Solo Bikepacking

Bikepacking is like being a parent.  You are never ready!   
Everybody gives you an opinion, everybody tells you that this and that is obligatory. 
Everybody tells you to carefully plan, everybody tells you the immense amounts of money you will need to spend.  
But, like being a parent, you can do it your own way, survive it and even enjoy it! 
In fact, life is like that! I started bikepacking in 2018...not long a go...and no, I didn't get out of my country to some exotic route. 
As Portuguese and being sun kissed, I kept it simple: I would use my summer holidays to...go to the beach! To cycle across the Portuguese South Coast. 
There is a route called rota vicentina that is simple and beautiful So some months before the vacations I started reading about bikepacking, what to take, precautions, planification sheets, bikes, routes, etc...
And well... eventually I got a little bored with that. I seemed like I would go to the war! It was just one week of cycling!  
So...I just bought a "lite" sleeping bag from lidl, a 20eur "sub 1kg" tent from ebay and some other stuff from aliexpress. For navigation I used old android smartphones I had laying around. All explained in this blog. And see what trains I should catch.
The adventure started "well":  the train got delayed and I arrived at dusk... Pedaling at night...in a place I didn't know...but..I got the pleasure of seeing the stars! It was amazing!  
As people say in Portugal "A sorte protege os audazes" (luck protects the daring ), and so on the first night I had the chance of having a stay in the fireman of the São Tiago do Cacém, got a good bath in the morning. 
The route started in the morning, I had breakfast with a long time friend and I was ready to go!
WIth my navigation skills I was lost about 30min just about 2kms after starting the route...I couldn't find the way...even with gps
But I was enjoying! I saw great places, animals and even met some people pedalling also. 

This adventure also had its downs, but as everything in a trip, and in life, a solution was found and I continued the way! 

One year after I still couldn't stop thinking about bikepacking, my next trip... In that year, I had already changed jobs, and I only had about two weeks vacation... 
Well...what about a challenge and a trip? That's how I "signed up" for Portugal Divide. 
You need to prepare the route, you need to prepare your material, food, and on my side the trips for going to the north of portugal and coming back from south with a bike (in Portugal is not that easy). 
Well..first is the preparation of the route...I am that kind of guy that can be lost in his street...so preparing about 1300kms took some time and learning... Needless to say that sometimes I almost ended up going to a highway...but all was solved! 
I needed to manage the training: well, I cycled to the beach to drink some beers... And the rest was adventure... 
Adventure is really right world...42C...lots of climbing...some desert places...but I was living!  Forgot to say that I tried to fundraise 1eur per km for "From Kibera with love", a kids association in Kenya...and by the middle of the adventure (and the end for me..at 600kms) I got it all! 

The learning was immense, the overcoming of fear, the sensation that you are almost invincible is within you when you are solo bikepacking.  2020: The year of big changes. Professional change, country change, corona and their issues. 

I re-discovered bikepacking...mostly with people that shared my passion..bikepacking with friends became like a sweet to me. 

But one of these weekends I was alone...I felt the urge to go...but I was surrounded by fears: in the nord of France temperatures are low, the weather is inconstant, I don't speak very well the language, I don't know the dangers, I don't have much people to contact in case something was wrong.  

Still..I decided to go! Picked a route given by my friends Louise and Rémi, and went to Parc d'Olhain. I couldn't explain...all day I felt fear..I felt it was doing something wrong (maybe because there was already couvre feu on Lille). 

When I arrived at parc d'olhain it was already dusk...I didn't want to stay in the wild. I checked my phone and a couple meters there was a camping site! I went there...nobody on reception..asked some people where to pay..no answers... Well...I said to myself..I don't care...I will stay here!  

Grabbed a free hot shower, ate my pizza under a tree and went to sleep.

But I couldn't. My head couldn't stop thinking "what I am doing here! I should be at home! But I am at 50kms from home..there are no trains at this time...and I don't feel like cycling at night". 
Then it started to rain...What?! It wasn't supposed to rain! I checked the Meteo! But it was raining. Softly, and then...hard! 
Just moved under the balcony of a wooden house... I haven't seen anyone in that house for hours, so I guess it was empty...but still..my mind couldn't stop asking me stupid questions: what if there is anyone inside and kick you off? 
What if the security of the camping site comes and kicks you off? 
Needless to say those are dumb questions, that if you manage to answer, you will understand that there is always a solution, and everything will work out well. 
And that was the case: I had a good night's sleep, woke up very well, had my breakfast, went to reception, explained my situation and I got the question: "But why did you sleep here? Camping site is closed in winter..." 

After explaining...the lady just said with a smile: you don't have to pay anything, enjoy your day!. 
And I pedaled home, with a great sense of gratitude listening to PJ Harvey's "A place called home". It was good to be there, to enjoy the sightseeings and to pass for this.  
And that is my message to all of you that maybe still didn't find anyone to pedal with, or are afraid to do it: DO IT. With what you have, with what you know...embrace your state, be positive, workout on a backup if you can, take risks, and in the end enjoy!  

Cycling vacations in the Portuguese coast

Some months ago I decided that this year I would ditch the car during my summer vacations, of course riding a bike.
This post will document my summer vacation bike trip (before, during and after) and not be fully about "changes" you can make in your life. Like a personal post.

Before the trip:
There were lots of things to be decided: whom will I travel with? what would be the route, or if none, where I would want to go? What time do I reserve to the trip? What bike to take, what equipment to buy? What is needed to prepare?

Regarding whom will I travel with, from the beginning I decided that I would travel alone. I always felt very import to be alone, to be able to have time and space for your self and to organize your mind (which I was in need).

The route was almost decided, I would do the Portuguese coast. I had done it last year by car, but I felt I missed something. That something was cycling in between beaches through the cliffs/unpaved roads. There is already a route marked called "rota vicentina". This route is divided in two routes: trilhos dos pescadores (fisherman's trail) and caminho histórico (historic way).
Fisherman's trail is classified as non cyclable. Reading the reviews this is kinda true, lots of sand, steep cliffs, you can go there but it will be risky and take the bike by hand.
Historic way was cyclable but was more focused on "interior" of the coast, not by the sea.
I decided to mix both: historic route from Santiago do Cacém to Cercal and then to Porto Covo. After Porto Covo I would try to as near as possible by the beach, either off road or on road. I was even ready to do some trails of the fisherman's trail.
As everything in this blog, the route was not strict nor definitive.
I downloaded the gpx routes from the site (historic route from Santiago do cacém - cercal - porto covo) and fisherman's route (Porto covo - mil fontes and almograve - zambujeira do mar) the rest of the route was planned through road using ridewithgps.
The time reserved from this trip was from 05/08 till 12/08 possibily extending to 15/08 if needed/wanted. The bike chosen was a mountain bike and I decided to not buy anything more than what I already have (8L seatpost bag, lightweight tent, sleeping bag and a backpack).

During the trip: 

I won't go too far in details about the places I've went. A picture worths more than 1000 words, so let's share some.

Santiago do Cacém - the begining

The end - Lagos train station

I guess the words speak for themselves.

What this pictures can't say was what I've learned during the way. Being alone I was exposed to situations that weren't common for me.

1 - Be positive

Accidents happen, things can go wrong. Easy or complicated. I learned that yelding and be mad won't solve a problem. Nobody would come and save me or solve the problem for me.

During this trip I had a flat tire (result of being imprudent and not re-filling sealant to the tire before leaving). In a normal day this won't be a problem. In my hometown we have at least 4 bike stores in a radius of 10km. There not even one. I had a spare tube but didn't want to be without nothing.
Decided I should take a "day off", rest, and find a solution. And after a morning of walking around searching for a bike store light came to my mind. Gas stations sell tire sealant for cars, so that should work for bikes, and it worked!

It is important no to quit, but also to give you some time for relaxing and stay positive.

2 - Always have a backup 

Never trust only one plan, one device, one person. Always have a backup! During this trip I tried as much as possible to always have a backup:

I carried two phones (for gps like feature), two phones (my main smartphone which I don't use as gps and old feature phone); chargers and a powerbank; offline maps and tracks but also a paper with the directions I should take.
Before this trip I though this whole backup thing was a bit too much, but it proved to be the opposite.
If I only had the chargers (for example) I would be without battery on gps and phones on the second day. This backup is also valid for people. In the day I had a flat, a guy gave a contact of a bike mechanic, and this one said it would meet me and sell me a tube. I decided to go around searching for a backup plan, and glad I did because the guy never turned up.
I regret not having two tubes or tube + sealant. Regarding the phones, believe me, they can fail. And for those lovers of "google maps", most of my time on the trails I didn't have network, so always have a backup!
Regarding tracks it is the same, I had them offline on my gps phones, online on ridewithgps and on my Suunto watch. One of the phones was without battery, I was ready to use the navigation on my watch, and guess what, the online service didn't upload all the tracks to it...
More than a backup, verify thing with a checklist (I haven't done it, so now I learned it!)

Also backups can be applied to drinking and eating. Believe there were days where that I opt for the safe way and eat something "somewere" just in case..and it turned out valuable, being the only restaurant in town being closed. Water was also scarce so I would refill every time I could.

3 - Be open to possibilities.

Most of us always have a way, a route. In fact, even saying I wasn't strict about the route, I was kinda determined to do it the way I planned. I learned that I should be open to possibilities during the way, because what matters is the way not the end. I decided to stop during two days, and those days gave me an extra boost and showed me another important thing that I will talk in 4.

4 - People are very importantBefore doing the trip I thought that going alone would be very nice, and it was. But during my first day off stop I missed people. Talking with people, sharing, etc. On my second day off I was with my cousin and other friends and it was amazing.

5 - Take risks

We always want to be safe, but taking risks elevate us, make us feel greater, and in the end the reward will be great.I decided to take the risk of doing some routes of fisherman way. In some trails I was scared, one bad step and I would die, but the view worth every risk. In fact it worth so much that the man you saw on the pics on the road bike decided to take the risk also (It is unthinkable to do this on a road bike) and stopped about 1min drooling on the view.

6 - Enjoy yourself as you are

Everytime I saw bikepacking adventure I saw great footage, great pictures, gps tracks and ways being perfect, everything on time etc etc

This is awesome, but you don't have to have/do it all to enjoy. This was my first time, and I decided to quit a bit earlier because I wasn't enjoying that much my time when off the bike (it was windy, and cold! and I didn't have clothes for that) or too hot (didn't had a "umbrella" for the sun on the beach).

I also didn't want this vacation to be all about cycling, so continuing the trip further just to pedal wasn't for me. For some people this was a "quit" , something bad.
For me it was just how I am, I want to do things to enjoy, not just because, so came home, finished reading the awesome book "The Art of Possibility: Transforming Professional and Personal Life", met my friends and decided to write this post.

After the trip:

I decided I would continue to do more adventures like this, I considered it was very well succeeded and that with a better "infrastructure" things could be even easier.

I will ditch the backpack, at least for adventures longer than 2 days. The weight on the back is bearable but not confortable at all.

I will also ditch the saddle bag. This solution is nice for two day trip, but since I have a rack I will buy some panniers.
I will also try to get some paper maps to be able to have a "fully offline solution" just in case and to be able to improve my navigation skills (that are close to zero).

I know this was a massive post, and if you read it all, feel free to comment and to join me for a coffee, I will pay hehe.

 

For the geeks/bike freaks here are some specs:

Bike: Klein Palomino 26| Shimano SLX 1x11 (34t Blackspire Oval| 11-42 Cassette)|Shimano XT brakes
Gear: Tent from ebay, cheap and light. Keep in mind that I measure 1.7m and I touch every bottom of the tent. It may not be waterproof. Sleeping bag from lidl. Sleeping bag support from Newboller.  Saddle bag from ROSWHEEL (model 131414 8L) can be find on aliexpress and gearbest. Rear support, Thule Tour Rack.

GPS: Two old android smartphones Samsung Galaxy S I9000 and HTC Incredible S running Oruxmaps with offline maps from Openandromaps. Since they are very old and gps chips are very weak I am running a Nokia LD-3W gps antenna. 

The world is changed by your example, not by your opinion

It is been about one year I decided to change my habbits a bit and start using more the bike to commute.
I hate walking and so most of the times I would commute by car.
It was a pleasant surprise to see some of my work colleagues bringing the bike to work, I guess motivated by my example.
I guess sharing opinions is important but won't change too much. People actually seeing you do the stuff you promote and being happy with it may follow you.
The best part, you start meeting more people like you, and it is awesome! So stop wishing and start doing, people may actually follow you =)

Minimalism - and why it is not about things

As everything in this blog, this post doesn't mean to be 100% term correct, super duper informative or extreme, just my view about this theme.
Yesterday I went on a "Video Session" called "The Minimalists". This even was hosted by my inspirational friend Bernardo Conde at his "workplace" Trilhos da Terra.
In fact this session was about this documentary and allowed us to discuss about it after watching it.
This was not my first attempt to know more about minimalist, I was reading about it on reddit here and here.
I was already "in love" with the idea of less possesions, why? Because I am lazy, and more possesions means more tidy up, more cleaning, more caring about them.
Most people will say, so what? That is normal!
Well, that may be the norm, doesn't mean we all have to follow. Less time spent with things could mean more time with yourself or with others.
And in the end of this session, that was my opinion about minimalism: it isn't about reducing frantically your possesions, but how to maximise your quality time. Reducing your purchases, buying what actually is necesary/brings joy to your life, is just a tool to achieve it. It will  bring you more interest to people, yourself, the world, etc.
But also, if you maximise your quality time, with yourself, with people you truly find inspiring and somehow you will see your interest in material stuff decreasing.

So, take one hour of your day, cook some pasta with mushrooms in fifteen minutes and invite one of your best to dinner in the balcony. Spend the other fourty five minutes enjoying each other, talking and eating =)

Portuguese made bathroom choices

This days I see some people looking for alternatives to plastic bottled shower gel, so I decided I should show what I use and why.
Again, this may not be the "perfect setup", but so far is where I am. Suggestions accepted.
In fact it may be easier to explain my "method" for choices:

Everything I try, I try to fit in this method.
Now about the bathroom products:
1) Bar soap - more than one year ago I ditched plastic bottled shower gel. First I tried those "supermarket brand" 3 bar soaps for 2 eur. The experience was bad, they would disappear in my hands and were oily. Later I read that "ordinary" bar soaps are mad with animal fat.
Then I tried Portuguese brands. As fair as I know there about 4 or them: Confiança, Ach Brito, Castelbel and Foz.
I started with Confiança, having the cheaper alternatives, from about 1eur a small/medium bar soap and 100% vegetal. I can recommend them and I find the size nice for taking on trips. Confiança also has limited edition and premium soaps which cost about 6-8eur pack of two rounded soaps which are very nice. The minus on this edition is that they come packed in a box+plastic wrap.

Then I tried Ach Brito soaps, again 100% vegetal, a size bigger than confiança, and with a price tag of about 2.5eur per bar soap. I find them also good quality, but at least in the super market there aren't many "flavours" available.

Again, the ones that I have tried said 100% vegetal on the paper wrapping.

About Foz soaps, I only found 100% vegetal glycerine type, and I wasn't keen on it. Used it for hand washing. Can't remember the price but they were cheap, something like 1.3eur per bar.
This brand also manufactures deodorant, the one in the picture. I find it very effective and it has very little plastic in the packaging (in order to reduce the plastic I am thinking of trying Alumen Rock deodorant).

Due to my "passion" for bar soaps I decided to try Castelbel bar soaps. In fact I guess I saw somewhere that Castelbel "slogan" was something like "We don't produce bar soaps, we produce gifts" and I can attest that. I guess they make my "consumism" side grow with their collections.
Their prices are high, from 6 to 12eur per bar soap, but their sizes are large and the fragrances are trully orgasmic.

Since I only use bar soap, no shampoo sometimes I am getting dandruff. I also had it in the past and some shampoos didn't work very well.
Thanks to my friend Carine from Minimal Impact I discovered that Apple Cider Vinegar could be used as a softner and dandruff preventer. I decided to choose the one from the Portuguese Brand Paladin. Unfortunately it comes with a plastic bottle.
One day per week I mix two soup spoons of this vinager with water in a cup and brush my hair with it. My hair is soft and without dandruff.
No worries about vinegar smell, after rinse the smell will disappear.

Finishing on toothpaste, I use the "old one" from Couto. This toothpaste can be found on pharmacies and cost about 1.8eur. I use it from my teenager days and never had problems with my teeth.
From what I've read it is made with vegetal only ingredients.And not tested in animals!
The bad part, the packaging that brings an unecessary manual (in my point of view).

Well this is my setup and hope to help you. Feel free to share what you use.

A phone in 2018

First about the title, why phone? Because most of us now have a smartphone, not a phone (which for me means either a dumb phone or a feature phone).
Some months ago I was feeling too much connected to my smartphone, and constantly thinking that although I was connected to it I wasn't getting anything in return.
Most of my social networks only show me products and not people. Most people will only show me cats and dogs and products and...it make no sense...since I am all day on the computer.
I started searching and came to the conclusion that I wasn't the only one. In fact people do videos about it, and this one for me was one of the best:

After watching this video I decided I would go back to a basic phone. In fact I always had basic phones laying around, from the simplest black and white Nokias (iconic models like the 6510 and 8310) from the color screen ones.

But this time I went on the consumist side and bought a new in box Sony Ericsson C702 for 20eur. This is one of the latest feature phones, dated from 2008 that is waterproof, has 3G, integrated GPS, bluetooth and whopping 3.2 megapixel "cybershot" camera.

This was the phone that I decided that would "substitute" my iPhone SE. Why?

- I wanted bluetooth to connect to my car's handsfree (you can always use corded headset)

- I wanted to be able to receive more than 160 character sms (B&W Nokias don't, they split it)

- I wanted to still be able to take pictures

- I wanted a featurephone that could sync my contacts with a cloud service or at least could import the ones that I have (thanks MyPhoneExplorer)

And a month later what I have learn with it?

1 - This things are slow, so you train your patience, and you value much more sending an sms.

2 - Since GPS on this phones is almost as paper map and not turn by turn navigation you end up planing your trips and be sure you have your old GPS charged (I had a TomTom One from 2006 laying around)

3 - Since you don't have social networks (in fact you can have facebook but the experience is so horrible that you don't use it) you end up doing more things, in my case I started reading again.

4 - Again with no social networks on your hand, you end up being more assertive and booking meetings immediately.

4 - Old games are amazing, specially puzzle bobble or frozen bobble.

5 - There are still some "apps" for this phones that are usefull, like "Weather", Trekbuddy and Opera Mini.

Did I stick with it forever as I meant? No. Why? Mainly because of Instagram.

What will I do about it? Whenever I feel to I will go back to my featurephone. In fact the more I use the smartphone the more I feel the need to disconnect.

If you feel to, try for yourself and let me know your feelings!

Reduce, reuse and Re Cycle

Most people (me included) whenever approach a more ecological life style just think about buying.
Buying new and more ecological stuff. Kind of going backwards right?
That's it, if we want to be more ecological we must follow the 3R rule: reduce, reuse and recycle.
And in my opinion by this same order.
Due to my passion about bikes, riding bikes and being outdoor I was lurking a new GPS unit, since my Suunto Ambit 2 has very limited navigation capabilities.
As anyone would do, I went and search what the market has to offer and how much would it cost.
Most of this equipments cost about 180-200eur or more.
I decided to try another route. The 3 R Route.
First I evaluated how much I needed a navigation equipment: well I have my suunto watch wich can read routes but don't have maps. I have my iPhone, which has maps, and to be fair those will do for 90% of my outdoor adventures, so I decided I don't really need that gps navigation equipment so much.
Still, I wanted to be on the safe side when outdoors. Gps+phone+data in one device means low battery in a short time, and what I don't want is to be without phone to contact anyone if needed.
There are many paths possible to solve this issue, if one really wants to use his phone:
-Using a powerbank - for most of us means buying one, so I try to rulle out this option. You can always ask someone to lend you one, or to give you one of those freebies. But still I am kinda against this option.
-Taking a second phone, if possible a basic one. I guess everyone has a basic one laying around! This was a nice option, but I kinda preserve my iPhone and don't want it to be exposed to hours on the sun, damaging battery in the long run.

So I decide to take another route: turning old smartphones that I had laying around (from family members and friends) into gps navigation devices.
In my case they were 7-8 year old devices like the original Samsung Galaxy S i9000 and HTC Incredible S, both powered by 1GHz single core processors and whopping 512-768mb of ram.
After a factory reset I installed GPS Status to help finding gps sattelites faster and test their gps functionality.
I installed Codesector Maverick, in fact Maverick Pro Version (paid version to help the development) and with this app I could load track (gpx) and download maps at home.
I went on a small test and it seemed satisfactory. I had some problems with Maverick (map/route orientation) and I couldn't get an answer from the devs.
Also I noted that battery life of this smartphones and not that good, and in the case of the samsung the gps reception either.
I decided to mitigate this problems the following way:
-App: Orux Maps, in my case the older 6.5.10 version worked better.
-GPS: Nokia LD-3W GPS Module

Orux Maps has lots of functionality and works as good as maverick. I am still learning to deal with it, but at least I have friends that confirmed me it has no problem with orientation and map downloading.
About the Nokia LD-3W bluetooth gps module. As many tech guys may know, back in the Feature phone days you bought this to have gps on your phone. So many people have them laying around, and most will sell you one as low as 5-10eur.
What are the advantages? GPS Work is done by this device and not by your phone and the precision is much better (in case of old phoneS). I already had this laying around. I suggest you to only buy one if really needed (latter I will try to test batterylife with internal gps and with external gps).
Well now I just needed a mount for the bike, I searched for used ones (smartphones get so big that users must sell the old mounts) but they were more expensive than one in decathlon outlet (my bad buying new stuff, but still better than going to waste land or buying a new gps device).

After that I just loaded the GPX route, download the map using wifi (zoom levels between 11 and 16 on maverick) and all I can say is that it worked more or less good in my 200kms ride.
The bluetooth connection between the Nokia module and phone failed sometimes (I guess it may be some powersaving feature of maverick, will test it further with orux also) but I found it satisfactory.
If you have a more recent smartphone laying with stronger gps signals I guess you won't have any problems.
All in all I got a "good" gps for about 10eur (the price of the mount). Even if it is no garmin, it will help and it will not go to the wasteland =)
All in all, reduce, reuse and re-cycle!