Welcoem to posts!!
in the future - u will be able to do some more stuff here,,,!! like pat catgirl- i mean um yeah... for now u can only see others's posts :c
THOUGHTS ON TOURING COSTS
I've been asked about budgeting for motorcycle trips so here are a few pointers
*** Fuel
My CB500x consumed on average 3.2 litres per 100Km, so I would err on caution and base future estimates on 3.5 litres per 100 Km, therefore, 35 litres per 1000Km. Assuming 2 Euros per litre, this would be 70 Euros per 1000 Km. Simple maths for a 10k trip would be 700 Euros on fuel
*** Tolls / vignettes / ferries
This really depends on where you travel, I avoid tolls where possible, if you plan your route you can calculate these, remember tolls can apply to major routes, certain bridges and tunnels.
Ferries on some routes are bookable in advance and depend on route, time of year and how far in advance you book them. Assuming you know your route and rough dates in advance, these can be researched. Hop-on, hop-off ferries are usually paid at the dock or more often, on the ferry per trip, in Norway you can buy a ferry pass which saves you some money, but they were quite cheap anyway
*** Accommodation
My trips are a mix of camping and hotel / guest house. I booked accommodation "last minute" - usually between 16:00 - 18:00 each day using Google maps to locate camp sites and Booking.com for hotel / guest houses near where I intended to spend the night.
There is no easy way to average accommodation. I paid between 10 to 45 Euros per night camping and between 25 - 75 per night in hotels / guest houses. This really does depend on location, time of year, day of the week, facilities and availability based on how desperate the facility was to rent out an empty room
So for a future trip I would use 25 Euros per night for camping and 60 Euros per night for hotel / guest house
You can wild camp in much of Europe if you don't mind not having "facilities"; toilets, showers, electricity etc, there are differing regulations per country so check in advance. Wild camping would certainly reduce costs dramatically. Personally, for the longer trips I undertook, I wanted the facilities, chats with fellow campers (you meet interesting people and conversations without a common spoken language are really fun) and to some degree, the sense of security for my gear within a formal campsite especially if I went wandering for the day.
*** Food
Really tricky to estimate this so I cannot add anything here, it depends on how much you eat and your taste so you're on your own for this one I'm afraid, but I estimate for me 25 Euros per day which may be a little on the light side.
*** Sundries
Aside from other consumables, chain lube, ice-cream etc, these include entry tickets to places of interest that you stop to see, tips for meals, tips for free walking tours etc. Again, all down to personal choice and taste.
*** Example
As an example, for my Norway trip (I cannot find how to format a table in this post so this is the best I can do…
-- FUEL
3.2 litres per 100 Km = 32 litres per 1000 Km
32 litres per 1000 Km * 12 = 384 litres for my 12k trip
384 litres * 2 Euros per litre = 768 Euros
-- CAMPING
45 nights at 25 Euros per night = 1125 Euros
-- HOTELS
7 nights at 60 Euros per night = 420 Euros
-- FOOD
52 days at 25 Euros per day = 1300 Euros
-- TOTAL BASICS
3613 Euros sounds about right for my trip (plus sundries and tolls)
I'm sure there are better ways of estimating and you may want to change the daily values but hope this helps!
Bye for now
Nick
76 - 34
LUGGAGE and SECURITY
I have been asked for my thoughts on luggage and bike security while travelling, so these are my personal thoughts, yours may be different...
Soft v Hard luggage?
- As I mentioned in my previous post,, hard panniers may provide a sense of being more secure, which they may well be, especially from the opportunist. I cannot recommend one over the other, I've used both in the past, and if I were to replace the bike and needed to replace the luggage I think I'd err on hard luggage (minus top box which I've never owned or wanted).
*Hard luggage*
Looks more secure is lockable and can often be removed and placed back and locked securely on the bike easily
*Soft luggage*
Can look flimsy and even if locked, could easily be sliced open and needs securing back in place once unsecured and removed. Once you have the straps / bungees figured out it may only take a few minutes once you establish a routine, but, this could take a while to get fixed in the mind (it did me).
You can buy metal mesh sacks (Pacsafe do various sizes) which look good to enclose your panniers in and attach to the bike, but again a bit more faff.
I used a "Frostfire Moonlock - Adjustable Keyed Cable Lock, 6 Foot", but it is no longer available on Amazon, that I threaded through the bag straps and rack just to make it awkward for anybody to walk off with all my luggage. See CB500X - Solo Norway trip Part 3 - Into Denmark" 2:00 I show briefly how I have secured the bag I put my riding gear in so I could walk around Bremen for the day).
*General thoughts on security*
A few hefty folk could lift my CB500x with all its luggage into the back of a van and be away in moments. So, with that in mind, I do the best I can when travelling.
Where possible on all my trips, I parked the bike next to the tent at night and as out of sight is the norm at hotels, I removed all the luggage and secured the front wheel with a disklock and covered the bike with an "Oxford 2016 Aquatex Waterproof Motorbike Motorcycle Cover (Large)" bike cover which I also secured to the wheels with cheap cable locks. It worked for me! The bike cover is very lightweight, quite robust and compacts quite well, but the waterproof aspect does not last long.
I hope this post provides information for you to consider luggage types and security, they are just my thoughts on the topics
Bye for now
Nick
17 - 2
CB500x ADDITIONS / MODIFICATIONS
I've been asked a few times about the various additions I've made to my CB500X 2022 model which I've answered on an as asked basis, but thought I'd try and capture the items and my thoughts in a post. I hope this helps.
Hepco & Becker Tank bars
- These are designed to protect the top end plastics and tank, I have dropped the bike twice at a standstill and these have done their job, although very slightly scuffed themselves
Rally Raid CB500X 2019-on Engine Guard-RRP 747
- These are designed to protect the engine, cases and oil filter with the skid pan. They do reduce ground clearance marginally but provided piece of mind on rough terrain. The down-side is they use the centre stand pivot point, so if you want a centre stand - useful for lubing the chain and without a separate jack, necessary to change the rear tyre. Luckily I had no tyre issues, as they are tubeless tyres I carried a repair kit so hopefully would not have changed tyre or tube at the side of the road anyway.
Barkbusters BHG-081 Handguard Kit Honda CB500X '19
- Hand and lever protectors and plastic guards were great. Per above, I've dropped the bike twice at a standstill, these protected the levers being damaged, and the plastic guards have protected my hands when riding narrow lanes with protruding twigs and brambles. Worth it in my opinion.
Blesiya 28cm Motorcycle Clip-on Windshield Windscreen Extension Deflector
- Universal screen extender from Amazon, it works well and deflects the air to the top of my helmet rather than mid-visor
SW Motech Footrest Kit
- I fitted these having ridden very few miles on the bike, in reality I did very little "off road" so not sure how useful they are. They seemed comfortable enough to me, would I fit them again if I were to purchase a new bike… no, based on my preferred surface type
R&G Kickstand Shoe-RRP 474
- This little item was very useful, it widens the kickstand surface area, just about essential on grass, especially when wet. And yes, I also carried a puck for wet grass and mud, but it is much easier to place the puck once you are off the bike, I would not have trusted getting off the bike with the standard surface area on many occasions.
Outback Motortek Pannier rack and Rear rack (including exhaust heat shield)
- Luggage is a personal choice, for the soft luggage I used I found these to be great, but would I travel with soft luggage again? Maybe, maybe not. Hard luggage provides a sense of being more secure when leaving the bike out of site (in shops or even sight seeing). So for soft luggage; yes, but you need to weigh up soft or hard yourself.
Lomo dry bag motorcycle waterproof panniers -soft
- If you go the soft luggage route, these bags were cheap and waterproof, if I hadn't been camping and vlogging I would only have needed these panniers. One side of the pair of panniers held my clothing, the other side had food, waterproofs, bike cover and some tools.
***
I will do a separate post ref my thoughts on Soft versus Hard luggage and general security
***
SW-Motech dry bag (60 litres)
- This bag contained all my camping gear (except the tent) so was not full, but was very waterproof and never let me down. Would I need 60 litres on another trip? Unlikely, I could probably get away with 50 or even 40, but empty space just gets rolled up into the bag anyway so no real advantage in replacing it.
Oxford tank bag (need to use rain cover in heavy rain)
- This worked well and held much of my vlogging equipment, it had 3 pouches which were useful and was extendable. After many years of use, the zip was playing up so I replaced it with what I thought was like for like, it wasn't the pouches are completely worthless, only big enough to hold a pen or something. I would not recommend this to anybody.
Rally Raid Billet Multi-Mount for 12mm (1/2") Crossbar - part number RRP 643
- This worked very well for my Garmin Zumo XT GPS device and I'd use the same again if I replaced the bike with another CB500x in the future
Generic twin USB charger mounted on handlebar
- Useful for charging batteries on the go, and I had a lot of them!
Oxford Advanced Hot Grips Wrap
- These grips use velcro to wrap around the existing grips and wire into the bike, the grips can be removed very easily via simple connectors. I did not use these so cannot comment on whether they were any good.
Metzeler Tourance Next tyres
- Worked well on all surfaces I road on, except for deep gravel and I'm not sure any tyre would in that situation, however, I managed to square them off riding through the very efficient but absolutely straight roads I encountered through Finland and Estonia. I'm not sure if they are any better than the standard OEM tyres but they were not available before I set off on my Norway trip.
In case you wondered; I retained the standard gearing which works for me
I hope this post is of use to somebody
Bye for now
Nick
38 - 4
Hi all, I'm now back in the UK having had a fantastic trip on my CB500x starting in the UK and travelling 7500 miles / 12000 kms, mainly camping over a 7 week period through the Netherlands, Germany, Denmark, Sweden, Norway, Finland, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Poland, Germany, Belgium and France. As you may be aware, I took a different approach to releasing videos this trip and decided to edit and publish when I returned home, providing very short glimpses along the way with video "shorts". The first "real" episode will be available Saturday 29th July 2023.
In the meantime, an advert for chatGPT popped up on my laptop lock screen so I asked it to compose a poem about motorcycling from the UK to Norway. This may be a bit cheesy, but just shows where AI is headed.
I'll leave you to read the poem, and just say "bye for now",
Nick
The road ahead is long and winding,
From the UK to North Cape we’re finding,
The wind in our hair and the sun on our face,
We’ll ride through the miles at our own pace.
The journey is long but we’re not alone,
We’ll see sights we’ve never known,
From the fjords to the mountains high,
We’ll ride through the land beneath the sky.
The road will take us far and wide,
Through valleys deep and mountainside,
We’ll see the world in a different light,
As we ride through day and night.
The journey will be tough but we’ll be strong,
As we ride through the land where we belong,
From the UK to North Cape we’ll go,
On our motorcycle trip, we’ll take it slow.
63 - 9
Sorry folks, I uploaded the incorrect version of Episode 36, Day 40... the final day! I am Producing it again and will upload as soon as I can!
Nick
UPDATE - The replacement video is now published, apologies for the delay!!!!
Nick
20 - 14
Hmmm, ref my previous post, only seems to have uploaded one of the images, so here is the other
9 - 11
Hi all, a word of warning with using soft panniers stuffed to the brim. I'm on my big trip round Europe and on day 3, I managed to burn a hole through my exhaust silencer side Lomo pannier on the CB500X 2022 model. I am using Shad rails to keep the panniers away from the rear wheel, but hadn't realised just how hot the silencer got, or the real heat being vented through the emissions. I've not made a habit of checking tail-pipe temperatures but I seem to think "in the olden days" they ran quite free and cool. So, just something to consider. My ordeal starts in Episode 3 of my Biking Travels vlog, but it is yet to be uploaded, hopefully these photos will convince you of the need to check these things frequently whichever combination of bile and soft luggage you may have.
Nick
18 - 12
Welcome folks. I'm Nick in 2022 I started a big solo trip round Europe on my Honda CB500X 2022 model. The trip had to be split into 2 parts, initially travelling South Easterly and returning more centrally over a 6 week period. The 2nd part was postponed until 2023 travelling North, to Nordkapp and the northernmost point in Europe accessible by private wheeled vehicle.
This really is about the journey, camping where I can but I'd not camped since childhood, and never undertaken such a long trip.
The videos are really about my learnings along the way. Taking paper based preparation to reality with the humps and bumps encountered along the way. I included some short "ride-along" sections just to get a sense of the changing scenery and life along the way. It was my first venture into YouTube so please bear as I learned... it is "all about the journey" both physical and psychological, I hope this is conveyed in the videos.
If nothing else, enjoy the scenery!
Nick