Hi everyone!
In April 2025 my partner and I will be setting off for a 3 month cycle tour from London to Athens.
We are looking to take our time and really enjoy the ride, stopping off here and there for a few days at a time. If we do an average of 50km a day then we should make it within 3 months. A direct route is of less concern to us if it means being able to cycle through beautiful scenery and stop off at memorable places.
Here's the gist of the route so far:
- London to Dover, taking the ferry to Calais
- Calais to Ghent
- Head south through Belgium, Luxembourg, The Ardennes and get to Strasbourg
- Skirt Switzerland via Lake Konstanz and pass through Liechtenstein (bit of a geography geek so like to tick off the tiny states!)
- Link up with the Via Claudia Augusta to cross the Alps into Italy
- Head East from Bolzano, entering Slovenia via the North West
- Down to Ljubljana via Bled
From Ljubljana I'm less sure of any routes to follow down through the Balkans. I've heard the Eurovelo8 down the Croatian coast can be very busy and full of traffic. I'm wondering if staying further inland and going to Mostar in Bosnia and then taking the Circo Trail to Dubrovnik.
We'd like to go through Montenegro, Albania and then Northern Macedonia before entering Greece and following the eastern coast down to Athens.
Here's a link to a high level route I'd put together with a few of the above waypoints.
If anyone has any experience of doing this sort of routes then I'd love to hear your experiences. Also if anyone has any knowledge of routes along the way (similar to the Circo in Bosnia or the Via Claudia Augusta) it would be great if you could share them. Thanks!
by GeographyJoe