prepared to live "in the now" are at a great disadvantage. The adventure of touring is all about unknowns that are happening or not happening at the moment. For example, the weather "now" is more relevant than the weather report. The fact that a perfect campsite is five miles away is not relevant if you can't make it there because of injury, weather, exhaustion, or road conditions. Being comfortable in the now is only way to deal with these unknowns.
___
meyers66
-Good points.
I've been thinking about this post for a week. (That's the sign of a good post IMO) I'm interested in exploring this idea. This is why I need to tell you something about where I'm coming from. I practice zazen mediation which is about being in the Now. I agree that traveling puts the individual in the present in order to solve practicalities of the tour. And I have not cycle toured per se. I have hitched around Europe solo for 2 months when I was 19. I have lived in Taiwan for many years and enjoy traveling solo because it forces me to meet people. So I know something about traveling in the Now.

When I do my day rides I go through a series of states of mind. Being in the Now is one of them but it isn't the dominate. In fact the dominate state of mind I'm in when I cycle is what I call the Zone. When I'm pedaling along and not thinking, kind of spacing out really. For example, listening to my Shuffle on headphones and forgetting to eat and drink regularly. The reason I know this is when I hit a bump in the road or get hit by an insect it shocks me out of the Zone and into the Now.

This is different from zazen because meditating is simply sitting watching the breath and mind whereas cycling has so much stimulus.

Hey I learned this thing on an adventure race:
If things are going badly and you want to quit, before you take action towards quitting, take care of your immediate needs. Rest, sleep, eat, do what you need to make yourself feel better RIGHT NOW without regard for what happens next. If you're thinking "i have to either keep going or quit right now" remember, there is another alternative - take care of yourself first, then decide. Quitting will still be an option if you still want to do it later.

As that applies to touring, if things are going to heck, just get a hotel room, eat a good meal, watch TV, sleep in a bed, take a hot shower, buy a new WhateverItIsThatYouNeed, wait for the storm to pass. Chill out for a while. When you have some time to get your head together, you can re-examine how you really feel about the situation and whether you need to end the tour, keep going, take some other form of transportation to remove yourself from the situation you don't like, etc.

This is exactly right and describes my last week and a half - two weeks to a tee. I'm on a cross-country (USA) sagged tour (see sig) and the past week and a half, my knees have been kicking my ass. I'd been on the road for a month and hadn't had any problems - no sore muscles, no sore butt, nothing other than the occasional $%^ the #$%*ing weather because I get really cranky when my shoes and socks are wet. All of a sudden I started having knee troubles and had a tough time coping - I'd spend 40 miles (a typical day for us is 70-75 miles) a day thinking about how I'd never be able to get to Vancouver (our destination) and finally calling our support van in tears, feeling like a huge failure for having to be vanned, particularly on the longest day of our trip.

I finally gave in and went to an urgent care (the only one for about 100 miles, by the way, thanks North Dakota) and the doctor told me I have severe tendonitis and would have to be vanned for at least a week. I was extremely pissed off, after waiting a year for this trip, training, raising thousands of dollars, I will not have 4000 miles on my odometer at the end. It's been two days since then, and amazingly enough I feel a lot better. I'm a lot better rested, a lot happier, and will hopefully be able to finish the trip after a few more days in the van.

Moral of the story: Take care of yourself right now, while you can, even if it means making some short-term sacrifice. Maybe you end a short trip early or take a "vacation" just to get yourself back in order.

Hi,

regarding mental problems:

- I was robbed (7 weeks injured after that)
- I was vomitting while cycling (heat sickness)
- I had 8 days permant rain
- A car destroyed my bike on the first day of tour
- A friend broke the shoulder on tour
- I had a blackout at night on toilet and awake 3 hours later
- I was in the middle of a sandstorm
- I had some bike defects (I cycled through British Colombia only with a front brake)
- I saw some robberies on my second tour
- Looked into a machine gun after stealth camping
- etc.

but I still go on tour because I like it... (If really like something you don't have mental problems with that)

Thomas

thomas i would love to have read your blog but i dont speak the lingo.seem's you also had your fair share of problems when touring,obviously you copped with each problem but the question is how.

Hi,

Such a homepage is a hell of work... I made now 23 cycle trips in foreign countries (this list is a summarize of all).

I don't care about problems until they appear. Then I think of a solution. Example weather:
the question is: Am I in a nice countryside or not? If not (that's the easy thing) I put on my rain gear and cycle on (I get more km on such a day because I quit breaks). If I'm in a nice countryside I have think a bit: Is it worth waiting? How much time do I have? Is it the highlight of the tour? Then I have to make a decision: go on or wait. My tours are well prepared - I know what I want to see, all sights are classified. So if I have to wait, I know that I can go to a minor museum to kill some time and I can very quick decide what I'll miss instead, when I wait. To be honest only 2-4 times the weather was so bad that I missed a highlight of tour. For optimal weather you have to wait appr. 7 days...keep that in mind.

In general:
1. I don't take care of things that I can't change (weather). Somethings you're luck somethings not - btw. It's always better than announced...
2. I'm happy with the things I can managed by my own or that I reached. Just compare that you have seen in a few days on tour - and compare it with that you would have seen at home
3. Don't panic - there is always a solution (this is experience)

For beginners I recommend: Don't think too much. Pack your bike, cycle and enjoy it. After a trip you know if this form of travelling fits to you. Nobody says that bike touring is easy...

Last but not least: You mostly tell the stories when the going gets tough (the personal hero stories :-)).

Thomas

Lots of good stuff in this thread.

Personally, I have really come to value the "now" element in touring, even when it means discomfort of some sort. In my everyday life, I can pretty much instantly adjust "now" to my liking. I can buy and eat whatever kind of food I happen to crave for at this exact moment, for example. Not so in touring. I cannot change the weather (but I have equipment to deal with it and can ride or wait it through).

The "now" element is even more pronounced in kayak touring, my other hobby. Options are more restricted there, for obvious reasons. Decision to wait may involve quite a bit of paddling to the next suitable shore. Decision to quit may involve even longer paddle to the next alternative transportation. Medical emergencies are another story, of course.

--J

Great thread. Especially since I just "tapped out" during a 10 mile climb (3 miles short of the crest) in a serious rainstorm. It was the 3rd day of rain(not continuous) and breakfast was scant. Food is key!! Weather can also be a major factor. When on a bike you have nowhere to go. Setting up camp in a deluge is often difficult.

Vlaygrl: excellent point to make yourself comfortable. Motel would have been nice but none near. My options were to establish a campsite to get out of the environment or hitchhike. Legs were spent, morale low so I hitched over the pass, found a restaurant and ate 2 meals:thumb: Felt a lot better but the forecast was for another 1.5 days of rain. I threw in the towel and biked back to my truck(in driving rain) which was only 13 miles from that spot. Legs did not return for 2 days so I made the right choice in bailing a day early as this tour had multiple days of big hill climbing. I enjoyed the tour and want to go back to "do over".

Machka: good luck in your move. I'm headed to Canada next week, Vancouver.

Another point about touring is that misery loves company. If someone was with me on this trip and and felt we should carry on I would have probably done so. Then again they might have wanted to bail earlier!

Machka: good luck in your move. I'm headed to Canada next week, Vancouver.


I've now moved right into a local hospital here in Australia ... speaking of things that go wrong on our travels. I've been diagnosed with DVT and it was indeed life-threatening. I'm being kept in the hospital until they know for sure I'll be OK.


"The best laid schemes o' mice an' men gang aft a-gley"
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/To_a_Mouse