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The UniCyclist

Books down!

The UniCyclist takes his final exam, but his epic bike journey across Europe continues. The studying part of UniCycle50 is now over. On 18 June I sat the exam for MT365 in Riga, Latvia, in a test room all alone. Well, there was also an invigilator. Pity. The empty exam room probably hints that there aren't too many OU students in Latvia, but I did meet one. Paul lives on Latvia's remote coast. I visited him on the way to Riga. His tiny village, Jurmalciems, is a long...

The freedom to be stupid

Every country that ever freed itself from an evil oppressor found a way to celebrate its release, but few countries have done it with as much style, beauty and humour as Lithuania. There are two options when it comes to having the last laugh: the first is to create something from the heart and the second is to stick up two fingers and really split your sides. Lithuania does both. The city of Siauliai, in the north of the country, sits on a plain. Despite the flatlands...

Chisinau & Kiev

Sorry, it's been a couple of weeks, hasn't it? I've been busy with the cycling but also revision for my MT365 maths exam on the 11th June in Latvia. Since last time, when I was banging on about phony vampires, I've seen three more capitals. I wrote about Bucharest on my other blog, so that leaves Moldova's Chisinau and Ukraine's Kiev. What can I say about Chisinau? Well, I can't see many people adding it to their bucket lists. It's got no real sights to see and none of...

Cycling with vampires

After a fraught first few days with Romania's roads I feel like I've worked out the country now. On the one hand, the red A-roads that I wrote about in a previous post aren't always stuffed with trucks; it's only those A-roads that are heading towards Bucharest. When Bucharest isn't involved they can even be quite pleasant. And the difference between really thin white roads and really, really thin white roads was clearly in my mind. I discovered this when one of the thinnest ones turned out to...

The Roads of Romania

In the whole week that I cycled across Hungary, I raised a small cheer from a woman at a bus stop just outside Budapest and a wave from a single construction worker a few days later. That was it. Within two minutes of crossing the border into Romania I'd already received more roadside greetings than that. And on my first day in Romania I made two new friends too. I'd been stood at the side of the road munching on a mini pizza when a young cyclist came past. He pointed ahead of himself, asking...

It's Snow Joke

I'm excited. By the time you read this I will be either preparing to leave Austria or already on the road to Budapest on the final leg of the UniCycle50 tour. And unless something amazing has happened to the weather between writing this post and you reading it, it's all going to be a bit snowy. The whole point of splitting the ride into three stages, from April to September for three years, was to avoid the cold stuff. Oh well. So far, over the 22,500 kilometres I've...

Food, Goriest Food!

Mmm, tasty! Steven Primrose-Smith: the gastro challenges of a UniCyclist

One month from now, the third and final leg of my rather large cycling tour will begin. From a tiny village in southern Austria, where my bike is patiently waiting, I will launch myself into another 12,000 kilometres, sixteen more countries, sixteen more capitals and, hopefully, sixteen more potentially stomach-churning culinary experiences. Food has played an important role during the ride and the challenge has been to find something new in each country. There have...

Sweet anticipation

Steven Primrose-Smith: Just one of the great views from this bike ride

It's funny how things stick in your memory. For no reason I can fathom I remember one particular school assembly in which Mr Heavisides, a name that at the time raised no titters but now seems eminently chuckle-worthy, talked about anticipation. His thesis was that the pleasure of anticipation is often better than the reality of the event you're anticipating. His example was a bar of chocolate. He believed that the thought of eating a Mars Bar was sweeter than the actual bar itself. Mr...

My results are in!

My bike ride started with a big question: Is it possible to study and do a long distance cycle tour at the same time? The results are now in for Year Two of this experiment and my conclusion is a resolute...erm, it depends. My results for this year's 60-pointer M208 Pure maths were delivered more than two weeks early. I got the grade three I'd expected, not a great score although I managed 83% in the exam, only 2% from a distinction score. It was the coursework that...

The dogs that had their day

An aim of this mammoth bike ride is to raise funds for a handful of charities. One of those organisations is a small animal charity - that is, a small charity that helps animals, not a charity that helps small animals - founded by my girlfriend, known in this blog as The Lovely Nina. Last month her charity - Action for Animals - was responsible for doing something quite remarkable. Action for Animals is registered in the UK and also in Spain, where Nina lives in a little, whitewashed Andalusian...

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About The UniCyclist

Follow @unicycle50

Hi, I'm Steven Primrose-Smith, otherwise known as The UniCyclist – one bloke, two wheels, two degree courses, one portable university and 50 capital cities. Nice to meet you!

I'm 40-year-old full-time student with The Open University and University of Wales, Lampeter. I got my first degree in 2008 in Philosophy and English from the OU and I'm currently planning my dissertation for an MA in philosophy with Lampeter as well as working through the necessary modules at the OU to get a degree in maths and another in physical science. The aim, once all these courses are done, is to be a well-rounded private tutor covering as many subjects as possible. But that's three years away. I might get squashed by a truck before then.

For 15 years I was a technical author and internet software developer, but other jobs that I've been paid for include (in order, from age 14): delivering newspapers, stocking supermarket shelves, working in a video shop cum off licence cum sunbed centre, playing a synthesizer (with one finger) in an awful band called The Slaves of Circumstance, buying electronic components, playing a synthesizer (now with two fingers) in an even worse band called Tuco Talks, graphic design, laying out newspapers, writing computer games, selling software online, knocking up websites, performing comedy, doing voices for radio ads, writing magazine articles, teaching people how to improve their computer skills, writing comedy sketches and, most recently, maths tutoring.

I did my first cycling tour in 1994 when I had a week on very windy Orkney. Shortly afterwards I was working in Austria and only did the occasional weekend tour although I had many a tipsy day-ride with friends out into the vineyards south of Graz. It wasn't until 2007 that I decided to get a bit more serious when I did an 11-day tour of western Andalusia. But the longest ride to date - in 2009 - was from the Isle of Man to the Costa del Sol, through the UK, France and Spain, lasting 32 days and covering 2,688 kilometres. It was that ride that gave me the idea for this one.

Other things I love doing include playing my guitar and keyboard (now with more than two fingers, but still not all of 'em), sailing, walking in the mountains, running, swimming and cooking.

This life is damn short, and it can be snatched away at any given moment. Whatever it is you want to do, just do it. Don't hang around. In other words, literally or metaphorically, get on your bike!

To find out more about the ride, including the rough route I'm planning to follow, or to donate money to the charities I'm cycling for, please have a look at my website at www.UniCycle50.com. And if you have any questions or would like to meet up, please email me at steven@unicycle50.com. See you on the road!