Laura Crawford in Yosemite National Park, U.S.A.  © Russ Roca

Formerly known as the "eco-friendly bicycling photographer" of Long Beach, I've since traveled 10,000 miles through the US together with Laura Crawford as www.PathLessPedaled.com . We now find ourselves in the US bike epicenter - Portland. Join us as we re-enter the working world to save for the next adventure.

© Cass Gilbert

Cass writes:

“I’m an avid traveller and cyclist, and have been touring regularly for the last 11 years. I’ve ridden from Sydney to London, across Central Asia on a tandem, through Tunisia and Morocco, around SW China and Laos, and through backcountry Cambodia. I love touring and mountain biking: my ideal journeys fuse the two, keeping to quiet dirt roads and trails.

I used to co-run a bike touring business in the Indian Himalayas and work as a bike journalist in the UK. I’m part-funding this trip by writing for bicycle magazines, and have been submitting words and pictures to Cycling Plus, What Mountain Bike, Singletrack, Adventure Cycling, Boneshaker, the CTC and wired.co.uk”

You can follow Cass Gilbert’s current American journey at: http://whileoutriding.com

Bicycle touring in China © Patrick Hugens

When they aren’t on a bike trip, Patrick is an architect and his wife Rachel is an Operating Room Nurse in Boise Idaho. They met when Patrick, a Dutchman, was cycling around the world and Rachel was bicycling in New Zealand and Australia. They have toured in Africa, Western Europe, South America and Asia.

"Our destination is never a place, but a new way of looking at things" (Henry Miller).  You can view more of their photos at: http://picasaweb.google.com/racpat.hugens

Cycling in South America © Daisuke Nakanishi

Daisuke Nakanishi of Osaka, Japan is a traveler in search of new friends and world peace. He worked and saved his money for six years and then he started to ride from Anchorage, Alaska on July 23, 1998. Daisuke has since cycled more than 100,000 kilometers and visited almost 100 countries on all continents, all on the same bicycle.  You can read more about that trip which ended in 2009 at: http://www.daisukebike.be.

In 2012 he cycled Australia together with his friend Mr. Motomitsu Ikemoto who had built a sailing bike. You can view pictures of the sailing bicycle crossing the Nullarbor Plain at: http://blog.daisukebike.be/ (in Japanese).

Cycling in Iceland   © Willem Megens

It must have been in 1984 when I was on vacation with my parents in Wallis, Switzerland. In St Maurice we suddenly had to stop the car. At tremendous speed a "peloton" racing cyclists passed us by. That was my introduction to the Tour de France and cycling in the mountains. A love affair was born.

In the coming years I cycled through the Dutch regions of Achterhoek and Twente. The Ardennes and the French Alps followed in the early nineties, after which Marieke and I took the bicycles with us to Switzerland, Italy, and Norway. What a superb feeling to climb a mountain. In 2000 our first, genuine cycling holiday was a fact: our honeymoon in Slovenia.

To suffer yet keep on going, to pitch my tent and live life simply: that gives me a sense of freedom and satisfaction. It also explains my love for cycling vacations, and for cycling over mountains in particular. And the nice thing is: there is still so much left to see. The Andes, Rockies, Pamir and Himalaya are on my wish list, but let's start with Europe!

You can see more of Willem Megens photos at: http://themeeg.nl

Cycling in Mongolia   © Dave Turner

Dave Turner has been riding, photographing and writing about adventure cycling for almost 20 years. He writes; “I live to ride, I'm happiest when riding my bike, usually in the middle of nowhere learning as much as possible about remote cultures and stories.”

You can read more about his cycling adventures at: www.mushypea.net

Biking out of Lake Henry campground, Idaho   © Adam Coppola

Photographer Adam Coppola is specialized in product, outdoor and event photography. In January 2011 Adam, together with his wife Christy took off on a yearlong bicycle tour through all of the fifty states of America. During their trip they are “spreading health and happiness through the gift of a bike” via the charities World Bicycle Relief and Achilles international.  You can follow their trip (and see more of his great photos!) at: www.giveabike.com.

Cycling in Bolivia  © Rick Galezowski

Rick Galezowski and Maggie Bennedsen are architects from Toronto, Canada who have toured extensively through Asia and the Americas. Their travels have been featured in publications throughout Canada, the United States and Europe.

Their website:  http://www.backintheworld.com is full of inspiring photos and stories although you do need a fast internet connection to load it.  (It’s a flash based website.)

On their welcome page they write:

“This website chronicles our ongoing journey around the world by bicycle.  Exploring the world from the seat of a bicycle, the everyday experience is an intimate affair of small wonders and simple pleasures.  The overall experience is an ever widening panorama of people and landscapes, climates and cultures, ways of living, ways of thinking.

So what are you waiting for?  Why not join us, on a round-the-world bike ride?  It sure beats sitting in an office all day…”

© Aaron Teasdale

Aaron Teasdale is an internationally award-winning magazine writer, photographer, and editor focused on adventure travel, natural history, conservation, and wilderness.

His wide-ranging explorations and wanderings, usually involve bikes, skis, backpacks, and remote places with spectacular sunsets.  His work appears in books and a diversity of magazines ranging from Bike, Powder, and Mountain Gazette to Sierra, Audubon, and Adventure Cycling.

If you want to get inspired to go jump on your bike than check out more of his pictures at: www.aaronteasdale.com

© Sebastian Wevers

Out of University Sebastian decided that a life indoors wasn’t his. He quit his job, bought a bicycle, went to Israel, and spends three months in a Kibbutz before cycling back to the Netherlands, his home country.

The urge to go and see more of that interesting part of the world which is called The Road got him on his bicycle time and again. After some years combining work and travel he dedicated himself to a Red Cross project in Vietnam on which he worked for two years.

His love for long distance cycling is maybe best illustrated by the overland cycle journey from the Netherlands to Malaysia and onwards to Australia. Taking the best part of three years this venture changed his life into what it is now, -  a life on the road.

Sebastian writes: (translated from Dutch) No solid ground, always moving, always on the go. A Chinese friend calls me 'Bird without Feet' from a Chinese story about a bird that cannot land. A bird that is trapped in his flight. I was not a prisoner of my travels, I have lived in them. For nearly twenty years I have been on the road. I find comfort in my travels, which I can find nowhere else.

Sebastian’s  website: www.sebastianwevers.com (it might still be under construction) and blog:  www.vogelzondervoeten.wordpress.com

© Rick Gunn

With over 15 years of daily newspaper experience, American photojournalist and writer Rick Gunn has traveled throughout the world, bringing back unique photos and stories from around the planet.

His photos have been published in numerous magazines and newspapers such as: People Magazine, USA Today, the Los Angeles Times and Nevada Magazine.

An avid traveler, adventure-cyclist and ethno-photographer, Gunn has produced countless photo essays during his trips. He has been rescued by Muslim clerics in China, charged by yaks in Nepal, bitten by monkeys in India, attached by leaches in Malaysia and robbed at gunpoint in South America.

Rick regularly gives 90-minute slide presentations titled; “Soulcycler, Words And Images From a 25,811-Mile Bicycle Journey Around-The-World.” “Soulcycler” combines 350 photos from 33 countries, set to music, accompanied by a selection of Rick’s personal adventures from around the globe.  Rick is also currently working on a book about his Soulcycler adventures.

To learn more about Rick, his journals and photography, please visit www.soulcycler.com

Cycling in South America   © Gregg Bleakney

Gregg Bleakney is a photographer and writer who specializes in bicycle touring, cycling and adventure travel. He's based in Seattle, WA.

In July of 2005, Gregg left his career in information technology, sold nearly everything he owned (house, fancy car, furniture, etc.) and rode his bicycle from northern Alaska to the southern tip of South America. He pedaled 18,500 miles over twenty-two months and raised $50,000 for the American Diabetes Association.  Along the way, he was electrocuted by a lightning bolt and attacked by machete bandits. He also discovered a planet and people that demonstrated their magic time and time again.

In Santa Barbara, CA a slick camera salesman talked him into spending two-months of his trip's budget on a SLR camera. He started making pictures and writing stories for the first time. Those pictures and words have found their way into a coffee table book, "Bicycle Diaries"—it is being packaged for publication by Rich Clarkson and Associates.

Since his bicycle trip, Gregg has developed the unique ability to deliver strong feature length writing and fine photography packages to his clients.

 To see more of Gregg’s photography, check out his website at: http://gbleakney.com

 Patagonia also did an Earth Day podcast over his bicycle trip/photography:  http://www.thecleanestline.com/2011/04/dirtbag-diaries-ditch-logic.html

Cycling in South America    © Claude Marthaler

When he’s not exploring the world by bike, Claude Marthaler lives in Geneva, where he was born in 1960. After multi-year cycling trips through Europe and the Himalayas, Claude left Switzerland in 1994 for a two year trip to Japan. His bike, dubbed the "yak" has a passion for detours and the bike decided otherwise. Singing with every turn of its wheels, the “yak” traveled through Europe, Asia, the Americas and Africa before finally coming back to Geneva. This trip lasted 7 years.

Cycling in Iceland / 2003     ©Paul van Roekel

Paul van Roekel and Anja de Graaf are two cycling and photography enthusiasts who once did a two year world bike tour and are still leaving Holland every year for a bike trip.   They are best known in the bicycle touring community for their website http://www.cyclingaroundtheworld.nl which contains great photos and extensive information on a number of cycling destinations.

As one reviewer said over their website, "What Paul van Roekel and Anja de Graaf did on their bicycles (North, South America, India, Namibia, and Australia) is certainly as impressive as their web pages about these travels. With pictures, so beautiful, you have to see them!”

Cycling in Scandinavia   © Kees Swart

Kees Swart is a fervent traveler and photographer who has cycled through Europe and Africa

Kees writes, “I studied photojournalism, portrait and documentary photography at the Photo Academy in Amsterdam and since then I work as a freelance photographer. I always work on location and try to approach reality without manipulating it
So no glamour and studio photography for me and I don’t have to carry suitcases full of lights and tripods. An additional advantage of carrying minimal equipment is that I can travel by bike and train and I don’t have to get a driver’s license.  There are already enough cars on the road ...”

Kees has also written a list of bicycle touring photo tips which can be viewed under the category “cycle reports”  The Dutch title is “Fotograferen op de fiets” which should translate to “Photographing while on a bike trip” and not the Google translation of: “Shooting the bike”.  If you want to improve your bike trip photos – then it’s a good site to check out.

Kees Swart’s Photography website: www.keesswart.nl