“You Need To Know You’ll Have Bike Brain”: The Journey To The East’s 1st Time TDA Riders On What They Wished They Knew

Camille Remi Kirby was the Content Creator on the 2025 Journey to the East Cycling Adventure.

It’s not until the very last day, right when you cross that finish line, when you’re about to box your bike back up to make the journey home, this thing that has become a part of your day to day existence – that’s when you realize you’ve been following a well paved, smooth ride of a daily routine. One that will cease to exist as you board a flight home, one that seemed so menial but is what got you through days of cycling in a foreign country. That’s what they don’t tell you — that a TDA tour is a lifestyle, one that only exists for a fleeting moment.

This year’s group of Journey to the East riders was made up of an equal mix of TDA alumni and TDA newbies, who have embraced that routine as if they’d been doing it for years. Choosing a cycling tour is one thing, but choosing a tour that spans two countries with notoriously challenging climbs with a group of international strangers is a whole other entity. Many of the new riders came expecting one thing, but left with completely new understandings of this type of cycling.

Jenny stops to check in with the float van on stage 27

Wes Rother, from outside of Vancouver, Canada, came into the trip feeling nervous, not only about shipping a bike halfway across the world but also about how one finds consistency in a trip where you’re constantly on the move. To his surprise, he found relief in the “camaraderie around the tour leader and the whiteboards.” He hadn’t expected to find solace in classroom-style whiteboards that are the holy grail of a TDA trip, and yet he did. (These whiteboards provide all the information for the day’s ride at the daily rider’s meeting as well as any information at the destination hotel at the end of the stage.) “At the end of the day, you need to know you’ll have bike brain and the whiteboards make sure you don’t miss a thing.”

“If you’re not in a routine, it’s going to bite you badly. You’re not going to be prepared for what are challenging days. After two to three weeks of cycling, your body starts to get into shape but you still need that routine to get your mind in shape,” says Wes. Orange flagging tape and those whiteboards became integral to ensuring that body and mind connection; they’re just what you need to see after a long day’s ride. The main thing Wes found unexpectedly?

American riders Karen d’Kint de Roodenbeke and Jenny Walker had both previously only done cycling trips within the USA, this being their first journey cycling in a foreign country. Jenny wished she had known how much the food would impact her day to day. “At no fault but my own lack of global knowledge.” For good and bad, many riders struggled with the Korean and Japanese breakfasts. “Fish for breakfast, fish for dinner. For some reason I didn’t expect such an intense cultural immersion.” As the weeks went on, supplementary breakfasts became the norm; fruit, yogurt and granola started becoming readily available as raw fish breakfasts were not working for a hundred kilometre days.

For Karen, it took her time to figure out how to not ride solo. “I still haven’t figured out how to ride with a group – that’s been a process I’m still working through.” She felt like “navigating the social game” of the trip was something she hadn’t been expecting to be a challenge, or at least a thing to navigate.

Karen d’Kint de Roodenbeke rides through rice paddies on stage 21

Another unexpected aspect of the trip for her, which was shared by many other riders, was that the highlights of the tour were actually not the ‘highlights’ such as Kyoto or Tokyo. Instead their greatest interaction with Japan happened everywhere in between; in the tiny towns, the shrines, the roadside coffee shop run by a single older woman. “That’s what the tour became about,” says Karen. There was a visible sigh of relief every time we rode out of a large city and back into the countryside, which is something not many of us had anticipated.

Many first-time TDA riders also found the notion of ‘independent travellers riding together’ to be unexpected, but refreshing. John Florin, from Australia, and Jenny both remarked that they hadn’t expected to feel the freedom to set a pace for themselves and not be pushed into a mandatory ride in the van or made to feel like they were lagging. Jenny enjoyed setting a goal for herself everyday. “I’m just going to go as far as I can go,” something that she hadn’t expected would be a perfectly acceptable way to journey with a group.

As the Journey to the East closes its doors on 2025, this group of TDA newbies can be proud of the fact that they’ve completed a journey not many can say they have taken, and they did so by embracing the unknown, jumping into a group of strangers they now call friends and pushing themselves into a whole new lifestyle and routine; one that they’ve made their own as they officially join the TDA global community.

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