Why I like "crazyguyonabike"
 

Not wanting to further hijack Siu's photo thread I though I'd start a new one to continue the Crazy Guy discussion.

I want to take a bike trip in Elbonia. First I searched Bike Forums but I got 278 hits on any thread that contained the vaguest mention of Elbonia buried somewhere in the thread. Most had nothing to do with travel in Elbonia.

Then I went to "Bikepacker's Magazine" to research the trip. A cluttered homepage of photos and I could barely distinguish the ad photos from the articles. A search turned up no info on travel in Elbonia.

Then I went to "The Radavist", another home page of photos. I tried to scroll to the bottom of the page but it just kept loading more and more photos on to infinity. Searched for Elbonia, again no results.

"Backpacking Light"? Another mish mash of photos mixed in with ads. Tried their search function to find info on Elbonia. It just linked me to Google. First hit? "357 Hotels in Elbonia"!

"donelreydotcom"? Just a personal blog with fine photos of 20 or so personal trips and not one was in Elbonia!

Then I found a web site called "crazyguyonabike". Wow! Not one ad on the homepage. On the top left I found "Journals by Locale".

Europe......click
Elbonia.....click

44 journals that include Elbonia without using a search function! Crazy Guy will forever be my number 1 resource for info on specific bike touring locales.

I will jump on this wagon!
We have been using AND supporting CGOAB for a few years. Friends who follow our journals really enjoy it.

I don't know any country what is named ELBONIA? where is it? sure in EU?

Everyone knows that it's just east of Macaroni . . . .

I found "Mallorca 2016" story, great island.

on page one I see 1 picture: https://www.crazyguyonabike.com/doc/..._id=17739&v=2C
on page two I see 1 picture: https://www.crazyguyonabike.com/doc/...id=458137&v=1D
on page three 1 map, 1 picture, 1 video: https://www.crazyguyonabike.com/doc/...id=458138&v=18

is it my browser what does not show more pictures, or is it right that I have to click 5 pages to see aprox 8 pictures?

An imaginary country from the US comic strip "Dilbert"!

https://goo.gl/nPp4f9

Crazyguy journals are not produced by professionals. They are produced by ordinary bicycle tourists like you and me. Some contain mostly pictures with very little text, while others are almost entirely text based. Some of the photography is weak by any standards while some ranks among the best that I have seen. The same goes for the writing. But there is no other site on the web where you can enter any location in the world and get information about that location from someone who has actually ridden a bicycle there.

Homepage>Journals by Locale>Europe>Spain>search "Mallorca"= 22 hits. Very organized!

I am happy to read, I am happy to view pictures ... but sorry, there is zero visual attraction there to make me want to read. and I don't want to click 26 pages, each page with a single picture. maybe deep inside there, there are some nice stories, for sure. but the surface is not inviting at all.

But finding things quickly and easily - and have pages load instantly rather than in 5 minutes is just so, so retro.

I got a flat in Elbonia...

Stephan,

I have looked a your website. It is beautiful. I thoroughly enjoyed the photographs and some of the writing. But having seen it, I have no reason to return to it. Crazyguy's format may be restrictive, but the content grows every day. To me, it is worth the effort to skim a few journals that really were not meant for mass consumption in order to find a gem that keeps me going back for the next installment.

i thought we are talking about about crazyguyweb. thanks for visiting "my" website, is not a encounter place for touring cyclists, its about photography, film, and digital. who comes, who goes, who does not come back ... its not important at all to me.

Not to mention the underlying ideology of Crazyguy - -

Crazyguy represents the very best of the early optimism of the open-access web.
An electronic democracy that is rapidly disappearing under the weight of image and self-promotion.
The light yellow background and Times New Roman font are a small price to pay.

Esse quam videri

went to your signature address, scrolled down....chose one of the lower
options at random. bike touring in romania. okay, lotsa pretty pitchers.
yippee.

but where's the information? that's what i'm asking as i'm trying to research...
.....um....bike touring in romania.

how about the roads? what about the weather? hotel or guesthouse
availability? how far did you get in a day, any problems? what about
border crossings or dealing with locals?

i want some details that will help me plan my next tour.

hundreds and hundreds of hits for "romania" on crazy guy.
the first one loaded with photos and an interesting tale.

https://www.crazyguyonabike.com/doc/...id=317732&v=Aa

Read? Who reads anymore??
What a total waste of time - especially if I have to read anything which challenges my current prejudices.
Where is Ray Bradbury when you really need him?

I kind of accidentally found CGOAB a while back, and really love it. Sometimes I search specific locations or routes, sometimes I just randomly pick journals to read during a lunch break or something (kind of my escape from reality). In the past I bought several books through Amazon about bike travels, most are far better written than the journals on CGOAB but the key word is that I "bought" them instead of free journals. I love that it loads quickly, easy to search, no pop-ups, and a huge content. I do occasionally read other blogs but once I read them they are done, no need to return usually. Overall it's a great resource.

Elbonia? I think I watched a documentary about the country on Comedy Channel maybe?

what information?
"my" page is not a information center for touring cyclists, I plan my cycling myself, improvisation ... borders I cross with my passport.
weather comes as it comes, I can't change it. hotels and guesthouses I find on the road cycling, no planing before.

yes, probably there are hundreds and hundreds of hits around for Romania on there, for sure very helpful.
but its not about the content, its about the layout ...


I love pretty pitchers.
yippee.! ;()()

P.S. still wondering where that Elbonia country is, for that one I would need some reading ...

Before I did the Pacific Coast route, I saw that there were two or three groups that were about one or two months ahead of me. Every day I looked at their latest postings to see what they were saying about the campsites, etc. I was very happy to have that resource available with timely information.

The website is not glossy and all postings are from volunteers, not glossy paid media types, so you get what you get and should not complain. I have been looking at it for where I go on my next trip, it is a very useful resource.

I have never posted a trip log there, but I might start some day.

Not a big fan of CGOAB. First off, the name of the site is insulting to mentally challenged people. Plus it puts bicycle tourers in a bad light. Second, it is a vehicle for endless repetitive entries. I stayed with X person and had an awesome meal of Y. How many times can you read that? Third, I don't need to preview my trip. Just go and enjoy. Having said that, IF I planned to travel to Elbonia or some other equally obscure place, perhaps it would be a good resource. Not there yet. Still have to ride all the beaten paths first.

Just west of Notonamapistan, just east of Macaroni. Elbonia was just a tongue in cheek example of an obscure destination.

P.S. Your blog and photo's are outstanding, str. Some of the best I've seen on BF!

If you like CGOAB, but think it needs an update, give PackJournal.com a try. A better look, a few added features (like a map of photos/journals, an offline-friendly app for journals, and charity fundraising), and it's built specifically for touring cyclists. And it's free and easy to use.

I agree that Crazy Guy is not the perfect website for just viewing travel photos as requested by Siu in the Touring pics thread. Those sites linked to by str, Max, Blarney and others indeed provide high quality photos. I just don't agree that Crazy Guy is "poorly organized and user unfriendly", "outdated" or "difficult to navigate or use".

For example a few weeks back a forum member opened a thread asking for suggestions for a two week tour on the Great Divide. I replied with a trip suggestion that I had taken over 10 years previously and I couldn't remember it's exact duration. I went to CGOAB and quickly did this search...

Routes>N America>US>ACA>GDMBR= 92 hits

I quickly scanned the contents of several journals and was able to edit my reply regarding the estimated days of my suggested trip. Only because of the highly organized format of the site I was able to find that info in about 5 minutes.

I find the blog format to be the most awkward unless one starts to follow a trip on Day 1. Say a trip starts in May and I don't start following until August. Assuming the blog is organized by months, I then need to click back to May to start reading at Chapter 1. When I arrive at the May entry I then need to scroll, scroll, scroll all the way to the bottom of the page to read the first entry. I then have to scroll back up the page, but not too far, to read entry 2. I find the CGOAB format much more user friendly to navigate.

I'm pretty sure that same documentary discussed the relationship of Elbonia with its neighboring country, Freedonia (of course well known for its duck soup)

btw, I do appreciate Neil's work at Crazy Guy and I do use the site for planning tours not infrequently. Could it be purtier? Yea, but its functionality is what I appreciate. As to the photographic sites, fine, but I can see beautiful scenic shots anywhere on the web. It's all good.

oh I dunno, for me the name works because for any of us who have toured for a long time, you just know that's the view of us by some folks travelling by car.

I have two memories decades apart that fit this exactly, one coming up the west coast of France and repeatedly meeting a family travelling by car at those "lookout" spots at the side of the road, they obviously were taking long breaks at them as I was always catching up to them-but you could see in their eyes that I was a "crazy guy on a bike" working hard and carrying all that crap on my bike, and seeing them over and over (ok, maybe it was only twice or three times, but it was funny running into them again)
Twenty years or more later, biking from Montreal to Boston during a summer heat wave, pulling into a hardware store to ask for some new cold water from their tap, and a real friendly (and rotund) fellow behind the counter asked me about my trip after letting me fill my bottles from their water cooler, and then said, "Don't take this the wrong way, but why didn't you just drive your car?"

re the quality of CGOAB, sure it can be all over the place, but it certainly is a great resource for real world cyclists route info and other good tidbits of info about an area if one is interested in biking there.