Episode 160: Anna Ruddiman

Four Months Spent Cycling Across Europe – UK to Turkey

What Would You Do If You Had Four Months Free?

It’s a question most of us daydream about and for London based outdoors lover Anna Ruddiman, it became real life in 2025. After quitting a corporate job, and having her girlfriend Fran being made redundant the very next day, the pair suddenly had the rarest resource of all: time. That was enough to spark a four-month, cross-continent bike adventure.

A Serendipitous Beginning

Amazingly both Anna and Fran had actually had the same dream before they even met, to take a long bike trip one day. Suddenly, with no jobs and summer approaching, they found the window to make it happen.

They didn’t book flights. They didn’t agonise over logistics. Instead, they bought second-hand Surly touring bikes off Facebook Marketplace, packed light, rolled out the door in London and boarded a ferry to Spain. No rigid route plans, just the idea of spending four months on the bike travelling to places they’d not been to before.

Cycling Through 11 Countries

The loose plan was to make it all the way to Georgia. Reality, as big bike trips tend to go, meant there would be a few detours, ferries, mountain passes and as far as the weather was concerned – extreme heatwaves. So instead of ending the ride in Georgia, the pair eventually finished up in Turkey.

Their route spanned 11 countries and they cycled from UK → Spain → France → Italy → Slovenia → Croatia → Bosnia → Montenegro → Albania → Greece → Turkey

Not bad for two bikes bought online just weeks before.

Heatwaves, Dog Chases and Detours

The reality of bike touring means it’s quite often made up of a mix of bliss and chaos. Anna shares how she and Fran got plenty of both. Some standout moments included:

• Crossing Italy’s Po River Valley in temperatures over 40+ degree heat on flat, exposed roads with no shade for days – hell!
• Multiple wildfires in the Balkans, forcing route changes and smoky cycling
• Ferry crossings and island hopping as a way to discover Croatia
• Flat tyre carnage and mechanical chaos in Albania, requiring a huge detour to source inner tubes
• Discovering the hill top Monasteries of Meteora
• Having to deal with territorial shepherd dogs in Greece, causing a 60 km reroute into Athens after firefighters warned them off the road

The journey certainly had its challenges but also showed that you can get through them all.

Learning to Wild Camp (and Sleep Through Unknown Noises)

For many newcomers to bike travel, wild camping can cause a bit of anxiety In daylight your chosen camp spot looks idyllic, but at night time every noise can suddenly trigger your imagination, and not in a good way.

Anna shares how in hindsight the start of the trip woudl have provided them with the best opportunities for wildcamping, but they wouldn’t set up their first wildcamp until they reached the outskirts of Venice. From there, their confidence grew and they soon found themselves with the ability of spotting perfect pitches, staying unseen when needed and getting through the initial panic of camping near wildlife. A particularly humourous moment is when Anna shares how they heard rustling one night and Fran shone the torch outside to reveal three pairs of eyes looking back. Of course it was three deer!

Fuelled by Pesto Pasta and a Pinch of Curiosity

I joke I can’t do a podcast episode without talking about food adn for Anna their “bike touring meal” was pesto pasta. Nearly every night. Oats and peanut butter in the morning. Ice creams on hot days. Fresh fruit whenever it survived long enough in the heat. Anna shares how at one point they got sick of eating pesto pasta every single night, but then they pushed through that mental block and never looked back. Her hot tip however is to perhaps consider a non plastic container to eat your food from – unless you don’t mind morning oats to also taste like pesto pasta!

People Make the Journey

For all the mountains, coastlines and ruined castles they pedalled past, what stood out most for Anna were the people. Whether it was people who hosted them on Warm Showers, curious locals or drivers waving from car windows, it was the people who made the journey a highlight each day.

The Emotional Curve of a Long Ride

Anna admitted that at the beginning, she felt a need to “make progress” every day and to move fast, cover distance, chase numbers. She admits to having a competitive side to her, adn the idea of a day that was slower or perhaps didn’t expand across a huge distance almost felt unfulfilling. But as the months unfolded, the trip taught her that bike adventures reward patience, curiosity and flexibility. Stopping when somewhere feels good. Staying longer when life invites you to actually makes the journey that much more special.

As the journey wore on Anna got into the rhythm of shedding the need for high mile days and enjoyed the slower ones that much more. The incessant heatwaves raging across Europe also had a way of slowing both of them down. Second ice cream anyone?

Finishing in Turkey and What Comes After

Eventually their route ran out of Europe and the trip wrapped up in Turkey, dusty and satisfied. From there, Anna and Fran headed into the mountains on foot to reset before flying home. Four months had whizzed by and the journey was over.

Back in London, Anna confessed that part of her initially wondered whether the trip was actually “significant enough.” This is something I’ve experienced from many guests before. Our algorithms can often show us others in the bike adventure space who are out on longer trips, doing harder routes, or going further each day. Sometimes we see people out for years at a time and feel our adventures don’t stack up. Anna said she did feel like this for sure. But it was the conversations with friends and family back in London that reminded her and Fran that actually, taking four months and cycling across a continent isn’t small fry. It is something to be proud of.

I strongly feel when it comes to bike adventures comparison is the thief of joy. Someone’s four months doesn’t need to match someone’s four years, four weeks or four days. Every adventure counts. Every adventure regardless of how long it lasts can give you the same feelings.

Want to do a Trip Like This?

If you’re reading this and plotting your own ride listening to this episode will remind you that you don’t need to ride huge daily distances, know everything in advance and be a whizz with bike mechanics. What you do need to do is be curious, flexible, patient with yourself and just start. You’ll find confidence comes with each day. Like Anna you’ll hone in your wild camping skills (if you choose to wild camp, it’s totally fine not to as well!), you’ll figure out how to change flat tyres and get through mechanical issues, you can make your route up as you go and most importantly, enjoy the unplanned adventures and the experiences you get from giving it a go in the first place.

You can follow along Anna’s future adventures via her instagram – @AnnaRuddiman

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