Touring Amsterdam to Copenhagen - sanity check

[minhtam]

Hi,
the better half and I are planning on riding from Amsterdam to Copenhagen in the middle of this year, over two and a half weeks.
We've done local three-day tours before, either camping or staying in pubs, but haven't done anything this long before. The longest single day ride we've done has been 180km, but we were pretty tired after. We plan on camping most nights, and stay in hostels/BnBs once a week or so.

The area is pretty much completely flat (only 1300m of climb according to cycleroute.org), so we think we can cover between 70 and 100 km per day and still enjoy seeing the places we go through and get to. As long as the wind plays nice.
I'll be riding an alu CX with rear panniers. She'll be on a flat bar roadie, also rear panniers. We can both take slightly wider tyres on the 700c wheels, which we've used on gravel tracks between here and the coast before. I'm just nervous about punctures, I don't want to have to buy more tubes or patches half way through the trip. What's people's experience with putting tubeless solution into 700c tubes with removable valve cores? Is it worth it?

We'll be bringing the bikes over from here, probably in Qantas' card board bike boxes, and discard the boxes there. At the end of our trip, in Copenhagen, we'll need to find bike boxes to bring our bikes back. If you've done this sort of trip before, do you think it's sufficient just to rely on the airport having the cardboard bike boxes available when you get there, or should I call in with a bike shop ahead of time?

The planned route is mostly along the North Sea Cycle Route to see nature, with some shortcuts across some of the peninsulas to see cities, if they are worth it:
Amsterdam, along the coast to Leeuwarden, cut to Groningen, Bremerhaven, bypass Hamburg to the north west, then north along Schleswig-Holstein's west coast on the North Sea Cycle Route. Not sure if it's worth heading out to some of the islands. We then think we'll head up to Esbjerg, and cut across to Aarhus and take the ferry across towards Copenhagen, but that would mean we skip the Odense 'island'. Has anyone been there?

Opinions, suggestions welcome.
Any important places we must not miss?

Thanks!

 

[Benizmo]

Haven't ridden in that area so can't comment on the riding, but should be great.

Distance wise you'll be fine, the greatest thing about Europe is everything is so close. You may plan 100k but you will be passing through plenty of towns so the riding seems so much easier with plenty scenery and food stops!

For the boxes I would scope out some bike stores at trip end. Some will often package up your bike for you for a small fee. I did this from Spain and they did a great job for less than 20euro.

For tubeless you have to consider that you will need to setup over in Europe, as they recommend flying with the tyres flat and I wouldn't risk boxing up with messy sealant to find it all through the box at the other end, especially if you have your luggage packed in as well. Not sure how good it is on a roadie, but i did a 1200k Spain trip on a Mtb set tubeless with zero punctures.

Another random tip is if you take anything carry on on the flight, remember they are strict about anything resembling a weapon including tools and bike locks!

I'm heading over to UK myself in June riding down to Rome!

 

[Cave Dweller]

Get boxes from bike shop and box them before you get the airport. Just imagine trying to do this at the airport only to discover the pedal is stuck in the crank arm and you just can't get it off. You just dont need that stress. On the other side just do the same.

Distances seem ok. On the flat you should easily be able to average 25km/hr, if not 30km/hr. So maybe 3-4 hours of riding per day.

In Europe I have ridden from Germany over the Dolomites into Italy and back on a road bike. We rode with backpacks and just stayed at hotels each night. This is worth considering. Camping gear is very heavy (tent, sleeping pack, something to cook with and the list goes on). Every gram you put on the bike you will need to carry with you.

I have also ridden from Sydney to Melbourne on a XC bike with slicks and panniers. Heavy panniers suck for bike handling. See if you can travel light and just hotel hop. We got boxes from a local bike shop before flying back.
http://www.rotorburn.com/forums/sho...ydney&highlight=cave+dweller+sydney+melbourne

I have been running tubeless on my road bike for almost a year. They roll well which is why i run them. But they do puncture and Stans does not seal punctures, the pressure is too high and just sprays latex everywhere. The tyres are very tight to get on and off so fixes are not as quick as a normal tyre/tube as you are not supposed to use tyre levers (or you risk stretching the kevlar bead and they wont hold air seal anymore). You can patch the tyres on the inside with a standard patch kit, but I normally end up throwing a tube in to get me to end of ride. Given the ride is more fun than a serious climbing mission where performance is optimal, my suggestion would be to just run tubes and get some touring tyres with puncture proof linings.

 

[minhtam]

Thank you both for your replies.
Cave Dweller, thanks for the advice about camping vs. hotel hopping. We considered it, but then we read about the supposedly free or very cheap camping in Denmark and along the North Sea, so we'll go with that this time round. We've got bushwalking gear that won't be too heavy. I'll post here to tell you if I end up regretting that decision

None of our wheels are tubeless ready, and I wasn't going to upgrade those wheels, so tubes it is. yes. maybe new tyres might be a good idea.
And I'll definitely look into getting bike boxes from bike shops at the finish now.