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Hiking Maps Trains Travel

Trip Maps

European Trips

European trips. Blue = Backpacking, Red = Cycle Tours, Green = Road Trips, Yellow = Walking Trips
  1. Interrailing, 2004. EuroStar to Paris, then by rail through France, Switzerland, Lichtenstein, Austria, Slovenia and the length of Italy. Cross the Adriatic to Albania which had not long been opened up, finishing up in Corfu. Sail back to Brindisi, train it all the way home via Milan. I was hooked!
  2. Pyrenees by Train, 2005. EuroStar to Paris, then by rail to Bordeaux, Toulouse, and up into Andorra La Vella. Bus down the mountains to Barlcelona, then by train to Madrid, Santander and ferry home to Plymouth.
  3. Russia by Train, 2006. EuroStar to Brussels, then by international train to Cologne, Berlin, Poznan and Warsaw. Travelled up through the Baltic states by a series of local trains, including some walking over borders. From Vilnius headed to the coast at the Curonian Spit, then up to Riga and Tallinn. Finally took a bus to St. Petersberg, before flying home.
  4. Midnight Express, 2007. Flew to Krakow, then travelled to Sanok (SE Poland) for family friend’s wedding. Then by train into Slovakia – after some walking in the high Tatras, train to Vienna, Budapest, and Bucharest via Sigishoara, Sibiu and Brasov in Transylvania. Train to Sofia and bus to Plovdiv; then night train to Istanbul. Fly home.
  5. Sardinia, 2009. A few days walking around the ancient sites in the vicinity of Oristano and the mountains of the interior (including not finding Tiscali).
  6. Croatia, 2009. Fly to Zagreb, travel to coast at Rijeka. Then series of ferries to Rab and Zadar. Strange train inland via Knin to Split, then to Korcula and Dubrovnik. Bus into Montenegro, then from Bar all the way to Belgrade by train. Train into Romania (Timosoara) to fly home.
  7. Corsica, 2010. Travelled by train to Nice, then ferry. Extensive walking holiday, hiking from Corte in the centre of the island to Porto on the west, then back home via Ajaccio and Bastia. Flights and trains were disrupted by Icelandic volcano, so ended up stranded in Geneva for a week! This trip has been documented in detail in the Hiking Corte pages.
  8. Scandinavia, 2010. Flying to Bergen, then trains to the Sognfjord. A series of ferries up to Balastrand & Sogndal, then to the Geirangerfjord, Ålesund and Molde. Ferry to Trondheim, then train into Sweden, via Ostersund to Stockholm.
  1. Belgians and Luxembourgeois bike tour, 2011. My very first international bike tour, where I attempted to ride from Dunkerque to Luxembourg on a very cheap bike bought in Oxford. No camping or cooking, but a fair bit of emergency bike fixing were required.
  1. Italian Wedding and Walking, 2011. Train to Parma, via Paris (EuroStar), Basel and Milan, to attend wedding of labmate. Train to Slovenia via Venice and walking across the border in Gorizia. Some walking around beautiful Lake Bohinj, then train through Austria to finish up in Munich.
  1. Walking the Dolomites, 2012. Last minute hiking trip to the Dolomites booked in the month after submitting my PhD thesis and starting work. Walked from the Val Gardena most of the way to Cortina. Extremely cold, empty, and beautiful.
  2. Irish road trip, 2013. After learning to drive, drove my new car from Kilkenny, to Cork, and then around the Dingle and Kerry peninsulars to Galway, and then back to Dublin. Included riding the original Dursey Island cable car.
  3. Winter in Central Europe, 2014. December in Budapest, Vienna and Prague – cold, but lots of hot wine and a perfect time to visit!
  4. Winter in Northern Europe, 2015. January in Berlin, Hamburg, Copenhagen and Malmö – what’s not to like?
  1. Full Italy Trip, 2015. Flying into Milan, starting by Lake Maggiore we worked our way south completely by train, visiting Florence, Pisa, Lucca, Rome, and Naples. Then a night train to Sicily and a ferry to Salina in the Aeolian islands. Finishing up in Catania.
  2. Middle of Sweden bike tour, 2017. Cycled from the southern tip of Sweden at Trelleborg up to the crater lake Siljan, then across the mountains to Norway, sailing back from Oslo.
  3. Baltic Bash, 2017. Flew to Vilnius, then travelled by train to Klaipeda, Šiauliai. Then by minibus to Riga, into the national park, then train to Tartu and Tallinn. Finishing up by taking a ferry across the Baltic to Helsinki.
  4. Spain and Portugal, 2016. Fly to Barcelona, train to Valencia and Alicante. Hire a car, and drove to Trevélez in the high Sierra Nevada, via La Isleta on the coast of Almeria and the desert of Tabernas. Dropped the car in Granada, then by train to Seville and Faro in Portugal.
  5. Cyprus, 2015. December trip to still-warm Cyprus, where we enjoyed ancient ruins and great foot in Paphos, hired a mini jeep and drove into the mountains at Platres, then finished up in Nicosia, including a couple of jaunts to the Turkish side.
  6. Black Forest bike tour, 2018. Cycled from Beaune in Burgundy, through the Jura, crossing then Rhine and into the Black Forest. Crossed that hilly terrain to meet my good friend Ben in Tübingen. Returned by following the Rhine, then Mosel, to Trier and Luxemberg.
  7. Iceland, 2018. Road trip all the way around Iceland, off the beaten track from route 1. After visiting Rekjavik and the golden circle, we made our way to the Westfjords via Vesturland and Borganes. Then along the Artic ocean to Akureyri and Husavik, to Egilstaddir and the souther glaciers.
  8. Crete, Spring 2018. Road trip around the island of Crete, starting at Heraklion and taking in Agios Nikolas, the Lasithi Plateau, and the remote south coast, including remote Loutro which is not accessible by road.
  9. Bohemian Rhapsody bike tour, 2019. Travel into Poland by train, then cycled from near Poznan through Silesia and into the Czech Rep. Crossed Bohemia, looping around Prague to stop at Plzen. Then crossed the mountains into Thuringia and crossed old East Germany to finish at Kassel.
  10. Malta, Spring 2019. A week and a half exploring Malta and Gozo, including some spectacular Easter celebrations.
  11. The Hills Are Alive bike tour, 2020. In a brief window when covid restrictions loosened across Europe sufficiently to allow bike touring, I cycled from Munich through the length of Austria to the lake Neusiedlersee, popping across into Slovakia then finishing up in Vienna.
Skiing trips
  1. St Gervais, 2013. Learning to ski around Mt Blanc
  2. Paris and Flaine, early 2014. EuroStar city break to Paris, then TGV to the Alps and a few days’ skiing in Flaine.

World Trips

  1. Transamerica, 2011. Three weeks crossing the USA coast-to-coast by train (and, unintentionally, Grayhound). Started in New York, to Buffalo for Niagara Falls, then Chicago, Colorado, Salt Lake, Las Vegas, LA, Yosemite, and San Francisco. A hurricane and a train derailment didn’t stop us!
  2. SE Asia, 2019. Flew into Singapore to attend the wedding of a university friend. A few days there, then up across peninsular Malaysia by train, taking in Taman Nagara in the rainforest, the tea plantations in the highlands, and Penang. Walk across the border into Southern Thailand to Nakhon Si Thammarat, then by boat to Ko Tao and Chumphon. Finally a night train to Bangkok and home.

Domestic Trips and Long Rides

Domestic trips. Red = Cycle Tours, Green = Road Trips, Yellow = Walking Trips
Walking Trips
  1. Crossing Dartmoor (2006). Growing up in South Devon, I’d done innumerable multi-day walks on Dartmoor including the Ten Tours. But somehow I’d managed never to walk it north-to-south. Two days, camping in Princetown.
  2. Snowdonia (2013). Spur-of-the moment drive to Snowdonia to walk. Managed to accidentally cross Bethesda slate quarry.
  3. Wester Ross (New Year 2013). Bored between Christmas and New Year 2013, drove for a night and a day from Devon, past Inverness and up to Wester Ross near Ullapool in the far north-west of the highlands. I walked for three days in the snowy peaks around An Teallach and around Gruinard bay.
Road Trips
  1. Northern Ireland, 2019 to attend wedding of University friend in Strabane. We drove up to Stranraer and got the ferry to Larne, and then drove across to Strabane via the Sperrins. Following the wedding, we drove home via Giant’s Causeway and the Antrim coast.
  2. Lakes and Scotland, 2021. Covid stay-cation, we had four days good walking in the Lakes, and then drove up the west coast. Reaching Oban we then had a few days walking and circumnavigating Mull, before driving up along the remote Ardnamuchan peninsular to Loch Ness. Then a few days walking in the Cairngorms, before finishing up in Edinburgh.
Cycle Trips

This excludes the innumerable day-rides etc. I’ve done in my home counties:

  1. Oxford to Gloucester (2010). Not a long ride of about 65 miles – but ever since buying a bike and getting back into cycling during the dog-days of my PhD, I had worked towards being able to cycle to Gloucester as a major goal. After about six months I was ready and made it no problem. I enjoyed it so much I repeated the ride again in 2013.
  2. Welsh borders to Oxford (2011). My longest ever day ride, from Craven Arms near the Welsh border, via Ludlow and Worcester back to Oxford. 123 miles on a cheap, heavy and partially-loaded bike, I doubt I would be physically capable of repeating this.
  3. Oxford to Devon (2011). A two-day loaded ride from Oxford back home, with stealth camping somewhere in Somerset and two 100+ mile days. Train back, but many days of exhaustion followed this one.
  4. Isle of Wight (2011). Loaded camping ride from Oxford to the New Forest, where I wild camped (after failing to find a campsite). Then ferry over to the Isle of Wight where I rode to The Needles.
  5. Brecon Beacons (2011). Two days cycling through South Wales, starting from the Forest of Dean and camping up on the Brecon Beacons. Finish in Neath on an extremely wet day.
  6. Coventry (2011). Cycling through the midlands to Coventry. Not much to see, but the people were very friendly.
  7. Peak District (2011). Cheating by taking the train to Banbury, then a 100-mile ride to the south edge of the Peak District via Derbyshire. My plan was to ride the Snake Pass and finish in Manchester, but a spectacular blow-out meant I ended I riding a tyre held together by a crisp packet to Buxton, where I returned by train.
  8. Basingstoke (2012). For Oxford. Why? Because it was there.
  9. Avebury (2012). Through the Vale of the White Horse to the fantastic stone circle at Avebury, I did this after I’d broken my toe (I couldn’t really walk, but I could cycle fine).
  10. Oxbridge (2012). The classic Oxford – Cambridge ride, as following Richard Griffin’s SquareWheels route. That page was one that first inspired me to try longer rides, so I was pleased to complete it. I repeated this ride on several occasions, including to visit my girlfriend, and (in the opposite direction) for college reunions.
  11. The Welsh Desert (2012). A three day ride, much of it offroad, across wild country in central Wales with wild camping and a stove. This was “bikepacking” avant la lettre, but that term hadn’t been invented then, so I just called it off-road touring.
  12. Norfolk and Lincolnshire (2014). After a long gap following the start of work, I started to do (day rides only) properly again in 2014. From the southern tip of Cambridgeshire, I rode all the way to King’s Lynn, with a tiny bit of Lincolnshire, nearly destroying myself at the time.
  13. Stevenage (2014). Just to see if commuting by bike was feasible (it was not).
  14. Newmarket (2014). Continuing a series of not-very-long day rides.
  15. Rutland Water from Potton (2017). Determined to get back into cycling properly, this was the first long (100km) ride I’d done in a long time.
  16. Thetford Forest (2017). This was almost purely to scope out the forest for wild camping – this time just a day-ride.
  17. Rutland Century (2017). I was also keep to get back into wild camping – following a night in the woods, I circumnavigated Rutland water and then rode home via Bedford, for a full century. Ouch!
  18. Luton (2017). Very much the journey (lovely hilly scenery) than the destination, here.
  19. Thetford Camp (2017). Following on my threat to camp in Thetford, I had a very tough day returning following the Little Ouse into the Fens.
  20. Leicester (2018). By this point I had my proper touring bike. In between tours I rode it through the East Midlands to Leicester in sweltering heat. A very nice ride, but a bugger to get back on the train.
  21. To Hull and Back (2021). The next few years, my long rides were nearly all on the continent. But in 2021 coronavirus restrictions meant that touring abroad was impossible. Instead I made a five-night domestic trip to near York up through Lincolnshire, across the Humber bridge, then down through Yorkshire and Nottinghamshire, wild camping all the way.
  22. Norfolk in Hope (2021). Repeating my camping in Thetford Forest, I then continued on into the Norfolk broads, ending up in Norwich.
  23. Home from Home (2022), Devon and Cornwall. A natural ride I had been planning for a while between my childhood hometown and my current home in West Cornwall – the hilly way, across Dartmoor.
  24. Cornish rides (2022). Some day rides in West Cornwall – to Land’s End, The Lizard, the North Coast and Penwith Moors.