Portugal from the top to the bottom

Updates

Day 10, Day 9, Day 8, Day 7, Day 6, Day 5, Day 4, Day 3, Day 2, Day 1

The Tour

If anyone had said to me, 10 years ago, that I would cycle Portugal from the top to the bottom, I would probably called them an idiot!

But, here I am, preparing for the tour. The tour goes from Valenca in the north to Faro in the south. It is about 850 kms long and we will climb around 7500 m during the trip.

We start at the magnificent fort in Valenca with views over the river to Spain. The day is spent in the spectacular hills of Northern Portugal, before striking the coast and following coastal paths for three days.

We then slowly work our way down and across the country, finally reaching the Spanish border in the northern Algarve.

Riding conditions get progressively easier as the country flattens but the scenery is always great!
For our final day we strike the Algarve’s southern coast and then follow cycle trails down to the coastline

We are a group of. 24 people, 21 cyclists and 3 support. 15 of the cyclists have Parkinson´s . Nationality in the group is 4 from Canada, 3 from USA, 8 from UK and 9 from Norway.

For me the trip is about not giving up, but fight PD and make the progression as slow as possible, and the only way to do that is to exercise (which is the only documented way of slowing down the progression of the disease).

Tour de ZWAP 2025 is organised and arranged by ZWAP Cycling club

The goal is to race against Parkinson’s, not each other.

Preparations

So here I am, training for the trip. Under you will find an example from a training session where I tested the photo gear I’m bringing for the trip. I will leave my favourite gear (to heavy) and will bring a small DJI Osmo Action 5 for the trip.

https://videopress.com/v/KgnpQDj8?resizeToParent=true&cover=true&posterUrl=https%3A%2F%2Fphotosbyehastein.wordpress.com%2Fwp-content%2Fuploads%2F2025%2F05%2Fchatgpt-image-3.-mai-2025-01_50_42.png&preloadContent=metadata&useAverageColor=true

Training for the trip, testing out photo gear

Fact box

10 years ago I got the diagnosis Parkinsons Disease. You can read more about it here if you are interested (I’m still standing an article I wrote in 2024).

I really thought everything would come to a halt for me, but as the years has gone by I have realised that a lot is dependent on what’s in your head. It’s a mindset. A great source of inspiration is my former colleague and friend Alexander Arvidsson who has MS and his take on life (check out https://www.alexanderarvidsson.no/).

Ride on
When you are going on a trip like this it’s good to have a local bike shop that can and will help with anything.

Ride on is a place like this, and Rajeev Gjelsvik, the owner makes sure that the customer experience is top class.

He offers good advice, service of the bike and he also helped me with a cardboard case which I needed for the transportation of my bike to Portugal and back.

If you have read so far, I hope your are interested in reading more. My plan is to update this page each day of the trip starting 23.06.25

I hope this can inspire others to take on challenges and enjoy life, even though life throws sh..t at you at times.

It’s all in your head!

Arriving in Porto

All bags and bikes are here.

1 hour drive to Valenca where we will stay the night. We must put our bikes together and try to sneak our bikes into our rooms. the hotel director has instructed the receptionist to stop us from keeping the bikes in our rooms 🫣😝

When we arrived at the airport at 1830 it was 28 degrees .