A Cycle from Nice to Zagreb

[Greg Albery]

Hi everyone,
I'm planning a cycle from Nice, in France, across Italy to Croatia. I'll be doing it this Summer with 2 friends, and we're all experienced and expecting to spend up to 2 months doing it.
We're just getting into planning it now and have little idea how much it will cost, etc. as we've only done one of these sorts of things before and it was only a couple of weeks, on the West coast of France. We hope to leave around the 15th of July, but the main problem i'm running into is how to get the bikes down to Nice (we don't particularly want to cycle the distance from calais/paris down to the South). Does anyone have any tips? We have £1000 each at our disposal and we all have the necessary kit already, including tents, panniers, bikes, etc.
Thanks in advance

 

[willem]

That is only about 1000 km, or something you could do in two weeks. If you have two months you could just about ride from Calais to Zagreb and back. Given your tight budget that seems just about the only option, and a fun one at that. 500 km a week is quite feasible, with 100 km on a typical day, but rather less on days with a lot of climbing, and one rest day a week.
Willem

 

[rich p]

I've just checked on Easyjet and you can fly to Nice on July 17th for £62 incl. the bike. Sounds a bargain to me!

 

[Greg Albery]

The easyjet flight sounds great, i've looked it up myself, but i'd need a bike bag to pack it in. Do you guys have an advice about where to get one of those? Or if there's a way to travel without packing the bike away? Bikes can't be taken on TGVs without one either i think.

 

[rich p]

The easyjet flight sounds great, i've looked it up myself, but i'd need a bike bag to pack it in. Do you guys have an advice about where to get one of those? Or if there's a way to travel without packing the bike away? Bikes can't be taken on TGVs without one either i think.

I assume you won't want to lug it with you, so I cadge an empty cardboard bike box from an LBS and dump it at the airport. It's what I'll be doing later this summer to Faro. I have got another one at my final destination in a similar way to fly back. On another occasion I bought a proper bag in Bologna and sold it when I got back.
Others on here use a CTC plastic bag which seems to work although I haven't tried it. A box with Easyjet also allows you to secrete a lot of kit in it too up to a total weight of 50 kg.

 

[Greg Albery]

The easyjet website says it needs to be in a bike box/bag, are they insistent on this or are they quite flexible on what counts as a "biike bag"? By the way I found a Eurostar from London to Nice for £65, and that seems to be possible too.

 

[Greg Albery]

Also, the "secreting" thing seems clever.. have they never caught you doing that?

 

[rich p]

Also, the "secreting" thing seems clever.. have they never caught you doing that?

No, they never check the bags or cardboard boxes - ever. I have only used a real bike bag, both soft and hard or a cardboard box from the lbs. They're happy with either and only interested in weighing it. I did cut the cardboard box down though to it's minimum size.
Others say that they are happy with the CTC plastic see-through bag with the pedals off an the bars turned but I haven't done that.

 

[Greg Albery]

OK thanks a lot Rich, you've been a great help. I have a much better idea of what i'm going to do now. Wish me luck

 

[Jimmy Doug]

Hi

If you don't fancy the plane route, it is possible to take the train to Nice with a bike using the SNCF Intércités de nuit service. The train leaves from Paris Auserlitz and, as the name suggests, travels overnight arriving in Nice in the morning. There is no need to put your bike in a bag or cardboard box, and there is no need to take it to pieces as you would on some TGV trains. I took this train a couple of years ago with my bike and it was dead easy. (The service was called Lunéa then, but I don't think that changes anything on a practical level).