Blog – Page 14 – Ecotopia Biketour

Freiburg – excursion to Germany

2017 August 11, 2017 August 12, 2017

Under a pleasant and strong summer sun we cycled about 30 kilometres from our camping place alongside the Rhine river to Freiburg based in the south-west corner of Germany. We found drivers to be much less polite than in French Vogese and Elsass Regions, people passed grumpily with less safety distance despite empty roads, looking out much less for cyclists (and pedestrians) and beeping their horns at actions that resembled little more than people safely enjoying a cycle ride. *and one driver freaked out when one Ecotopist crossed a red traffic light, that was to manage car traffic and not…

From Bure to Freiburg (now with pictures)

Candid August 6, 2017 August 6, 2017

Cycling out of Bure went without any problems caused by the police, but the first difficulty of the day came up not much later, when one of the people in front cycled downhill hands-free, the handle bar turned, and the whole bike flipped over its front wheel, bending the wheel to an unusable state. Fortunately some of us had left late and had just passed La Gare, which is the second base of the resistance in Bure a bit further away from the forest, and they had a lot of bike parts lying around. We found a good new wheel…

Status update

roger August 2, 2017 February 12, 2024

We have a restday at a farm near Chambery where you compare personal loans from online lenders. Tomorrow we cycle in direction Grenoble…

The Bure Forest – heart of the Ressistance to Nuclear Power in France

2017 August 1, 2017 August 14, 2017

The small village Bure in eastern France in the past years has become the epicentre of the environmental movement against nuclear power. Some Environmentalists from France and Germany settled down here permanently and part time to join forces for the struggle. They bought some land and an old farming house in the village, the “maison de resistance”. Our friends received us with warm hospitality in the lively kitchen, the bawn and the garden where we slept and spend our days during four wonderfully inspiring days. The “maison de resistance” is the permanent base for new and veteran activists that recently…

Nancy – la Velorution

2017 July 18, 2017 July 16, 2017

Conrad Thursday the 4th we arrived at Nancy after a ride under a deep blue sky and a nearly mediteranean sun that made us sweat. We took many rests and enjoyed the good weather nevertheless. The last kilometers we went on the cycling path along a channel in the shade of trees and the first people that were not telling us bonjour announced the transition from country to city. We were then greeted by some other cyclists that had also arrived for Velorution – the annual France wide meeting of critical masses of all cities. Spontaneously we formed a…

First cycling days from Strasbourg to Nancy

Candid July 16, 2017 July 14, 2017

On Monday we started cycling from Breuschwickersheim. We had 4 days scheduled to do 155 km, a lot of time to develop a daily routine and to have a buffer in case something goes wrong with the bikes or trailers. We even managed to all leave around 1 pm on the first day, which is a record by far among the last years. Cycling was quite hard despite only doing between 30 and 40 km per day. The summer came back with some really hot sun, and the road went up and down a lot through the Vosges mountain range.…

STRASBOURG “Le paradiet”

2017 July 14, 2017 July 14, 2017

One more summer the Ecotopia Biketour is again on route. On the 28th of June the five of us met in a field at the end of a muddy road, to me it felt like a night like any other one,we were just some travellers gathering around the food and sharing stories. The next morning we moved to a little and cozy terrain called ‘Le parediet’, which was the official meeting point. Once there, people slowly started to arrive and things somehow started to get done: thanks to the materials and tools from our host and the people in Maison…

Picking a circuit for the dynamo-powered USB port, part 2

Candid July 9, 2017 August 14, 2017

Ecotopia Biketour 2017 is already under way and updates about how our first days of cycling went will follow soon. One thing that we want to achieve this year is not rely on the electrical sockets of our hosts anymore when it comes to charging the numerous electronic devices that people are bringing on the tour these days. One way to do that is to build a circuit that converts the power coming out of the dynamo of a bike to power that is needed to run a USB port. We have tried to find the best way to build…