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Childish Weeks: 1–14 August in Southern Sweden
by Ecotopia Biketour 2026 16 Jan '26

16 Jan '26

So far around 15 parents have gotten in contact with us and expressed interest in joining the Childish Weeks with their 1–3 children each. This is much more interest that we have expected! We are excited to see how this experiment will turn out! When wefirst announced <https://www.ecotopiabiketour.net/2025/announcing-the-ecotopia-childish-weeks>the Childish Weeks, we did not realize some of the differences in the needs of people with very young children and with older children. In particular, older children are restricted by school holidays, and their dates vary greatly across Europe. We found out that the most overlap is in the first half of August, which also matches with the availability of the parents who have expressed interest so far. This means that the Childish Weeks have to happen in the middle of the tour. Combined with the fact that we often start in the best reachable place and end in the least reachable place, this creates a challenge, as the Childish Weeks also need to be well reachable. This year in particular, one important topic will be to visit Sápmi (the region in Northern Europe inhabited by the Sámi people and under occupation of Norway, Sweden, Finland and Russia), which is quite far north and thus difficult to combine with being in the south in the middle of the tour. As a compromise, we have decided to/start/the tour in early June in Sápmi, and to possibly use other means of travel such as trains to get to the south faster. Since the group will probably be quite small at the start, we might organize the first segment of the route as a pre-tour with less equipment, and possibly visiting some remote places without bikes by hitch-hiking or public transportation. An additional challenge for the Childish Weeks in this year’s region is that taking trains with bicycles seems to be a real challenge. For people with children, taking long-distance buses is usually not an option, as it is difficult for children to sit still for many hours, and for smaller children, bringing a car seat would be required, which would add to the complexity of the journey. This means that trains and ferries will be the main means of transportation for people with children to reach the tour. In Sweden, long-distance trains operated by the national railway company SJ do not accept bikes, only most (but not all) regional trains take them. As an example, taking regional trains from Malmö to Stockholm requires 5 changes, takes more than 7 hours (if all connections are reached, with is unlikely with bicycles, trailers and children), requires looking up whether the 6 different train companies on the way accept bicycles and otherwise looking for alternatives, and looking up the prices and buying 6 different tickets from those different companies. This would already be a hassle with just a bicycle and luggage, but with a bicycle, luggage, a trailer or children’s bikes and one or more children, it becomes an impossible challenge that few people would be willing to take. We have found out that Skåne, the southernmost region of Sweden, would be the most suitable place for the Childish Weeks, as it is densely populated, meaning there is a lot of infrastructure, and cycling and taking bicycles on the train is the most common there. We are aiming to have the Childish Weeks in Skåne and follow a train line during the weeks so that it is easy for people to skip parts of the way by train. But the exact region will only be decided once the planning of the route progresses. It could also happen a bit north of Skåne but still easily reachable by train, or somewhere that can at least be easily reached by ferry from the European mainland (for example Oslo). But the dates are now fixed to the 1st until the 14th of August. You can already reserve this spot your calendars if you are planning to join the Childish Weeks. You are of course welcome to join the tour with children also before and after the Childish Weeks, but during those 2 weeks we will put a special focus on the needs of children and other children are guaranteed to be there. We would like to emphasize that the Childish Weeks are meant for children/of all ages/. There will be both babies who travel in trailers or on bike seats, as well as older children who can already cycle themselves. If you would like to join the Childish Weeks, pleasecontact us <https://www.ecotopiabiketour.net/about/contact/contact-form>. We are putting the parents/caregivers in contact with each other to exchange needs and experiences and plan the travels together. All information will also be added to theChildish Weeks <https://www.ecotopiabiketour.net/2025-2/childish-weeks-2025>page, and updates will be posted here on the blog.

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Announcing the Ecotopia Childish Weeks
by Ecotopia Biketour 2026 01 Dec '25

01 Dec '25

For many years we were wondering what is the reason that people with children are very rarely joining Ecotopia Biketour, while on other biketours this seems to be different. Now some of us have become parents ourselves, and it starts to seem that the biggest reason why there are no children on the Biketour is that there are no children on the Biketour. Biketouring with children requires additional effort, preparation, skills and confidence, and in addition to managing the daily life on the tour itself, it is particularly challenging to get the right equipment to carry both children/and/luggage on the bike, and to get all of that to and from the tour using public transportation. We are a few experienced Ecotopians who want to join the tour next summer with our children. To support each other on the way there and back, to share equipment along the way, and for the children to have someone to play with, we are trying to all join at the same time. For this we are announcing the*Ecotopia Childish Weeks*. For 1–2 weeks, Ecotopia Biketour will put a special focus on the needs of children and their caregivers. Daily distances will be shorter and more flexible, the route will have vital infrastructure (shops, train stations) along the way, and skill-sharing will happen both during the preparation and on the tour to make sure that the group is aware of the specific needs that children and their caregivers have and that people joining with children feel confident to prepare well for their trip. The Childish Weeks aim to make the tour/inclusive/for people joining with children,/not exclusive/for people joining without children. Also, children are still welcome on all other parts of the tour, and the Childish Weeks can be an opportunity for children and their caregivers to slowly get used to this way of travelling and then staying on the tour when it returns to its regular pace. The Childish Weeks will probably happen some time between middle of June and middle of July in southern Sweden, Denmark, and/or Northern Germany. We want to decide the exact dates within the next 4 weeks to make joining easier for people who need to plan their summer far in advance. For this reason, if you are considering joining us next summer with children, pleasecontact us <https://www.ecotopiabiketour.net/about/contact/contact-form>now. We are planning to create a group chat where we decide the most fitting dates now and will later plan our travels together and exchange helpful knowledge. Most of us do not have experience biketouring with children yet and we all have doubts and insecurities about it. To encourage and empower each other, we plan to keep in touch throughout the year, share useful knowledge on our blog, and even organize some local test tours to gain some experience.

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ECOTOPIA 2025
by 2025＠ecotopiabiketour.net 17 Jun '25

17 Jun '25

Dear Ecotopians, In case you've missed it we've finally posted the route of this years tour and opened the registration form. You can see it on the blog of the website. This years organizing has been a bit messy and we're sorry for the possible confusions that happened and might still happen. This year well have a slow start and will be cycling with SunRide System, a fellow bike tour of street musicians and performers. The tour begins in western switzerland. Then we'll be driving through Northern France towards Bretagne visiting all kinds of exciting projects on our way. In Normandie we'll be having a little festival of Ecotopia on our way. Music, skillshares, fun and whatever we'll create together! The tour will end in belgium, where we'll avoid wildcamping and be hosted more in rural settings before the final destination at Brussels Find the registration form and other useful info here: https://www.ecotopiabiketour.net/2025/registrations-are-open Hope to see you soon!

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Knödel the dog is looking for a new human
by Candid Dauth 02 Jun '25

02 Jun '25

Hello, Quite a few of you have met Knödel the dog. Knödel (German for “dumpling”) was found on the Biketour in 2014 in Bulgaria when he was just 2 weeks old. He and his sister had been left to die next to a dumpster. Some Biketour participants picked them up and found local families to take both of them. However, Knödel somehow escaped and decided to come back to us, so he travelled with us around the Balkan and eventually came to live with me in Berlin. In the following years he kept joining the Biketour together with me and has probably spent around a year of his life on the Biketour in total. If you joined in those years, you may remember him for his playfulness when he was younger or for his various efforts to defend his trailer when he was older. He has lived with me for almost 11 years now, but my life situation has changed a lot recently and unfortunately I do not see a way to keep taking care of him much longer. I have recently become a parent and am expecting a second child in a few months. As my child is growing up and becoming more mobile, it has become apparent that it is not safe for a small child to live in the same household as Knödel. In addition, my capacity to care for him well has decreased, and this will only get worse when the second child is born. Because of this, I am looking for a new permanent caregiver for Knödel. While Knödel is a very lovely dog, he has some character traits that make him incompatible with many living situations. Because of this, I am sending a very detailed description of his quirks and needs here, so that if you are considering taking care of a dog at all, you can make a first judgement whether Knödel could fit into your life. I have also attached some photos so that you can get a first impression. Knödel is a medium-sized dog (15 kg) and a mix of unknown breeds. For his size, he has a quite strong body. He is able to climb very steep rocks and even ladders, and when he falls on the way down he doesn’t seem to mind at all. He is now 11 years old and is starting to get old, but he is still fit as ever. He cannot run very fast or very long, but he has practically unlimited endurance when it comes to walks or hikes. He has never been sick. I would expect him to live another 3–5 years. Because he grew up being carried a box on a bicycle, he is very patient and likes to stay in small boxes. He loves travelling to new places by bicycle, train or car. On the train, he likes to sleep in a box under the seat, so he can travel for free as luggage. Even very long trips are no problem for him, and other passengers often don’t even notice that he’s there. He is very resilient to noise, even heavy traffic or fireworks don’t bother him. However, there have been some constellations where he barks when left home alone, in particular when he can hear someone entering the building, but he cannot get there to greet them. Other than that, he has no problem being home alone for longer periods. He is very social and affectionate with humans. When you show love to him, he shows it back, sometimes in a quite dramatic way. If you don’t interact with him, he leaves you alone. Because he grew up in a bigger group of people, he has no fear of large crowds at all and easily trusts anyone who is nice to him. However, since he was about 1 year old he has had a tendency to defend his place, his food and sometimes random items that he considers his, such as sticks or toys. The range of ways in which he defends these items can reach from just growling to serious bites. This never happens while on the move, but it can start to happen as soon as you settle down for a few minutes in one place. It particularly happens in places and with items that he is familiar with, such as his sleeping place at home and the box or bicycle trailer that he travels in. He is more likely to attack smaller beings such as children. It is unsafe to have him in the vicinity of children, except on a walk when constantly moving. When stationary around adults, he needs to wear a muzzle, and he needs to rest in a place where people are not walking by directly in front of him. If he ever must be left alone outside a shop, he has to wear a muzzle and needs to be put in a corner where people are unlikely to walk by. His attacks are clearly a result of fear, not aggression. They can happen completely suddenly and unexpectedly, particularly for people who are not experienced in reading the body language of dogs. He is less likely to attack when is basic needs are fulfilled. Dog trainers who have experience in making scared dogs feel more safe have usually also had success making his attacks less likely, but I don’t think it is possible to achieve complete safety. Importantly though, he never attacks adults that he knows, trusts and respects, so with his main caregivers, no safety measures need to be taken. He does not seem to defend his caregivers. On the opposite, he has always treated people very close to me, such as intimate partners, relatives and close friends, as if they were his caregivers, even when meeting them for the first time. Regarding other dogs, he is very sociable and can adapt very well to the whole spectrum of personalities from aggressive to anxious. For anxious dogs, his persistence can sometimes feel exhausting, but so far he has managed to convince any dog to play after a few minutes. The fact that he is castrated might be a contributing factor that other dogs, including street dogs, have never attacked him. He defends his place and food from other dogs in the same way as he does from other humans, but because dogs know how to react this has never resulted in an actual bite. It might not be the best for him to share a household with an anxious dog, as he would defend all the comfortable places and the food, which would really restrict the other dog. As far as I can tell, he doesn’t seem to have a hunting instinct, although he does have a strong desire to play, so when an animal runs away he likes to run after it. However, he is exceptionally reactive to being asked to do or not do something using words, so he will stop chasing if you ask him to. Because of this, it is no problem walking him without a leash, even when there is traffic. To give you a rough idea what financial effort is to be expected: He has a Greek passport and a microchip, and all the usual vaccinations are up to date, including a blood test for Rabies antibodies that stays valid as long as you renew the rabies vaccination every 3 years. This makes it legal to travel abroad, including non-EU countries. To keep the right to travel abroad, you need to have him vaccinated every 3 years, which costs 20–60 € depending on the country. The recommended but optional vaccinations would cost the same but every year. Regarding food, he is not very picky and could live off the cheapest dog food for 5–10 € a month, although he surely prefers a bit more quality for 10–20 € a month. He does not like raw food like dumpster-dived raw meat, but cooked foods like bread and sausages work. In Berlin, you would legally be required to have a liability insurance (in case he causes damage, around 5 € a month) and pay a luxury tax (10 € a month), although this is rarely checked. This might be similar in some other places. So far there have been no vet costs other than the vaccinations, although I don’t know if this will change as he gets older. Considering his specific personality and needs, I would say that his future caregiver must have some dog experience, in particular being able to read the body language of dogs. Living in a community is only possible if everyone there is experienced or at least quite tolerant with dogs, and/or if he has a personal space where there is not much contact with people. A nomadic lifestyle is possible but challenging (because he likes small boxes, a foldable travel box can make him feel at home anywhere, but it needs to be placed where people don’t pass directly in front of it). You must consider that because of his specific personality, he is not a dog that you can just ask any random friend or relative to take care of while you are travelling. This means that if you are travelling frequently, it would only be compatible if either your style of travelling allows always taking him with you, or you have some specific people who have the commitment and ability to take care of him while you are away. Be aware that most long-distance buses and most paid accommodation does not allow dogs. If your style of travelling is mostly by foot, bicycle, car or train (hitchhiking also works) and you sleep in a tent, a car or in communities or at friends’ houses where you can find a secluded sleeping place for him, it could work out. If you need to leave home for work, even for many hours a day, it should be no problem, as long as he cannot hear people entering the building and barking dogs from his sleeping place, or your neighbours/housemates don’t mind if he barks. Taking him with you to work is only possible if you can find a safe corner for him there and there are no children around. If you can imagine becoming Knödel’s new caregiver, I would be very glad to hear from you. I’m imagining that as a first step, we would have a call and/or meet to see how you get along with Knödel and see whether he fits into your living situation. Greetings, Candid

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Anyone around Heidelberg to pick up a trailer in the next days?
by Ecotopia Biketour 2025 12 May '25

12 May '25

Dear Biketour community, We are in the process of getting a new trailer, and we found a really good deal for a used one. The trailer is close to the train station of Oftersheim (not far from Heidelberg). It needs to be picked up in the next days, the sooner the better, as there is already another buyer who has expressed interest. Is anyone staying around there and could pick it up in the next days? Happy cycling, the Ecotopia Biketour preparation group

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Ecotopia Winter Meeting is happening!
by Ecotopia Biketour 2025 27 Dec '24

27 Dec '24

hello everyone, missed us? ---- some people have started to form an orga for ecotopia 2025. wanna be part of it? send an e-mail to info(a)ecotopiabiketour.net ---- next year we'll go to northern france! and possibly some surrounding regions/countries. ---- there will be a winter meeting in vienna on the second weekend of january. please come if you want to do orga work! please only come if you know you have some capacities for orga work! ---- Thursday 09. and morning of Friday 10. will be some time for arriving, hanging out, catching up ---- 10.-12. will be days mostly commited to orga work special focus will be on: - re-evaluation of last year, especially internal conflicts + learnings from this - reflecting on ebt being a very white group & orga + a workshop on antiracism within our group - how to incorporate antiracism into ebt 2025 as a core focus - starting to plan the tour ---- the 13th will be for some more hanging out (if you have the time) and leaving. by 14th everyone should have left or made other plans with our hosts (write us about it!) ---- if you wanna come send and e-mail including your day and time of arrival. also tell us if you want to get your travel refunded! we'll send you the adress & instructions about the space then. ️ ---- see you soon!

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Re: Flyers & Posters
by Alexandre 04 Jun '24

04 Jun '24

Nice job!!! :) On Tue, Jun 4, 2024 at 10:41 AM <2024(a)ecotopiabiketour.net> wrote: > dear bikeborgs and ecotopians! > > flyers and posters are now ready to print. if you want to print and > distribute some in your circles or maybe just to hang a poster in your > room - feel free to do so. any distribution is very welcome! the files > for the flyers are attached, another mail with the posters will follow. > > big thanks to jonas goonface (who is an artist that you can find online > too) for the beautiful poster designs! > and i did the flyer - i apologize for bad editing skills when we filled > in the speech bubbles for the translated versions. > > these are the translations that we have: english, finnish, estonian, > latvian (only via online translator), lithuanian, polish, russian, > belarussian, ukranian, french, german, italian. > > if you do lay out the finnish version of the flyer somewhere, please > also print the bypaper ("FLYER_BYPAPER_SÁMI") and put it next to the > pile. sadly, we didn't manage to get a sámi translation but we still > want to warmly welcome all sámi people who would like to join the tour. > > also sadly we failed to get a proper latvian translation - we reached > out to the community but not to our projects in latvia - what a mess-up! > so the one we're sending out now has been translated with an online > translator. do let us know if there is something seriously wrong or > weird about it. ^^ > > all the best, > mint (he/they) and the rest of the > orga_______________________________________________ > Biketour mailing list -- biketour(a)eyfa.org > To unsubscribe send an email to biketour-leave(a)eyfa.org >

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Registration now open!
by 2024＠ecotopiabiketour.net 02 Jun '24

02 Jun '24

Hi everyone! we had a problem with the registration form, some of you might have noticed. now it has been fixed and the registration is working and open! so please do register if you're planning to come to the tour. :) it's not a must to register, but it helps a lot with organising, especially in communication with our hosting projects. you can register almost anonymously, put a name that you want and leave any field free that you don't want to fill in, or don't know yet what to put. the only thing that is needed is a working e-mail and your consent to having read the guidelines. there is also more detailed info online now! check out the "projects/events", "route" "QINTAW start 2024" and "how to get there" pages on our website under "2024". we are still looking for a host in vilnius! let us know if you know something. see you in the summer!

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challenging white ecotopia!
by 2024＠ecotopiabiketour.net 14 Mar '24

14 Mar '24

dear ecotopians - especially dear black, brown, indigenous, asian and migrantized ecotopians, ---- for a long time the ecotopia biketour has been quite the white environment and it mostly is that way still. this doesn't mean that no BBIPoC or migrantized people have joined ecotopia in the past or have been/are part of the tour and orga, of course. but they have usually been a minority or even just a single person. some of our PoC friends feebacked that they were hesitant to join or didn't come to the biketour because our group was so white. we would like to acknowledge, challenge and change that. ---- there are many reasons for this exclusion, most of which have to do with structural and individual/casual racism. it also has to do with the history of cycling and climate activist communities in the past and today. it also has to do with how we are organized and how difficult it can be to make a community that is constantly changing places, people and structures into any kind of a safer space. ---- but we are sure there are ways to open up more space, as we know there are just as many enthused cyclists in BBIPoC and migrantized communities as there are in white ones. we also draw hope and motivation from seeing how tools like the QINTAW start have changed the biketour structures. ---- so there are some steps we want to take to make the tour more welcoming and safe to you as a person and less dominated by white voices overall. we already have a few concrete ideas that we will talk about more and hopefully put into action during the ecotopia orga month and some others we still need to work on and discuss more. ---- one thing that we want to invite you to right now is to make your voice be heard by the broader ecotopian community. throughout the next months leading up to ecotopia biketour 2024 we would like to have more regular blogposts and we want a big portion of them to adress and challenge ecotopias whiteness. some of these posts will be written by us, reflecting on our values and structures and educating each other about racism and critical whiteness. ---- for other posts we invite you to write us and share your perspectives in your own voice. you can write about anything you want. feelings like anger, frustration, exhaustion, fear and sadness are just as welcome as joy, love and jokes. you can tell us about what keeps/kept you from joining the biketour, any good, bad or mixed experiences you had while on ecotopia or in other travelling and bike communities, anything you want white people to finally understand or anything you would like to tell your communiti(es) about cycling and being with a group like ecotopia. of course, you don't have to write about any of this or anything related to racism at all. some of us are motivated to work on more educative and explanatory blogposts and it's not your responsibility to make ecotopia a less racist or less white space. so write about anything you want! any format you choose is welcome, be it a poem or a drawing or a shortstory or a long essay or whatever else you choose to express yourself. ---- you can send your contribution to info(a)ecotopiabiketour.net and put "suggested blogpost" into the subject of the email, so we know where to put it. ---- let's start some change - careful with each other, dangerous together!

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Ecotopia?? Tell us what you think about our name
by . 26 Feb '24

26 Feb '24

Hello! Ecotopia?? One of the topics that came up during the meeting in December 2023 was about the name of the biketour. More specifically, if we want to change it. The name has a lot of history – it was first used as a name of a bus tour and later gathering from many years ago, starting in 1986, then a biketour was attached to the gathering in 1990, and then the gathering stopped happening in 2008, and since then there is just the biketour! This isn’t the first time we have discussed the idea of changing the name. It has already come up a few times in meetings over the last years, but the decision to change it was never made. When we discussed the idea in the last meeting, we came to conclusion that the organisation group is too small to make this decision and we want to ask more people what they think. The main reason we discussed, as a reason to change the name, is to have something that reflects more of the values that we try to practice. Sustainability and the environmentalist approach are still main points on our agenda, however some felt like the name “Ecotopia” can give the impression that we are only that. And since many eco-/sustainability-/climate movements in Europe are very white, ableist and cis/heteronormative, we worry that the name “Ecotopia Biketour” paints that same image instead of the intersectional approach that we want to have. The biketour has changed a lot over the years and has a wider focus than just environmental issues. On the other hand, we are quite widely known under the name Ecotopia, we have lots of connections and it’s easier for us to receive funding, while we have this long history. As a small group we couldn’t reach any decisions or concrete ideas, so we want to ask all previous participants, current participants, hosts, friends and community, what you all think. Below is a link to a poll where we want to hear from you what you think. Here is the poll <https://cryptpad.fr/form/#/2/form/view/7LwFw7T5WvS620tZMpnY22UcjIk2L4SvxKIv…> https://cryptpad.fr/form/#/2/form/view/7LwFw7T5WvS620tZMpnY22UcjIk2L4SvxKIv…

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