Cycling holidays and bike tours

The majority of our cycling holidays are self-guided, because this is why The Natural Adventure was founded really. To facilitate people who want to cycle (and walk) independently, from one accommodation to another. We share expertly-crafted cycling itineraries, book the hotels or guesthouses en route, transfer your luggage so that it’s there for you when you arrive that evening, and have 24/7 local support if you need it. In short, we do all the organising, and you just have to do the cycling. At your own pace, in a wonderful place.

As we grew, and our adventurers started cycling far and wide, we realised that there were some trails where people valued the support of a daily guide. Which is why we now have a collection of small group, fully guided tours, as well as some privately-guided. On both of these, you can explore epic trails and just cycle without thinking, wander without worrying and cycle along safely. The only difference is that, with privately-guided tours, you have an expert that’s exclusive to you and your cycling companions. Examples of these are in Morocco and Vietnam.

In addition, we also have escorted cycling holidays. These fall between self-guided and guided, because as well as having your luggage transported on these tours, there is a minivan with a bike trailer accompanying you all the time, in the event of you getting tired or just needing any kind of assistance. It’s not a guided tour, but just a good-guys-on-hand tour, to check in with you at cols, crossroads and coastal cooling-off points.

These are some of our most popular cycling holidays, covering both seascapes and rivers, cities and islands. On bike and boat holidays, you stay on small boats of between 50 and 150 passengers and then you get to moor up and mosey off on your bike regularly, sometimes with guides and other times self-guided. Either way, these holidays are all about going slow and letting the skipper keep you in tow. For more information, see this blog.

We know that a lot of our keen cyclists like to bring their own bikes, which is why, for the most part, we don’t include the price of bike rental in our tour price.

We certainly do and we are big fans of e-bike options on our cycling holidays. The e-bike has done so much more for cycling holidays than give them power. They have empowered adventurers to get back in the saddle and not feel overshadowed by expert cyclists who conquer cols all year round, or for whom Lycra is a second skin. It’s as if the arrival of the e-bike has democratised cycling. When they first arrived on the scene traditional cyclists were cynical, and now many are embracing electrical. E-bikes have gone from niche to norm and, although we have some cycling holidays that are only for e-bike riders, the majority of our traditional cycling holidays have an option for vélos with volts.

We have cycling holidays in over 30 countries, with bike tours in Italy, Spain and France being our top destinations. However, we also have cycling holidays in Vietnam and Morocco, New Zealand and North Macedonia. We recently launched a collection of TNA Specials, which are cycling holidays that we’ve curated ourselves, rather than by partners in that country. We’re pretty proud of this collection, which currently ranges from cycling the Great Glen Way in Scotland to the Cammino dei Borghi in Italy, as well as a lot of Catalonia and Umbria. 

We don’t have a favourite cycling holiday destination but, what we do have, is a good collection of blogs to help you choose where’s good for you. If you want easy cycling holidays, check out this blog. Or if you fancy a short and quick hit of cycling, we’ve some great suggestions here. You may want to cycle the Camino de Santiago, or choose one of Europe’s lesser-known cycle routes. We also have blogs on our top cycling holidays in Italy, Spain and France. For all our cycling blogs, see here.

Although the majority of our holidays are cycling from one accommodation to the next, we have a growing collection of what we call centre-based cycling holidays. Where you’re based in the same accommodation throughout the holiday. These are only possible in places where there are enough terrific trails on that accommodation’s doorstep, sometimes with a taxi transfer to a trailhead. So with no packing and unpacking every day, this gives you more time on the trails. Here are some of our favourites.

On the majority of our holidays, your overnight luggage is transferred on cycling days to the next accommodation. We request that you keep this to one piece of luggage per person, and maximum weight 15kg. You will, of course, need a daypack, to carry your layers, water, picnic etc on your cycling adventures. Which you can, ideally, put in your pannier.

One of the other aims of our founders was to facilitate financially accessible cycling and walking holidays, for people who want to delve a little deeper into nature and the local community. Lux? Not so much. We have locally-owned accommodation when possible, comfy beds and en-suite bathrooms are the norm. 

We have cycling holidays starting from under £300, and we are very clear on all our tour pages about what’s included and not included. What’s never included, however, is your transport to and from the holiday. Nor are most of the meals, with the exception of breakfast, although some tours are half-board. In addition, the cost of bike rental is not included on most of our tours, with some exceptions. This is because many cyclists like to bring their own. 

On some holidays there is an option to upgrade your hotels, and on others, there are In Comfort options, which have a few more trimmings.

Some of our adventures have a short window for cycling, especially when at a high elevation, or when temperatures are just too hot. All of our cycling holiday pages have a ‘When to go’ section on them, and we also have a collection of Best time to go blogs, in our leading cycling holiday destinations. For the most part, it’s best to avoid peak season, although our cycling holidays do take you off the main tourist trail of course and to avoid risks of overtourism. It’s also more sustainable to support destinations during less busy periods too of course.

Accommodation varies on our cycling holidays, from mountain lodges in Norway to small, locally-owned guesthouses on the Ciro Trail in Croatia and Bosnia-Herzegovina, and four-star hotels, as in many of our centre-based cycling holidays. In general, they are carefully selected, based on a variety of criteria including their location, warm hospitality, fine local food or commitment to responsible tourism. As well as being totally switched on to cyclists’ needs of course. In general, all rooms have en-suite or private bathrooms. 

In short, our focus is on the cycling trails, and trying to find beds that bring you as close as possible to those. Rather than trying to shoehorn trails around a chi-chi boutique hotel. We list daily accommodations on each of our tour pages, with photos of each and links to their websites too, for full transparency. As mentioned above, there are often options for upgrades, but not on all of our holidays.

We are all for keeping things analogue when it comes to maps and directions, especially on a holiday where you might be seeking to have a digital detox. However, technology is here to help if you want, and it’s very user-friendly and accessible too. The technology in question is in the form of GPS and GPX files, with more details below as to how these can be used on your cycling holidays. If you’re a newbie and you were around to get this reference point, rest assured that you definitely don’t need to be Scully from the X-Files to get your head around our GPX files. Read more in our blog, Getting your head around GPS and GPX files.

We have local experts who support you via phone or WhatsApp 24/7 on our cycling holidays. So, if you’re on a self-guided or solo cycling holiday, it feels like there’s an invisible hand guiding you throughout. As mentioned above, we also have escorted cycling holidays where you have help a little closer to hand. From the moment you engage one of our adventure specialists, you’ll see that no question is ever too stupid, especially when it comes to safety concerns. And when you get there, we have a local partner on the ground around the clock. 

We are all travellers at The Natural Adventure, and we recognise that people can feel vulnerable about all sorts of different aspects. But don’t worry – we hear you, and we’re here for you. And before you go on your holiday, we will send you all the contact details that you need while you’re there.

Our cycling holidays are all categorised with regards to their difficulty levels, or you can just click on the following links for a shortcut: Easy, Easy/Moderate, Moderate, Moderate/Strenuous, Strenuous. These guidelines feature on each tour page, and aim to give you a general idea of what to expect from your holiday in terms of daily distance and times of your cycle routes. Of course, cycling times and distances vary according to the type of terrain and elevation changes. 

It’s always a good idea to read both our suggested times and distances on each tour. Please remember that these are only guidelines. The whole idea of a self-guided holiday is that you do things at your own pace. And, if there’s a day that you want to skip while you’re there, because you want to chill, it’s your holiday. You do you! You may also enjoy our blogs on Mountain biking holidays and Easy cycling holidays.

No one is going to force you to do anything on a cycling holiday! This is your well earned break and so, you can always take a rest day. There are times when weather conditions mean that you have to skip a cycle anyway, and then you take the transfer to your next spot with your luggage. When you’re booking the holiday, we can nearly always build a rest day into the itinerary and, in many of our more strenuous holidays, they are automatically built in anyway. With guided, small group holidays, you just need to chat with your guide to organise a transfer, if you feel like skipping a day, but everything is possible.

Of course, and as many families embrace slow travel in their plans, we have some bespoke family holidays. However, many of these holidays mix things up a bit, with one day of cycling, followed by a day kayaking or something like that. In addition to these bespoke holidays, it’s worth checking out our easy/moderate level cycling, to see if they appeal to all family members. And if you have older teens who have cycling experience, you may want to explore more moderate level cycling holidays. Our adventure specialists are here to cater for your needs, and we can often adapt a day’s itinerary if you think it’s going to be too hard or too easy. For more information, see our blog on family adventure holidays.

You most certainly can and indeed escaping on your own can feel like a spa for the mind, body and soul. We have a wide array of cycling holidays that are suitable for our solo travellers and, like all of our holidays, we provide 24/7 support on the ground, a carefully crafted itinerary that guides you safely throughout your journey, and welcoming hosts to greet you at the end of the day. Please do remember, however, that a supplement will be charged as the cost of rooms and also luggage or private transfers (when applicable) is not shared. 

Whether you’re an epic-seeking empty nester or a solo parent travelling with a travel-loving teen, we have something for everyone seeking a solo cycling sojourn. You may also enjoy the following blogs: Our top holidays for solo travel, Overcoming your fear of solo travel and Solo travel at Christmas.

Of course, this depends on the country or region that you are visiting but, as with most of our adventures, you may be exploring remote terrain where weather conditions may be unpredictable. For that reason, we have some detailed blogs on packing, which may be of help: What to pack for a cycling trip and Camino de Santiago packing list. When you book, we will also send you a recommended packing list to suit the place you are cycling

Our holiday pages list all the items that are included or not included in the price of your cycling holiday. Breakfasts, luggage transfers and some taxis to and from airports or train stations are included too. So, you need to budget for lunches and dinners, although some holidays also offer half board options, especially in remote areas, such as on many of our bike and boat holidays. 

On the Camino de Santiago cycling holidays, you often get pilgrim discounts along the way, where you can get, on average, a three course dinner, including wine, for about €14-18 per person. With other holidays, it will depend on the country you’re travelling in, of course. So do read our tour pages carefully to see what’s included and what isn’t. On our guided cycling holidays, we also recommend tipping your guide at the end of the holiday. Read more in our Guide to tipping around the world.

There are too many to list really, and also it depends on whether you’re talking about for you as guests, or for local people in our host countries. For our adventurers, cycling holidays are a way to switch off from the world, practise mindfulness, take time to bond with friends and loved ones, or just have some precious time to yourself. They are a great way to stay fit, while immersing yourself in new landscapes and local cultures. 

With regards to our hosts, responsible tourism has been at the heart of what we do since the get go, and we aim to respect and work with the main pillars of responsible tourism on all our holidays. We call these pillars the four Ps of people, profit, place and philanthropy – and we walk the talk whenever we can. You can read more here, but we also have a bevy of blogs on the subject to show ways in which you can also support this ethos of doing the right thing by your host nations on your travels. It’s fundamental that we support the stewards of precious places where we cycle, by putting money into the destination and respecting and supporting local people while we’re there.