~ European adventures ~
My first bikepacking expedition - Riding to Keila waterfalls near Tallinn, Estonia
In my quest to train for the Silk Road Mountain Race, I decided to squeeze in an 80-kilometre, 2-day mini bikepacking expedition during the week to test out my bike’s setup, find gaps in my preparation, build conditioning and more fitness, experience Estonia’s summer temperatures, and see what kit I might need for bigger bikepacking trips (like tackling the 500-kilometre Eurovelo 11 route that I want to do later this year).
Taking the scenic route: my 1000-mile motorbike adventure from England to Estonia.
In summer 2022, I rode my Yamaha Ténéré motorbike over a thousand miles from my home in the UK across Europe to Estonia – one of my longest motorbike trips ever.
The endeavour was tiring, navigationally complex (for someone who’s only ever ridden a motorbike in the UK and US), yet bags of fun. I took a ferry to the Netherlands, rode to northern Germany (stopping at an old Army base I was posted to in 2007), took another ferry to Lithuania; and finally rode to Estonia’s capital city of Tallinn, via Lithuania and Latvia.