Hi everyone 🙂 Thought it’s time to check in again… I am still here, and alive, the adventure continues ! I have recently been featured in an interview with Hive life about my journey, you can check it out here : Basile Verhulst: A Transformative 16 Month Cycling Adventure Thanks for Hive Life for compiling the interview ! Basile … Read More
AS I take a step back to reflect on the what I learned from my bicycle trip, I realize that it is difficult to distill such a vast learning experience into a single page. The journey has affected me in almost every possible way. What I learned remains mostly unconscious. Before I started my journey, I felt my life surrounded … Read More
Dear everyone, Now that the journey is completed, I am starting a new phase of my life. My goal has always been to start a company once I arrive in China, and really immerse myself in the culture there. First, I’d like to announce that I co-founded a Blockchain engineering company based in Hong Kong called Blockdynamics (Website here). Second, … Read More
I arrived in at my destination in Hong Kong over a month ago now, and I thought it’s time to start sharing some of the insights I got when crossing the world on a saddle. So I thought i’d make one a blog post about it, but then I realized I have so many things to say that this would end … Read More
It’s DONE! I Arrived at the border with Hong Kong! After 16 months and 4 days, 18077 kilometers and 24 countries… It’s hard to describe how I feel right now. The end has suddenly come so fast. My entire soul is being carried away by melancholy. I wish this was not over, that I could live everything again. I close … Read More
I just crossed the border at the Mohan Port from Laos into China ! After 15 months of riding the cycle, I finally arrive at the land of destination! I have a hard time wrapping my head around what just happened. I’ve been looking forward to this moment literally since the last two years. The transition has been gradual. From … Read More
I am finally entering Thailand and Laos, the last few hundred kilometres before the border of China. Every day now I can feel myself getting closer to the Land of my Destination. It’s hard to describe that feeling, I get flashbacks of my entire one-year journey as I’m approaching it. I still don’t know what’s ahead, but definetly feeling a … Read More
I really didn’t know what to expect as I made my way into Hongphoi, a small village of notorious headhunters in North-East India. The adrenaline was surging in my blood as I got closer to the bamboo houses. Some villagers greeted me from afar with enthusiasm, raising their straight sickles in the air. In those remote mountains of Nagaland close to the Indian border with Myanmar, I noticed the change in people’s ethnicity and the thinning of people’s eyes.
As I walked into the village, I found the village’s Morung, a large war-ceremony building on top of a hill with a carved monolith. Two young men soon came towards me and offered to show me around. I was relieved to have found a point of entry to that yet unknown and mysterious tribe. They immediately called the village elders to come and greet me. That’s when I saw them: two of the few remaining legendary headhunters. … Read More
The possibility of traveling from France to China wasn’t served to me on a plate. I had to make sacrifices – I had to give up stability, proximity with my friends and family, my job, and the relationship with the woman I loved. None of this was easy and in a way, those sacrifices still affect me today. That’s not to belittle the privileges that have allowed me to even start, such as being born in the western world. My point is that if we want to follow our inner calling, we have to expect resistance. The problem is, like Nietzsche said, “‘we fear our higher self, because when it speaks, it speaks demandingly”.
In this bicycle trip I often feel like an explorer clearing my way with a machete through a thick uncharted jungle. There’s always a snake lurking somewhere – be it a thief, a storm while sleeping outside, or unknown cultural taboos. But the hardest is to be far away from any kind of home base or support network.
Yet despite all this, I am having the best time of my life. I feel that behind the passing clouds, the stars ars aligned. Because I know that … Read More
