The route

A visual overview of the route so far! (2007/06/24)

After reading lots and lots of travelogues and websites by other cyclists, during which I could slowly make up my mind, I eventually came up with a route, which I felt like riding. The main trick in planning the whole thing, was finding the areas I might be interested in visiting in, and connecting these, taking in account factors like weather and politics.

Each part of my route has it's own story, a story that in many cases I already forgot again. For two parts of my route it might be interesting to tell you these actual stories (these being Yemen and Japan). I won't bother you with the further details of my trip, but suffice with just mentioning which countries I plan on visiting and when I am planning to get there.

First of all there is Yemen. Since I will only leave by August first, I will only get to Turkey as winter is approaching. Considering the fact the border areas between Turkey and Iran are quite mountainous, and mountains tend to get cold and snowy once winter approaches, it didn't seem to much of a plan to hang around in those areas around that time.

Since the Middle East seems to really attract me in one way or another, this wasn't really too much of a problem. Visiting Lebanon, and making a little tour around Syria, Jordan, Egypt and back to Turkey again. However, that last part 'and back' started to bother me more and more. I really didn't feel like going back.

Then what did I feel like? Iraq isn't really an option, and Saudi Arabia is close to impossible to visit as tourist. And what about Yemen? Sounded strange, but as a matter of fact, I didn't know anything about this country, let go from the fact if it would be possible to ride my bike down there.

After doing a bit of research on the World Wide Web, I found that indeed it would be possible to do such thing, and that once every while there is actually a small group of cyclists doing this. Besides that, these is quite a lot of interesting things to be seen down there (Yemen used to be the base of the historical Kingdom of Sheeba, which gained much of it's richdes by selling incense, as Yemen is the only place on earth where the famous incense-tree will grow. Also it is home of the famous Mocha coffee, and the country where people have been living in massive 5-story mud-built 'skyscrapers' for thousands and thousands of years). Plenty of interesting things to see, so visiting Yemen became part of the plan.

In the most ideal case I would of course take a boat from Djibouti to get there, but as time and the seasons didn't really allow for a three-month trip through Sudan and Ethiopia, I decided to either try and find a boat to get there from Suez, or hop on a plane from Cairo.

Destination Japan mainly originated due to the maximum length my Chinese visa would allow me to stay in the latter country. Since I expect I will not be able to cross all of China in the mere three months I will be granted for doing so, there is some trouble there. After fantasizing about making a visa run to Hong Kong or Taiwan, maybe take a different route and make a detour via Tibet, or hopping on some Chinese bus or train, I decided taking a ferry from Beijing to Japan was a far more pleasant and feasible option.

Besides that, various people told me about the wonders of cycling in Japan, which is said to be rather expensive, but manageable, as long as you stick to camping. Definitely worth giving a try, and if I don't like it, it is still possible to return to China again..

Travel plan

first of August 2005: Amsterdam

start of October 2005: Istanbul

mid December 2005: Egypt

mid January 2006: Yemen

mid February 2006: Oman

start of march 2006: Iran

mid April 2006: Central Asia

start of June 2006: China

start of September 2006: Japan

October 2006: Taiwan, South East Asia

December 2006: Indonesia

end of January 2007: New Zealand

mid march 2007: United States

Augustus 2007: Iceland

mid September 2007: Amsterdam

(be aware this planning is getting more inconsistent the further away the dates are)

Updated travel plan (Dec. 2006)

now: Japan (Kyushu, Okinawa)

end of January 2007: Taiwan

end of February 2007: Malaysia (Saba)

start of march 2007: Indonesia (Borneo, Sulawesi, Flores, Sumbawa)

start of may 2007:　BALI!!