1.Today I want to talk about travelling abroad with your bicycle

Today I want to talk about travelling abroad with your bicycle. Let's cue that intro! The big question is this. How do we use cycling as a tool to improve our health, our happiness and our long-term? That is the question, a disc podcast will give you the answers. My name is Anthony Walsh and welcome to the Roadman Podcast. Roadman, welcome back to Roadman! cyclan podcast. I know this is not a topic that's right at the forefront of a lot of people's mind at the moment, but I present it to you as something that's right on the tip of my mind at the moment and hopefully to give you some motivation, some inspiration and just to put a little bit of a smile on your face heading into 2021 when you think about all the phone you are going to have right in your bike and all those bucket list places across the world. So regular listeners at the podcast will know I'm heading off to Colombia actually traveling today so I'm up bright and early recording this podcast. But as I was getting prepared for the trip last night, I started thinking about how many years I've been traveling with my bike and how second nature traveling with a bicycle is to me. But it's not that way to everyone. And I want to just give you some of the little tips and tricks and nuggets and stories that I've learned from, I guess a decade plus of traveling with my bike before I jump in and get into all the juicy details and some very embarrassing stories. I'd just like to remind you to head on over to patreon.com. Buy me a price of a point of beer to celebrate the new year and ring it in over in Cartagonya, Columbia. You can do that in the link down below. It's www.patreon.com forward slash Anthony underscore watch. It's how the podcast keeps moving forward and we've loads of super cool plans for 2021 for the podcast and roadman starting today with this trip to Columbia and Cartagena. And you're going to hear a lot more next week about Columbia why I'm here stuff I I have planned, but it's super, super exciting. So traveling with a bike can be super, super stressful. Airports at the very best of times, they're sweaty places where you're trying to wear every layer you have to keep the weight in your suitcase down, you're stuck in lines, you're dealing with, checking clerks who are oftentimes frustrated because they've had difficult customers all day. And at times, it can be a frustrating experience. So the thought of COVID plus bringing your bike to the airport maybe doesn't appeal to a lot of people. But traveling and riding your bike in foreign countries, it's one of the best things I've ever done. It really is. And it's just such a great way to see an area, to experience an area, drive and through it, doing a sightseeing tour. It's not the same as riding something. It might sound corny and romantic and a little bit cheesy, but you get to feel the land, the smells, tastes, you stop where you want, you chat to who you want, people treat you different. And then when you do get there, you get to meet people and conversations flow easier on the bike. And it's just, it's such an amazing thing to do right in your bike abroad if you haven't done it before. I'm not talking about racing, I'm talking about literally ambling around on your bicycle in a foreign land. It's brilliant. I remember the first time when I traveled abroad at my bike. And I actually, I don't even know if this was the first time, but it's the first time I can really recall putting effort into packing my bike. And I'd got picked when I was in university for the World University Championships. And it was the first time I represented Ireland. And my bike was my pride and joy. And you've heard about how I'd falsified alone applications to ultimately the care of our college to get this bike. I'd really every little detail on the bike I loved and it wasn't state of the art by any means at the time I was riding the Jura-Ace Nines Bay, but the 10th speed was probably just coming out But I loved it and I loved it just because of the graft and the effort I put in to get in each part like you know plaster and a wall on a build inside and I might get money for a set of wheels and And, bulk ages, that's another day down the job here.

2.Was just, I loved it. I really loved that bike

And it was just, I loved it. I really loved that bike. And I wanted to make sure nothing happened that in transit to Holland to Noe Meghan for the world student games. And my dad was in, my dad worked his whole life in McKee Barricks in Dublin. And he managed to get a machine gun box on the soldiers who were coming back from the Lebanon. And for years he was the machine gun box to store my bike going abroad. And a few years after that, you know, results went my way and I went over to France and lived over in France, racing over there. And I still had the machine gun box with me and I used to come back, you know, for those occasional visits back home for our national championships and things like this. And I would stuff the bottom of the machine gun case with as much wine as I could afford and bring it home because the wine was super cheap. But you got to think about a machine gun box. This was solid, like there was bits of steel in this. It was wood, it was solid, and wine at the bottom. Honestly, the whole thing most of the way, at 150 kilograms, I'm not exaggerating. It was a two-trayman job lifting this machine, going case up. But there was no airline weight restrictions on bikes at the time. And airline weight restrictions were super, super strict. We were just in coming into that era of Ryanair, having to pay for every extra piece of baggage. And the airline experience was transforming. and people cared about an extra kilogram of weight, but for some reason they neglected bike boxes. And that's largely happened up to this day where bike boxes and bike bags they're very inconvenient to weigh and they typically don't get weighed very often. And that's for a long time, one of the reasons why when I was traveling abroad, I always chose to go with a bike bag and a carry on. So I'd have my bike bag and I'll go through for that because you ought to go to bag a box or a car bar box and just a couple of strategic things you want to consider there. But I'd always just go with something carrying the bike plus my carry on and that would be me. I wouldn't use the checked luggage and that's just to keep costs down during my student days and you'd normally get away with it. You normally get away with stuff and bringing your clothes in black sacks and putting them inside the bike box and it acts as extra pattern and it also transports your clothes for you. So clothes, helmet, shoes, everything, all go went inside in the bike box for me and then we carry on. And as I said, I did normally get away with it and the only problem is it's a stressful experience. The whole airport trip becomes a stressful experience where you're like, will I get the bike on? Will I get it on? And it just sets you up a horrible start to your trip or a stressful end to your trip. The last few years traveling abroad and going to training camps, I've typically just stopped down that because it's just not worth the extra, trying to pull the wall over the airlines' aways. I normally now go, bike is in a little bit of padding to keep it safe, checked bag. One of the reasons I started going with a checked bag is really innovations in that checked luggage for cyclists. I'm using an EVOC bag and I think I have it in roadman resources and the link is in the bio for this. The Evoc bag I use is just brilliant for transport near cycling kit and it also means I don't forget anything because it has one compartment for your helmet, a separate compartment for your shoes, a separate compartment for your gloves, iron warmers, etc. One compartment for casual clothes and another compartment for your race or training clothes. Love it. Use it for stage races, use it for travelling and that's largely the reason that I've stopped stuffing everything into that bike bag. That and I still recall vividly coming home from Toronto and I'd been out there for a good long stint and I was trying to bring home tree bikes in one go and I had this brainwave of cellotape and duct tape and two caribor boxes together at the scene to make it look like one caribor box and saying it was one bike and it worked gone over the first time but then when I went to come back it just turned so stressful.

3.Was over to maximum limit

I was over to maximum limit. I wasn't allowed board to fly. I was there for hours in the ghost and really since then I just stopped doing that and my whole airport experience has been much much nicer. But here's the thing you want to consider now when you're thinking bike bag, hard bike box or cardboard box, you might discard cardboard box right off the bat here and say oh I don't need a cardboard box but there's definitely some advantages to thinking about bring in in a car bar box. The main thing you want to consider is the size of the group you're traveling with. If you're traveling in a one or two person group and you've got transportation the far side or you're going to get a taxi the far side, it really doesn't matter what you bring. If you bring a bike bag, brilliant, it's got some safety features like the Skycon bag I brought off a friend I'm using this time and it's lovely. Everything just fits in perfect. It's very little of taking apart the bike. Lower your saddle down. You don't even need to move your handlebars. Take your pedals off, pop your wheels off. And that's it. There's five minutes' work in putting the bike into this Skycon bag. And it's actually the one I use traveling with the tandem as well. Equally, I've used it a VOC bike bag and it's just as nice of experience. Now I'm using a Billy bike box also this time for a second bike. It's a hard case. There's a lot more work in it. You need to take bars off, pedals off, saddle off, seat post down, twist and bars, taking hangers off. There's a lot going on here, but you have a bit more protection because it is a hard case. But when it's just two people traveling or a single person traveling, it doesn't really matter what you do if you're getting a lift at the far side or a taxi at the far side. Where you want to start considering it is I often fly to Gerona and for Gerona, I'll fly into Barcelona because Gerona's only a seasonal flight. And the taxi is super expensive from Barcelona into Gerona. You're looking at 200 plus Europe, taxi and the train is fairly convenient. It's like a 10 minute walk from the airport to the train station and then a 10 minute walk from the train station into the old town, the Barleyville in Gerona. But you do have 20 minutes of walking to do there. So if you've got a box with no wheels, one, no bueno, that is a difficult, difficult day because you're trying to carry your carry on bag. These days now I've my check luggage and you're bringing the bike box. it's just, it's horrible. So you gotta make sure you have wheels for that outcome. But if you are renting a car, and here's the beauty of the car bar box, and we found this one, we used to go to Belgium, and we'd rent the house over in Belgium, we'd go and we'd race there for three, four weeks at a time, and you'd have four guys flying in, you'd rent the car, and then you're driving down to your race, or to your accommodation. So you get there car rental, and you have four hard bike boxes, and four people to get into a car. The maths doesn't work. The bike boxes and the bike bags, they don't fall small enough to get four people into the car plus the bikes. It just doesn't happen. So what you do is you bring a bike rack, like a sea sucker, that you can stuff into one of the bike bags, or you can break it up and stick it into a few of the bike bags. You get there, you stick the sea sucker on the roof, build the bikes, stick the bikes on the roof, and you dump the car bar boxes. And then on the far end, you just need to get more cardboard boxes and you're sorted. Boychops throw these cardboard boxes out every single day of the week because they're the boxes that the bikes are transported in. Any boychop in the world will give you these for free. I typically used to get a couple of old pillows, put it inside, maybe an old blanket, put it all inside, wrap it up and I never, never had a problem with transporting my bike.

4.Now as I said, the downside to that is if you're not renting a car…

Now as I said, the downside to that is if you're not renting a car and you have some public transport to do or you've some walking to do. You've no wheels on that car bar box. I've learned this one the hard way carrying bikes, you know, in the sun and cigar view or the blistering heaves down in Carolina or something in the middle of summer. And I'm like pulling a bike box with no wheels along the concrete, which are a mop sweat out of my eyes. It's not a good look. So when you are traveling, have a think about bike bag, bike box, car bar box, don't cheat the weight limits, just go with them, check your airline for it's normally like 25 kilograms and then you have some dimensional limits but check the airline, it just makes your life so so much easier. Maybe this is just me showing my age and that little rebellious streak has gone. But now look, I'm still open to get one over on the airline anyway we can, but this is not the way because you're just going to make life hard, hard for yourself. it from me. Other than that, the things you want to think about when you're going away are thinking about your destination. Is there a local bike shop there? Is it close to you? Do you have access to tools, spare parts? I normally try to be as self-sufficient as I can. I bring spare tires, spare tube, the tools I need to work on the bike and I pack a track pump even because there's nothing worse than trying to pump up. Get 100 psi, which are poxied little hand pump when you arrive at your destination. Roadman, I am literally grab on my bag and run for a taxi to go out the door. I fly on gone, transplanting automobiles to get there for new years, but I absolutely cannot wait to get to Columbia. I have one of my good friends over there and he just speaks volumes about the place. So really excited to check out Columbia. It's connection with soy Glen the culture, the history, the music, the coffee. Absolutely cannot wait on flying Dublin Amsterdam, Amsterdam to Paris, Paris to Bogota, Bogota to Cartania. So there we go. It's going to be a long trip to get there but it's definitely going to be worth it. Roadman, don't worry about me. I'll be back with another podcast again tomorrow. Hey everybody, it's Anthony again. Really quick, I want to invite you to join arguably the best thing I've ever put out inside the road community. It's a challenge. It's a challenge called a 14-day Kickstarter challenge. So regardless of where your fitness is at right now, this is going to be the catalyst for making you faster and making you leaner. I've created this challenge to take the guesswork out of everything. It's 14 days of training plans regardless of what your level is. There's a master's beginner advanced, there's meal plans shopping list and even a video course holding your hand and talking you true at all. So what I recommend you do right now is just stop everything, press pause on this audio and go to roadmansoycling.com forward slash 14 day or check out the link in the bio that's roadmansoycling.com slash 14 day.