BIG NEWS – EXPEDITION CHANGES!
Let’s get to the point – I won’t be swimpacking 630KM of the river Elbe. I don’t want to go on an expedition that would only explore 57,8% of this river’s full story. I wouldn’t pick out the best parts in ANY creature that I love, ignoring all the other quirks and features they have just because it doesn’t fit my schedule.
And I won’t do it with this river, either. I want to be able to tell the full tale: from spring to delta, from start to finish.
So here’s the deal:
I will go on a 1090KM #bikerafting expedition of the WHOLE river starting on the 15th of July in the “Giant Mountains” of the Czech Republic and ending on the 7th of August in the river’s delta around Cuxhaven.
And if you’ve never heard of the term “bikerafting” before:
It’s when you take a packraft (an incredibly light-weight, portable, inflatable boat that you can take out when you’re ready to move via the water) AND your bike on a trip together. Bikerafting is mostly used in remote bikepacking adventures, when you’re headed out to cross rivers and the next bridge is miles and miles away. You cycle to the water, pump up your raft and strap the bike on. Off you go!
Physically, the trip will still be equally challenging as the river swim, if not more. Not only because I will profit less off the current than if I were swimming, and also the distance is nearly twice as long.
Making this decision wasn’t easy. After all, I trained for 1.5years to SWIM this river – not to bikeraft it. But the river IS polluted as heck (another factor that severely influenced my decision. I’ll get into the results from the latest water quality study in a separate post.) To those who might say I should just switch bodies of water then if the one I chose is so polluted:
That’s not the point.
This adventure isn’t (just) about the athletic aspect of swimming an incredibly long distance in a random body of water.
This adventure is about getting to know this river – in its entirety.
And I can’t wait. 🥳