day 5

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Barcelona!

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The longest leg of my trip has ended. 1,255 kilometers, from Zurich to Barcelona. In total I've done somewhere between 1,600 and 1,700 miles. About the distance of Charlottesville VA (my permanent residence) to Denver CO.  The first leg of my journey, Kranj, Slovenia to Vienna was such a shit show--poor sleep, inconsistent mileage--that I was spooked for the remainder of the trip and was overly conservative on planning.  From Zurich to Barcelona I really hit my stride and was doing 100+ kilometer days every day no problem and had gotten really efficient at camping.  I don't know how people camp occasionally. I did some math and I slept outside/wild camped about four days for every one day I used Warm Showers (cyclist social network for free lodging) and Hostels. I've essentially wild camped exclusively on the road and found indoor options when I was in cities and twice during bouts of rain.  I really like cities though so I extended in almost every major ...
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France

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Damn it. France wins again.  I've always joked that, of course the French are snobby, wouldnt you be if you invented baguettes, croissants, and human rights? But, after traveling in Austria and Slovenia, I just couldn't imagine anything topping it.  The first day I entered France from Switzerland I was a little shocked, there was peeling paint, and even some abandoned buildings! Switzerland, Austria, and Slovenia feel almost like someone built the "Idyllic Village" Lego set...10,000 times and lined them up and I was riding through them day after day. France just has a romantic vibe that no amount of peeling paint or drab colorways can hide. In fact, this aire of not caring just adds to the charm. It gives it this totally effortless feel. I had always considered myself a Francophile, now I have the receipts.  Exhibit 1.  This video  is from my first full day riding in France. I'm getting dumped on by rain in a rural area that is not touristic at all. ...
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On traveling frugally vs extremely frugally.

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This is basically just a WhatsApp conversation I had with one of my previous hosts that I edited and adapted to a post.  First an aside: Here's a picture of an abandoned building in Switzerland. There are so few abandoned buildings in Slovenia, Austria and Switzerland. When I tour in the United States and even in Japan, I went into a lot of abandoned buildings and houses. Becky gets annoyed because I'm always pulling off the road to jump through a window.  Ok, back to the original post: So I went around a month dirtbagging it --spending no money on lodging or transport, sleeping under bridges, park benches, even one rich person's ski condo balcony when they weren't home etc-- I'm now being much more proactive finding warmshowers hosts and infilling with inexpensive Airbnbs and hostels. I even booked a train to allow me to get further and see more things....gasp. This was is much more pleasant and still frugal! But, I had fun trying the former as sort of ...
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