So far around 15 parents have gotten in contact with us and expressed interest in joining the Childish Weeks with their 1–3 children each. This is much more interest that we have expected! We are excited to see how this experiment will turn out!
When we first announced the Childish Weeks, we did not realize some of the differences in the needs of people with very young children and with older children. In particular, older children are restricted by school holidays, and their dates vary greatly across Europe. We found out that the most overlap is in the first half of August, which also matches with the availability of the parents who have expressed interest so far.
This means that the Childish Weeks have to happen in the middle of the tour. Combined with the fact that we often start in the best reachable place and end in the least reachable place, this creates a challenge, as the Childish Weeks also need to be well reachable. This year in particular, one important topic will be to visit Sápmi (the region in Northern Europe inhabited by the Sámi people and under occupation of Norway, Sweden, Finland and Russia), which is quite far north and thus difficult to combine with being in the south in the middle of the tour.
As a compromise, we have decided to start the tour in early June in Sápmi, and to possibly use other means of travel such as trains to get to the south faster. Since the group will probably be quite small at the start, we might organize the first segment of the route as a pre-tour with less equipment, and possibly visiting some remote places without bikes by hitch-hiking or public transportation.
An additional challenge for the Childish Weeks in this year’s region is that taking trains with bicycles seems to be a real challenge. For people with children, taking long-distance buses is usually not an option, as it is difficult for children to sit still for many hours, and for smaller children, bringing a car seat would be required, which would add to the complexity of the journey. This means that trains and ferries will be the main means of transportation for people with children to reach the tour. In Sweden, long-distance trains operated by the national railway company SJ do not accept bikes, only most (but not all) regional trains take them. As an example, taking regional trains from Malmö to Stockholm requires 5 changes, takes more than 7 hours (if all connections are reached, with is unlikely with bicycles, trailers and children), requires looking up whether the 6 different train companies on the way accept bicycles and otherwise looking for alternatives, and looking up the prices and buying 6 different tickets from those different companies. This would already be a hassle with just a bicycle and luggage, but with a bicycle, luggage, a trailer or children’s bikes and one or more children, it becomes an impossible challenge that few people would be willing to take.
We have found out that Skåne, the southernmost region of Sweden, would be the most suitable place for the Childish Weeks, as it is densely populated, meaning there is a lot of infrastructure, and cycling and taking bicycles on the train is the most common there. We are aiming to have the Childish Weeks in Skåne and follow a train line during the weeks so that it is easy for people to skip parts of the way by train. But the exact region will only be decided once the planning of the route progresses. It could also happen a bit north of Skåne but still easily reachable by train, or somewhere that can at least be easily reached by ferry from the European mainland (for example Oslo).
But the dates are now fixed to the 1st until the 14th of August. You can already reserve this spot your calendars if you are planning to join the Childish Weeks. You are of course welcome to join the tour with children also before and after the Childish Weeks, but during those 2 weeks we will put a special focus on the needs of children and other children are guaranteed to be there.
We would like to emphasize that the Childish Weeks are meant for children of all ages. There will be both babies who travel in trailers or on bike seats, as well as older children who can already cycle themselves.
If you would like to join the Childish Weeks, please contact us. We are putting the parents/caregivers in contact with each other to exchange needs and experiences and plan the travels together. All information will also be added to the Childish Weeks page, and updates will be posted here on the blog.