1989: Best Cycle Tour Ever

Turkey to England with Jane

Living the dream
A decade passes extremely fast when life is going well. My intentions after the 1979 trans Europe cycle tour were to return to Australia, work for a while to save money and then return to the Middle East and keep cycling across Asia. That didn't happen.

What happened instead was that I accepted an offer of temporary contract to teach science in a secondary college. That first year of teaching in 1980 was the most exhausting, rewarding year of work I have ever done. By the second year of teaching, I was so totally absorbed in the work I gladly accepted the offer of a permanent position with Commonwealth Teaching Service. And that's when I indefinitely postponed my plan to ride across Asia.

I'd come to a fork in the road, took it and morphed from a naive ex-Mr Whippy, long distance cycle tourer into a cycle commuting teacher.

Ten years whizzed by. By 1989, I had completed many short cycle tours in SE Australia, been promoted, bought a house, traveled to India and Nepal with friends and relatives for short trekking and train trips, and was well immersed in my local Canberra community with many wonderful friends. The 1979 inaugural cycle tour soon became a fond but distant memory.

Most importantly, by 1989 I'd met and was besotted with a charming New Zealander called Jane. Not only was Jane beautiful and talented, she understood my peculiar addiction to cycle cycle touring, and she was very adventurous herself, having already completed some very long journeys in Australia and overseas. So adventurous was Jane, she was even keen (some would say crazy enough) to try a long cycle tour with me.

So in 1989 we applied for seven months leave from work, and with our bikes, and flew to Istanbul Turkey from Australia in March 1989 on Singapore Airlines.

From Istanbul we pedaled our way across and down Western Turkey, then we island hopped the Mediterranean by ferries. By riding around various islands such as Rhodes, Crete, Santorini and Kythera, we slowly rolled our way via mainland Greece (with the help of other ferries across the Adriatic Sea and The Channel) to Italy, France and finally into southern England via Plymouth.

We also did a bicycle-free side trip to Yugoslavia, Austria and Hungary via trains. This was while the Berlin Wall was coming down and Yugoslavia was beginning to fall apart at the seams. 1989 was a challenging political year in that part of the world. Big events also happened elsewhere. 1989 was also the year of Tiananmen Square. That horror happened a long way from where we were in Europe but the shockwaves of the Tiananmen killings certainly affected Australia.

Tailwinds and Sunshine Across the Roman Empire
By October 1989 we'd cycled from a cold spring in Istanbul to a damp autumn in England via a seemingly endless sunshine across Europe. By cycling from Istanbul to Bath, we'd never departed the Roman Empire. Along the entire route we found Roman rubble. Clearly if an empire needs to be remembered, its litter needs to made from well shaped marble and granite.

And by the time we were ready to come home, Jane and I were engaged to get married! As engaged, long distance cycle tourers do, we headed home to work and plan to marry early the following year.

1989 was an absolutely wonderful, unforgettable year. It was one of those years when it felt as if there was no cycling against the wind, and the beginning of a whole new phase of life had started. It’d been a tailwinds tour.

Then another 24 years zoomed by. By 2013, another fork in the road appeared. 2013 was also a year of major change, and another memorable, very different cycle tour which has led to the Against the Wind ride. 2013 will be covered in the next page of this journal.

Meanwhile, here are a few photos from 1989 cycle tour adventure.

1989 spring cycling in Turkey and the tortoises were on the move.

From Istanbul we pedaled our along the Sea of Marmara. It was Ramadan.

Our camping set up at Gallipoli on the eve of ANZAC Day 1989

After two months of cycle touring Western Turkey, we caught this tiny ferry to Lesvos. It was the simplest way to enter Greece. From Lesvos we caught a much larger boat to Rhodes and then Crete where we spent many weeks cycle touring.

Camping on Kythera, an island not far from mainland Greece. Many Canberra Greek families have links to Kythera.

Time off the bikes do some trekking in Greece. Samaria Gorge.

In Crete. One of the best, simplest most memorable museums is in Heraklion

Time off the bikes. Dubrovnik. The start of a side trip by train and bus to Austria and Hungry.

Umbria and Tuscany. 1989 cycle touring the beautiful parts of Italy I'd missed by racing through Italy solo in 1979.

Into France. On our way from Montpellier to Britanny via Paris. Orange caught our attention as we have family in Orange Australia.

Exiting Orange France at speed. We didn't stay long.

No stopping us when we reached Normandy and Brittany.

These quintessential cycle touring in France photo

My lovely cousin Doreen and her husband Duncan. They welcomed me in 1979, and again in 1989 when Jane and I rolled in to complete our Turkey to England cycle tour.

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Kathleen ClassenI am really enjoying this journal. We didn’t discover cycle touring until our sixties and wish we had started sooner. We too want to keep going as long as we can. I am also looking forward to a good look at cycle touring in Australia. We have a newly minted Australian daughter in law (November 16) and a whole wonderful new Australian family so will certainly be doing more exploring there. Lovely too that Australia arranged to be warm when Canada is cold! Well done 👍.
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4 years ago

Graham SmithTo Kathleen ClassenThanks Kathleen. I will eventually get to the actual tour, but I felt like it needed some of the back story.

South East Australia is in a bit of difficulty at the moment with unprecedented, widespread and relentless wildfires. It’s been a truly apocalyptic summer.

That said, please still come and cycle tour here, but avoid high summer. It’s simply too hot. Autumn is usually the best season, or even winters aren’t really too cold compared to what you are used to. Early spring is usually ok too, but a bit more unpredictable.

If you do come, I’m more than pleased to help with cycle touring advice if you need it. Canadians usually feel at home here, and vice versa.
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4 years ago