Me and my partner are planning on bikepacking around Europe from mid August to the first week of October, flying in and out of Paris hoping to get some logistics beta.
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Her parents live near Bordeaux and we are planning to catch the train there from Paris, is this trip going to be easier with the bikes still boxed or assemble them and take them on-board?
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Considering buying the Eurorail 15 day pass but from what I've read it can be a bit of a nightmare regarding bikes on trains, especially since it is going to be peak holiday season while we are there. It's about 500 euros which is a significant expense if it won't actually take us to the destinations we want, or be so inefficient that we could ride the route in a comparable time.
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If the rail pass is a good idea, we would probably head to the Pyrenees, across the south of France to the alps, through switzerland, through the dolomites and Slovenia and down the med coast to Greece before catching the train all the way back to Paris. Thoughts?
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If it's not a good idea we would probably go Pyrenees, alps through to Austria and cycle back to Paris via Germany. Thoughts?
Any advice around must do routes are appreciated, we are taking gravel bikes and prefer to camp 90% of the time. I've never been to Europe but we are comfortable covering 100-200km/day with big elevations and would prefer to do big days followed by a rest day or 2 in nice areas. Is chatgpt effective at planning trips like this?
Pic of bikes for attention 🚵♂️
by spagyetilegs