Tuesday, October 29, 2013

Goodbye home

I’m writing this post for several reasons. Several very important reasons that are influencing our lives at the moment and will influence them in the future.
This story is about our house and our future. For those who didn't know yet; we live in a small squatted house in one of conglomerate cities of Barcelona. We live here almost two years now constantly working on our house, upgrading it and making more suitable for living. House is almost 100 years old, it’s one of previous century architectural beautiful housing projects that still has a soul and piece of mind of architect inside. The type of housing that is being currently destroyed all over Barcelona and replaced with shapeless giant block houses, that swallow hundreds of living souls inside their small, serial flats of metal, concrete and glass. The same faith awaits our house…

Monday, October 21, 2013

Tonns of gold (and cyanide lake)


Recently our Romanian friend invited us to  participate in protest against controversial mine Europe’s largest gold deposit, located under the ancient mountain town of Rosia Montana in Transylvania. These street protests against the Rosia Montana gold mining project have been taking place every weekend in September, also in different cities around Europe. Political commentators have described the growing movement as one of the largest anti-environmental protests in post-CommunistEurope.
Project, which aims to use cyanide (highly toxic substance) to mine 314 tonnes of gold and 1,500 tonnes of silver, has drawn fierce opposition from civic rights groups and environmentalists, who say it would destroy ancient Roman gold mines and villages.It is led by Rosia Montana Gold Corporation, majority-owned by Canada’s Gabriel Resources Ltd with the Romanian government holding 19 percent.






Wednesday, October 9, 2013

New DIY gear

Preparation for SpainMorocco no budget bike tour is in full swing. It’s the end of September already, time flies. In the mid-end of October it’s decided to hit the road to Morocco. Again limited money resources will make us cycle all the way towards South of Spain to cross the Gibraltar and enter yet unknown to us African continent.

For this trip we decided not to limit us with time, schedules and record breaking rides, but simply enjoy the trip as much as we can. It’s possible that when we’ll return back to Barcelona our squat where we live now won’t exist anymore. So why hurry?

New adventure comes with new gear upgrades. We still trying to pack light, but taking in count aspect that we’ll be there bike-bumming for unknown period of time so we better pack some extra luxuries and leave some extra space for recycled stuff and souvenirs from Morocco. Maybe a flying carpet will bring us home? My new DIY bikepacking bags will come in handy. Made from 100% recycled material (old bags, backpacks and carritos).

Our kitchen now has a new cook pot. 1L pot instead of 2,3L. It fits perfectly into frame bag. Saves weight, volume and our stomachs from overeating.

My second made frame bag is designed to carry whole kitchen stuff inside + extra tube/glue/patches. First prototype model is generously given away to Gita, although her bike frame is one size smaller, prototype bag fits perfectly. New model features bigger volume, easier attaching to frame thanks to velcros and no internal padding.

Rise bags – well, as name suggests they are made specially to carry rise or any other grains on tour. One side bag hauls 1Kg of grains = 8 meals. Designed to use frame space and free up space in other bags. In Morocco they will be known as cous-cous bags.


New back rack came to replace my old Rixen Kaul seat tube rack/bag with 10kg weight limit. Poor thing was carrying always extra weight and after 5 years and 3 extended tours finally aluminum frame broke. As long my KTM doesn’t have rack mounts and I don’t have money to buy expensive racks for race bikes came an idea to use friends abandoned aluminum front rack and fit it to backs of my bike.

I had to cut of some parts of, bend some stuff, hammer flatten few tubes, drill some new holes and use my KTM V-brake mounts and quick release axle to attach it. The result was more than satisfying. I hope it’ll last for some time. Already tested it on Beyond The Borders south France tour this June.

This rack is more rigid than previous one. I bet it easily can carry more than 10kg. My backpack it attached on top with bungee cords. New add-on for Morocco will be two extra stuff sacks bungied on both sides, to carry extra food/water/stuff. When empty – folded and packed away. Portatable panners.   

Meanwhile Gita is surfing internet to find people from Coutchsurfing to host us. We’ve decided to stay more in peoples houses around Morocco to feel more local culture and hear the stories from people…

Subscribe for more new in the future!          

Friday, October 4, 2013

Night ride into mountais

Not so long a go we received a generous gift from a bike store Ebike  - based in Riga. A package of some really useful items for our upcoming Moroccan bike expedition. Headlights and backlights for our bikes, brand new Ebike team clothes and brand new wind 4ever jackets. Barcelona is still too warm and too bright to test this new stuff, so we hit a road to Alpens (~850m alt.), situated in foothills of Pyrenees. It’s place where our friends live in the countryside house deep in the mountains away from noise and pollution of the big city.


Monday, September 9, 2013

Untold stories

Last year was packed full of adventures. Just like 2013. So many things happening that we even din't have time to publish all the trips we did. We still decided to publish some of them. Better later than never. Right?  

Click on the pic to see/read more...


PARC NATURAL DEL MONTSENY




SITGES-ACUATICA







BICKEPACK WINTER  GARRAFF







VENDANGE-FRANCIJA





Friday, September 6, 2013

Hiking Pyrenees


Finally the real Barcelonean summer has arrived. Mid-day -  you are on the street, sun squishes you and fries on hot asphalt, shoe soles are melting and sticking to the ground and in the distance you see mirages of oasis. We took refuge from hot sun in the high mountains of Pyrenees. This time we are without bikes, to explore unridable tails of this beautiful mountain range. 5 days of hiking will be the longest hiking experience for both of us.





Tuesday, August 20, 2013

Grim reality...

Due to our squat upcoming eviction my trip to Pyrenees is postponed. My head is full with stuff going around our house, can't concentrate on enduro event. If we lose the house there will be more time to nomad around Morocco coz there's no home to come back to. We'll figure something out...