Counterculture

Bike Life

If you are a cycle tourer who takes the ability to tour on your own for granted, then meet Priyanka Dalal. She has overcome many cultural barriers to become the first known female solo cycle tourer from India.

When Priyanka started touring, not one person in her circle had any experience as a touring cyclist. But she didn’t let that stop her! In 2014, she traveled to Europe to complete her first solo cycling tour from Berlin to Copenhagen. She was hooked and over the last eight years, she has had many adventures.

Join us as she explains how she has overcome cultural barriers to find the freedom to follow her dreams and become an inspiration to women cyclists everywhere.

5 Fun Facts to Know About Priyanka:

• When Priyanka started her first tour in 2014, she had never ridden a geared bicycle. So it was only on her second tour in Australia that she understood how gears worked.
• Priyanka has always traveled solo, except for one time in Taiwan when she was with a group.
• She is entirely vegetarian, including a no-egg diet on all her tours. However, she shares that maintaining her vegetarian diet is more challenging in some places than others.
• Contrary to many other cycle tourers, she doesn’t ride that many kilometers per tour because she likes spending more time in specific places. For example, during a month-long cycling trip in Thailand, she only covered 1000kms.
• Priyanka has completed long and short cycle tours in 7 different countries around the world (including India).

Learn more about Priyanka and follow her adventures on her blog, MapRoute Travel Blog, and her podcast, MapRoute.

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Theme Music by Les Konley | Produced by Les Konley

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