Cycling across Denmark: students embark on travel fellowships to broaden perspectives

Yale-NUS students Bertrand Yan, Golam Rabbani, and Ayrton San Joaquin ‘bikepacked’ across Denmark as part of their Summer Travel Fellowship. Image provided by the group. 

With international travel around the world resuming, Yale-NUS students dispersed far and wide during the semester break to pursue a range of personal and professional development programmes. This year, 15 students took on the challenge of charting their own summer adventures through the Summer Travel Fellowship programme.

Coordinated by the Centre for International & Professional Experience (CIPE), the Summer Travel Fellowship celebrates the spirit of adventure, curiosity and self-exploration that is made possible through travel, and gives students the opportunity to forge their own learning journey. As individuals or in small groups, students curate their own trips abroad surrounding specific themes of exploration or intellectual pursuits.

These trips are typically three weeks or longer, so students are able to enjoy a deep engagement with the places, spaces and communities they are visiting. Upon their return, students share their learning in a meaningful and engaging way with the College community.

From left to right: Ayrton San Joaquin (Class of 2022), Bertrand Yan and Golam Rabbani (Class of 2023), pictured mid-way on their cross country cycle.  Image provided by the group.

One of the student groups comprised Ayrton San Joaquin (Class of 2022), Bertrand Yan and Golam Rabbani (Class of 2023), who embarked on a trip to Denmark to explore “the secrets of cycling countries”. With the backdrop of Singapore government’s plan to incorporate more cycling spaces and infrastructural changes to encourage it as a mode of transport, the trio hopes that their travel will be able to lend insights as to what factors are required to successfully create a thriving cycling culture.

Denmark was a dependable choice, being a country well-known for its avid cycling infrastructure and culture. More than 60 per cent of people in Copenhagen use bicycles as their main transport – regardless of weather. Through their research, the trio also found that Denmark has many national and regional cycling routes that connect the entire country. With this in mind, they planned a ‘bikepacking’ tour across Denmark ––travelling across the country primarily on bike, and carrying all they need for the journey with them.

Although all of them consider themselves avid cyclists, they mainly saw cycling as a form of exercise and relaxation. In fact, none of them had embarked on a multi-day cycling tour before. Denmark was therefore a welcoming destination that allowed them to ease into the experience with their cyclist-friendly infrastructure.

Golam shared how there were dedicated cycling highways, bike parking at almost every store and public transport. In addition, it was particularly welcoming for bikepacking travellers, offering many campsites or shelters for them to spend the night in, and facilities to shower and cook.

One of the campsites that Bertrand and Golam stopped at early in their trip, with a lovely campfire prepared by the Dutch man they met. Image provided by Bertrand and Golam.

Although they marvelled at the ability to experience all these infrastructures first-hand, they were also buffeted with a multitude of challenges throughout the journey. Some parts of their journey, for example, was filled with cold and rainy weather. Golam explained how days of perpetual rain can get miserable fast – even with the rain gear, as one could still end up water-logged, even with waterproof shoes.

The journey towards Hvide Sande was particularly bleak, and the trio shared that one of them “almost reached a breaking point” and wanted to just book a hotel room for the night – but the other two kept the group in check and they ultimately overcame it.

In addition, having to travel so extensively in foreign country with unfamiliar rules and weather conditions meant they had to constantly adjust and adapt their travel plans on the fly.

Ayrton in victory! Image provided by Ayrton.

Nevertheless, Ayrton shared that after battling strong headwinds and the cold, they were also “repaid with sanguine, sunny summers”.

Ultimately, it was an extremely rewarding and meaningful journey, and the trio were proud of having accomplished what they did in just over three weeks. Said Aytron, “We biked through every known terrain I can think of: the asphalt of highways, the concrete of streets, the bricks of distinguished roads, the rocky stones of a castle estate, the soil of the countryside, the gravel of the farm roads, and the sands of the numerous beaches.”

According to Bertrand, meeting people who also shared their appreciation for the cycling network was also a big highlight of the trip, such as an elderly couple doing a multi-country bike tour, and two German bikepackers on a two-year trip to raise awareness about human rights issues in Western Sahara.

Reflecting on the trip as a whole, Bertrand shared one of the most salient insights that he acquired, “I learnt that respect and an appreciation of cyclists is really the most crucial element [of building a cycling culture]. We saw it everywhere–in the way people act with cyclists, and in the infrastructure design like enforcing bicycle priority around roundabouts, letting some bicycle lights turn green before the cars, and so on.”

–––––––

If you are interested to learn more about their trip and read their in-depth reflections, visit their travel blog!