"What made you decide to do that?"

[Clare]

I was telling a colleague about our journey across the USA, NZ, Aus and Japan at work today; then I told her about our plans for another tour, probably USA, Japan, S.E. Asia, China, Central Asia and Europe. Her response was to look completely bemused and then say "What made you decide to do that?"

I have to admit I was flummoxed, nothing made me decide anything, I just wanted to do it and so did Vernon. In the end I told her I was sorry but I couldn't give her an answer.

[Vernon]

The voices in my head told me to do it! 

[alan]

Anyone not interested in cycling simply does not understand the attraction:but an inability on my part to explain it does nothing to enlighten the disbelievers.

[Polar Bear]

When she's next telling you about her package trip to Costa del Englando ask her the same question.   

[Clare]

She also asked me if Vern minded me working on Sundays    .

I told her it was none of his business.


 

[Raph]

When people ask me that kind of thing I get a bit prone to treating them like the idiots they're pretending to be. "Couldn't you have gone by car?" - honestly what a numpty question but i get it quite often. I end up with the attitude "do it and find out for yourself cos you sure ain't gonna understand from me trying to explain it".

Going up mountains is a similar thing - "can't you sit in the hotel and just look at the mountains rather than trek up them with a tent?"

I end up regarding even dear friends as idiots when that kind of stuff comes out. What's the point of getting out of your armchair at all for that matter? If life's about getting around and experiencing things then i don't get what it is that someone wouldn't get about you going round the world experiencing some.

She also asked me if Vern minded me working on Sundays    .

I told her it was none of his business.


 

Not being rude about yer mate but I think that goes with the territory.

[Julian]

There's one person at work who wasn't quite sure why I'd want to cycle down a lump of America for fun.  She started with "gosh, that sounds like quite hard work" and moved on to "couldn't you hire a car?" and "will you get to relax though?"

I told her (as a joke) that obviously what we'd wanted to do was spend a couple of weeks in Tenerife drinking and shagging, but when we tried to book, the beaches were full.

But she didn't get that it was meant as a joke, and said quite seriously "I didn't know beaches could get full..."

[Clare]

 


I've given up trying to be witty to people about this kind of stuff, I did once try telling somebody that we would have driven a car around the world but that we weren't allowed to take it into France, so couldn't start the journey. Unfortunately they thought I was being serious and proceeded to tell everybody who would listen how dumb I was, it took a while to clear up the ensuing mental mess.

 

[Hummers]

I was telling a colleague about our journey across the USA, NZ, Aus and Japan at work today; then I told her about our plans for another tour, probably USA, Japan, S.E. Asia, China, Central Asia and Europe. Her response was to look completely bemused and then say "What made you decide to do that?"

There is no reasoning with someone who 'doesn't get' something, anything, like that sort of tour.

Touring is like nothing else: you have half an idea what to expect but the stories you tell later will be about the things you didn't expect - good and bad. The memories will be about the vistas that took your breath away, the people you never throught you'd meet, the events that pushed you to your limits and the moments you never wanted to end.

That'll be why touring is so compulsive.

H

[Clare]

There is no reasoning with someone who 'doesn't get' something, anything, like that sort of tour.

Touring is like nothing else: you have half an idea what to expect but the stories you tell later will be about the things you didn't expect - good and bad. The memories will be about the vistas that took your breath away, the people you never throught you'd meet, the events that pushed you to your limits and the moments you never wanted to end.

That'll be why touring is so compulsive.

H

That is so true, even now we'll see a photo come up as a screen saver and start an hour long discussion of "Oooh, do you remember when..."

[Raph]

"I've given up trying to be witty to people about this kind of stuff" - same here. I usually end up insulting people - it's less tedious than going away leaving them thinking the usual "you're mad you are!". I say - yeah I suppose it would be "hard work" for you, being the unfit weakling tub of blubber that you are... I work on the notion that it's only unthinkable for normal mortals cos they're pathetic. The fact that I'm by no means a greek god myself kind of introduces a bit of mystery into the matter, and has on a few occasions got people into trekking or cycling just out of curiosity and once they've done it once they never slag it off again - even if they don't get into it. It either defeats them so badly their soul is scarred for ever, or they embrace it and realize that the human body is actually strangely capable of propelling itself - and was indeed designed to.

My other half was exactly one of those "you're mad you are" types when I first met her - strange that we got together really, but on her first ever ride that I persuaded her on she had an over-the-handlebars incident, cracked her shoulder, was off cello playing for a month... and was hooked on cycling and has been into it ever since. In one ride she went from not understanding why a person would ride a couple of miles to a pub to riding 150 mile stints and seeing them as exhilarating, despite the first ever ride involving a crash - now that... is a turn-on! Sorry, didn't mean to eulogize about my bint on here, but just pointing out that a person can "see the light".

[Raph]

Sorry, me again - it's a topic close to my heart! Another phenomenon is people who think you're doing it to prove something - e.g. one summer we tried to do the Pyrenees end-to-end, but it rained every single day for a month - we'd set aside six weeks but after four we'd only done a third of the distance, mostly sloshing about day after day in mud in the mist - and the weather didn't seem to be letting up so we came home and did rides for the last two weeks. Several mates said "bad luck, shame you didn't make it", which I found strange - to me it was a shame we went all the way to Pyrenees to do a trek that might as well have been an average Welsh summer. The "achievement" part of it is the only bit you can convey to people that don't understand - they think you're putting yourself through hell for some kind of proof of how macho you can be, not realizing what a superb laugh it can be.

There's also a slightly "stamp-collecting" mentality about it - I've done nearly all of the GR10 in the Pyrenees, but the outer ends are simply boring - I've done the Biarritz end and that was like Wales except not as nice, and on that basis I've never bothered with the Perpignan end of it - it's just endlessly flat and boring. The general perception is that if you haven't done "the whole thing" - like collecting a whole set of stickers from yer cornflake packets, then somehow it's worthless. Trying to tell someone that the good bits are in the middle is a waste of time. They just want to hear statistics - whereas the most impressive statistics are usually on the most boring bits - e.g. I rode back from Paris in a day - it wasn't actually a particularly interesting ride, but non-cycling mates can relate to that.

I'll stop now!

[Raph]

I have to admit I was flummoxed, nothing made me decide anything, I just wanted to do it and so did Vernon. In the end I told her I was sorry but I couldn't give her an answer.

Ask her whether she breathes, eats, or whether she's heard of "fun".

Strangely enough, apart from the very simple fact that I like the experience of getting about on a bike or on foot with a rucksack, as an atheist I think of really big treks as a sort of confrontation against futility - e.g. there isn't a meaning of life unless you make one up yourself, and boy when you do, there really is a meaning of life but it can't necessarily be conveyed in a few words to someone who isn't on that wavelength - and yet I can understand a religious person doing it as a sort of personal pilgrimage. Ultimately the two are probably quite similar in a way. Sorry, I promised to shut up...

Anyway, that outburst might make pseud's corner ya never know. 

[Tom B]

I refer the OP to her inspiring post of Dec 31st last:

At some point somebody will ask what my resolutions are and I will reply that I intend to be be less understanding and more direct in my responses to idiots.

[Clare]

Ah, good point Tom 


At least I didn't hit her   


Thing is I do know why I do it, it's because it's fun and the best way there is to see the world, the problem is conveying that to somebody who thinks it will be a huge chore. I'll leave them our blog address, a couple of months of that should bore them into submission  .

[Clare]

Actually I think Raph has hit the nail on the head with his posts, there are many reasons why anybody does this kind of thing; all of them valid and most of them personal.

 

[LEE]

I was telling a colleague about our journey across the USA, NZ, Aus and Japan at work today; then I told her about our plans for another tour, probably USA, Japan, S.E. Asia, China, Central Asia and Europe. Her response was to look completely bemused and then say "What made you decide to do that?"

I have to admit I was flummoxed, nothing made me decide anything, I just wanted to do it and so did Vernon. In the end I told her I was sorry but I couldn't give her an answer.

I guess she's never been to Portsmouth then.

[Andrew Br]

Sorry, didn't mean to eulogize about my bint on here

And they say romance is dead..............

[Raph]

Sorry, didn't mean to eulogize about my bint on here

And they say romance is dead..............

Yeah well you see, that's romance for me - I'm not generally attracted to the usual vacuous hairspray advert that thinks him/herself superior cos they wouldn't be seen dead on two wheels or in hefty boots - as a teenager I remember I once fancied this girl who blabbed on about how she'd been to Africa on photography trips etc... the ultimate independant woman, feminist (note this is 30 years ago) therefore interesting but not extreme enough to be a bore (or irrelevant to a horny teenage boy!)... anyway, she said she'd done some cycling, so as you can imagine I was squirming with desire. So I lent her a bike, we were supposedly going swimming...

This is the awful bit, I can hardly bear to recall it...

She said "oh no, it's got those funny handlebars" (drops) - my heart started to sink, and then she asked "what are those clip things on the pedals?"... eventually - "I can't ride this, I'll fall off" - and as my heart hit the bottom she said "can we take the bus?". From that point onwards I soooooo didn't fancy her, I personally despised every single molecule she was made of.

Mates saw pics of her and told me "she's pretty - Raph you're an idiot" - I thought they were the idiots. I said get a copy of Cosmo or whatever it is and gawp at some bimbos in there, and when you're bored with that, get off with a bird with some GUTS.

Oh dear I've done it again... but I don't think that was entirely off-topic, was it?



Clare - have a good time in "USA, Japan, S.E. Asia, China, Central Asia and Europe" - and I'm glad yer fella's up for it too! Send your colleague lots of postcards! 

[Rich753]

I usually just shrug and go "yeah, why not" with a smile.

They already think I'm a bit daft, so no real harm done. And if they do respond with "becos' it's such hard work" or somesuch then you can say "oooh, have you ever tried it? you might really like it" and then(s)he is on the defensive, having to justify why they have a view on something they don't know about . Games, eh?

Better than "cos I wanted to see where the world ended", people think you're being sarcastic if you say that.

[Raph]

I usually just shrug and go "yeah, why not" with a smile.

They already think I'm a bit daft, so no real harm done. And if they do respond with "becos' it's such hard work" or somesuch then you can say "oooh, have you ever tried it? you might really like it" and then(s)he is on the defensive, having to justify why they have a view on something they don't know about . Games, eh?

Better than "cos I wanted to see where the world ended", people think you're being sarcastic if you say that.

Well, you are being a bit sarcastic, and understandably so. Nobody is quite as daft as the one that sits on the sofa in front of the telly every single night because somehow they think it isn't "daft". I know a few people like that, and some of them are perfectly nice, just there's a strange mechanism in their ego that seems to tell them that anyone with an interest or a passion is a "nerd" - some of them have passions and interests of their own but somehow that doesn't come into it. It only bugs me when it's someone I like or care about, the rest of the time like Rich I just shrug it off - after all, too many of us going up mountains and it would get crowded so really I should shut up and keep the secret to myself.

[David Martin]

It only bugs me when it's someone I like or care about, the rest of the time like Rich I just shrug it off - after all, too many of us going up mountains and it would get crowded so really I should shut up and keep the secret to myself.

There is a really great route from Pen-y-Pass up Snowdon that is pretty, quiet and secluded, even on a summer bank holiday. Not many people know it. I like it that way.

Being fit and riding a cycle tour is an experience money can't buy. It is intensely personal, difficult to express and immensely fulfilling. And very hard to share with someone else.

[Tourist Tony]

It only bugs me when it's someone I like or care about, the rest of the time like Rich I just shrug it off - after all, too many of us going up mountains and it would get crowded so really I should shut up and keep the secret to myself.

There is a really great route from Pen-y-Pass up Snowdon that is pretty, quiet and secluded, even on a summer bank holiday. Not many people know it. I like it that way.

Being fit and riding a cycle tour is an experience money can't buy. It is intensely personal, difficult to express and immensely fulfilling. And very hard to share with someone else.

By Clogwyn y Person?

Hummers summed it up for me earlier, but the question that I suffer least gladly is "You doin' it fer charidee?"
Those who tour do it for a mass of different reasons, but it does boil down to a core of commonality.
I am on my own.
REALLY on my own, sometimes.
The pace I travel at is a human speed, and I am in the world not passing it by.
I can spend several hours just putting silly thoughts into context.
I meet people. I spent this morning exchanging e-mails with a Victorian friend I met touring, who lost 21 neighbours in the fires there.
These people are often amazingly kind and generous, perhaps because a cyclist is perceptibly human.
If I do 1,000 miles, my colleagues gasp. That 1,000 is simply a series of days getting up and settling into a comfortable routine. As would be 2,000, or 20,000. You learn to take days as they come.

Other folk will have other reasons, but those who have stretched themselves just a little along the road will understand.

[Raph]

I am on my own.
REALLY on my own, sometimes.

and

The pace I travel at is a human speed, and I am in the world not passing it by.

Those two things are the main ones for me. If I knew what Zen was I'd probably mention it now.

[Tourist Tony]

Which is why my wallpaper (and Gordy knows ths one) is a stretch of road in Australia I captioned "zen road"
We know why we do it. Does it matter if others don't? My ex-wife calls it "being amazing"
It isn't. We are just doing what people have always done, but forgotten they could.