The plan

Half a year has passed since we took the decision to travel the silk roads by bike in the footsteps of Marco Polo. After some years of dreaming, some months of thinking and some weeks of planning we came to the conclusion that the plan is feasible.

Janneke and I will travel unknown countries with different cultures, passing ancient cities, through deserts and rough mountains on our way to China. We will start our journey in Beirut, Libanon on April 13th. From there the route goes through Syria, Turkey, to Iran. Then onwards to the Central Asian region with Turmenistan, Uzbekistan, Tadjikistan and Kyrgyzstan until we reach the country of the middle: China. We will cross China from East to West: Kashgar, Urumqi, Chengdu to Kunming and from there to Laos and Thailand. The final destiny of our trip is Bangkok where we will be around Christmas 2008.

In August we will visit the Olympics in Beijing. We are not able to get there in time by bike, therefor we will fly from West-China to Beijing. We make a short break of one week when we fly from Beijing to Amsterdam to attend to important parties. First the wedding of Janneke's brother and my friend Jorrit with Nienke, and second my father's 65th birthday and my parents 35th wedding anniversary.

After this time-out we will return to our bikes and pick up the journey from there.