Route 2010

Overview

The Ecotopia Biketour will move from Northern England, through France, Belgium, (maybe the Netherlands briefly) and Germany. See the rough route on googlemaps It will be about 1600km long, which is shorter than last year's and we'll take a little more time to do it (a bit over two months). (Hopefully it's an improvement...ah, don't you love learning from lessons!)

Places + events + dates we are planning for so far:

ENGLAND:

• Fri 25th June - Critical Mass, London, England - starts at 6pm at South Bank, under Waterloo Bridge south (for those coming from continental europe.... arriving in St Pancras international is fine!)

• Sat 26 June - people travelling from London go by train (we have 15 tickets from London to York, including 5 to Northallerton booked already and will probably take a local train from there to somewhere... We have 15 cheap tickets which will be taken by the first 15 people who register to join the biketour from the start. If you register later the tickets will be more expensive.)

• The meeting/start point in the afternoon of Sat 26 June: somewhere in North Yorkshire tbc, hopefully just a nice short ride for everyone to the first sleeping place somewhere nearby. Please suggest possibilities in this area! (Northallerton - surroundings or further....)

• Sun 27 & Mon 28 June - ride from North Yorkshire to York via indirect route - approx 100km - we still need sleeping places on this section of the route - contact us if you have any ideas!

• Tues 29 June - York: participate in the "Open day" at the Towards Carfree Cities Conference IX [1]

• Weds 30 June - York: Biketour Concensus Decision Making workshop led by Seeds for Change [2] Starting 9:30am - 5pm. There are also social events in the evening each day we are in York.

• Thurs 1 - York-Pontefract 50km (via 'Megawatt Valley')

• Fri 2 July - ride Pontefract to Leeds - 40km

• Sat 3 July - in Leeds: same time as possible UK Climate Camp gathering (meeting)

• Sun 4 July - Leeds-Sheffield - 60km

• Mon 5 July - Sheffield-Wincle (near Buxton) - 50km

• Tues 6 July - Wincle-Stone? - 40km

• Weds 7 July - Stone?-Huntington Lane Camp (near Telford) - 40km

• Thurs 8 & Fri 9 July - two days at Huntington Lane Camp - [3] - for rest days, or optional visit by train to Centre for Alternative Technology in Wales [4], or action that we organise

WALES

• Sat 10-Mon 12 July - ride Huntington Lane Camp-Abergavenny - 130km - we still need sleeping places on this section of the route - contact us if you have any ideas!

• Tues 13 July - rest day, including some helping on the organic farm at Abergavenny Gaia Coach Institute - [5]

ENGLAND AGAIN

• Weds 14 & Thurs 15 July - ride Abergavenny-Bristol - 65km - or maybe ride all distance one day, start activities in Bristol one day earlier

• Fri 16 July - day of visits to local projects/organisations in Bristol

• Sat 17-Weds 21 July - ride Bristol-Portsmouth (150km) - we still need sleeping places on this section of the route - contact us if you have any ideas!

• Thurs 22 July - take the ferry to France! (Portsmouth 0830-Le Havre 1245) we have paid for 20 cheap tickets for cyclists for this ferry - these will be used by the first 20 people to register. After these might not be space for any more cyclists or you might have to pay more or take a different ferry, so register as soon as possible!

FRANCE

• 22nd July - 1st August Camp Action Climat (french climate camp [6]) near Le Havre, France.

• Dieppe (?) something to do with nuclear!

• 6-7 August - Ruisseauville "A petits pas" [7] Environmental education, eco-construction

• 8 August - Landrethun le Nord (?) eco-construction "Le Chenelet"

• 9-11 August - Calais No Borders camp

• 12 August - Herzeele (?)

BELGIUM

• 14th August - riding to Oostende, Belgium.

• 15th August - Oostende. Climate event: "Big Ask" for a climate law, big dancing lesson on the beach, political panel discussion and arts, concert with Cold Cut as part of the "Energy Union Tour". GOOD PLACE TO JOIN THE BIKETOUR (Laura thinks so)

• 16th August - Gent. Staying in a squat in Merelbeke!

(? action + workshop) 17th August - Gent.

(? action) *17th - 18th August Brussels - action against the brussels ring road?

(? possible) *19th - 20th August Nethen (30 km from Brussels) Permaculture festival www.festivalpermaculture.be

(? dates) *21-22nd August Hasselt, action with newly formed local Friends of the Earth group

NETHERLANDS

(?maybe earlier) *23rd August - staying somewhere in the netherlands near Maastricht / Sittard / Geleen & meeting up with dutch people to cycle to the klimacamp!

GERMANY

• 24th August - We will arrive to the klima camp in Borschemich-Erkelenz, Germany!!

• 25th August - Bike-action day with the klimacamp

• 21st-29th August [http:/www.klimacamp2010.de/ Klima Camp], Borschemich-Erkelenz, Germany.

• 30th Ride Erkelenz - Cologne

• 31st Cologne An evaluation on our successes, concrete suggestions on improvements and planning for next year's tour .... and then an ecotopia biketour 20th anniversary reunion party !

Activist/Ecologist Events in north-western europe, summer 2010

How did we come to this proposal? We decided to evaluate all events, camps and gatherings together, instead of automatically going to an Ecotopia gathering now. After lots of broad brainstorming and discussion, and an amazing compilation of activist events near the general route proposals, we came up with what you can see above. See the larger list of possible events here: http://btwiki.ecobytes.net/Possible_Activist_Events_for_BT2010. Please add anything else that you hear about! The list can also be seen on an open edit google map at http://bit.ly/ceNwc6

How to get to BT 2010

UK

BT will be taking place in the UK from the evening of Friday 25th June until the morning of Thursday 22nd July but if you come a bit earlier it should be okay, just let us know.

How to get to the UK (please add your own knowledge and advice here) and also see the information on the FAQ page:

By train:

• Some advice on taking bikes on trains between the UK and other European countries here: http://www.seat61.com/bike-by-train.htm The information is mostly suitable to people coming from the UK, but just read it the other way round!
• If you are coming via Germany you could use the very cheap tickets - Schönes-Wochenend-Ticket (with which groups of five person can travell everywhere within Germany only on Saturday or Sunday for 37 €, no fast trains: EC, ICE) and London-Spezial (from any town in Germany to London for 49 € with ICE and Eurostar, can be booked online here: http://www.bahn.de/p/view/angebot/international/london-spezial.shtml, if you need help with the translation, ask Moritz).
• Some information about taking your bike on Eurostar: you can either carry it onto the train - but it needs to be inside a 'bike bag' (which you could make yourself) - or you can pay extra to have the bike transported separately (25 GBP, don't know Euros price), usually on the same train.
• For advice on taking bikes on other trains in Europe it's worth sending an email to the Biketour list to ask the experts there. Contact
• Taking bikes on trains in the UK is very complicated because we have a stupid system of around 25 different companies running different trains in different parts of the country, and each one has different rules about how you can take your bike on the train (sometimes it's free, sometimes you pay, sometimes you must make a reservation, etc.) This page http://www.atob.org.uk/Bike_Rail.html has the best explanation of each company's current rules.
• Booking tickets on UK trains can be done on lots of websites. This is the main one but is limited and sometimes doesn't show you the cheapest tickets: http://www.thetrainline.com/ A better website for ticket buying is http://www.eastcoast.co.uk/ which has tickets from all over the UK (I think) but gives good prices for trains between London and Yorkshire.
• On Saturday 26th June we have cheap tickets for 15 people and 15 bicycles to travel from London to Yorkshire by train leaving on 3 different trains between 1100 and 1600. If you aren't one of the first 15 people to register, or you are travelling on a different day you need to book another tickets. Contact us if you don't know what to do.
• In Germany, International bike tickets cost 10 Euros and are valid for most trains in Europe. http://www.bahn.de/p/view/service/fahrrad/mitnahme/preise_fahrradmitnahme.shtml

By boat:

• Mark has done some price research on all the possible route to France, Belgium & Netherlands http://bit.ly/dzeFXJ The cheapest ferries are the ones from Dover, and tickets get more expensive further away.
• Sometimes it is possible to 'hitchhike' ferries by having your bike put onto a lorry and travelling on the ferry with that lorry but you need to have time for this.
• There is the "rail and sail" offer from STena line that goes between amsterdam/ rotterdam/ any station in NL and London via Harwich. Trip including train and ferry costs from 39 Euros one way, if you book at least 14 days in advance. http://www.stenaline.nl/en/ferry/london/ Don't try to look at the dutch train companies' website, it's utter crap and doesn't even show this connection...
• You can easily count on £25 - £30 from most ferry ports to london by train and a wee bit extra for your bike depending on which train company you travel with. So the Eurostar might be cheaper.

By bus/coach:

• Bringing a bicycle by international coach is not easy, although Mark and Elissa managed to take their bikes in large cardboard boxes from London to Vienna by Eurolines coach to start the 2004 tour. This was a coach company from Slovakia, maybe that made it easier.
• Taking bikes on buses and coaches in the UK is almost impossible, don't plan to do this.

Cycles in London:

• It might be possible to get hold of a bicycle in London or somewhere else in the UK - contact us if you are planning to do this. You should allow yourself time to organise this, and be aware that the organisers already have a lot of responsibilities before the tour starts.

General notes

• Any more ideas how to come to the tour? mitfahrzentralen/ ride sharing, night train offers, the Czech bus student agency (do they take bikes?) Who wants to expand the list and fill it with details ?

Route questions for the rest of Europe

• Who would like to co-ordinate the first few days in France ? probably around Caen
• Qui voudrais co-ordonner les premiers jours en france ? (probablement aux alentours de Caen)

• who would like to coordinate the Biketour in Germany? This is a small role, as the route will be very small!

For Belgium, google fietsroutenetwork or see http://www.fietsnet.be/routeplanner/ with 18000 km of bikeroutes in Belgium. And I'll ask around in my Maastricht web for Dutch contacts as it seems bt will go through south of limburg - Daniël.

Route Ideas 2011

Ideas for 2011 include baltic states, belarus, ukraine, switzerland, italy, greece...If you have ideas for 2011, however crazy, or if you are interested in being a regional or international co-ordinator, please do so on the bt-org or biketour lists, or write to info[at]ecotopiabiketour.net It's really helpful (for themselves) for people interested in being co-ordinators next year, to join the tour for at least a week this year! Also contact us if you're interested in doing an EVS (European Voluntary Service) project as the ecotopia biketour.