Cycling in India travel guide

2 min summary When to go Map & highlights Kerala cycling Rajasthan cycling Chennai to Kochi Tips & advice All our India guides

Cycling in India travel guide

The wonderful thing about cycling in India is that you are traveling with local people. At their speed, through their terrain, stopping to drink chai and talk bikes with them. The routes you can take vary greatly, and we do recommend traveling in a small group tour for most of them. This makes it easier to negotiate getting bikes on and off house boats in Kerala’s backwaters, for example. Or take an overnight train to Jodhpur to begin a Northern India odyssey.

Every single sense is bashed every single day. Smell, sight, taste, heat, just everything. That’s why it is amazing to travel in India by bike.

Also you will be cycling with such a wide array of fellow travelers. A father and son celebrating the first born flying the nest by cycling from Manali to Leh. A group of friends turning 50 together while cycling from the Bay of Bengal to the Arabian Sea. Or a 30-something couple training for a triathlon but vacationing at the same time, with the hills of Kerala’s Western Ghats ticking all the boxes. Cycling and India – it’s a magic combo. Read more in our India cycling vacations travel guide.

See all our India cycling Vacations

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Go on an Indian cycling vacation if...

… you want to experience India a little off the usual tourist track. Less Taj and temples, more mountains and remote monasteries. … you enjoy the company of an expert, local guide. Not all cycling vacations are guided, but good ones take you, and your vacation, to another level. … you want to experience the Himalayas, but don’t think of yourself as a trekker. … you are open to the unpredictable. From a flat tyre to an eagle swooping past, or a bus full of kids laughing at you hysterically.

Don’t go on a cycling vacation in India if…

… you don’t have some level of fitness. Talk this through with your tour operator as these guys know their gradients. … you like a lie in every day. Early starts are important to avoid the hottest part of the day in places like Rajasthan. But you’ll get to see the sun come up over mountains, or hear the Buddhists chanting at dawn. … you love freedom, but being sociable isn’t a strong point. Many India cycling trips include homestays, camping and plenty of hanging out as a group. … the word ‘chafing’ upsets you.

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WHAT DO OUR EXPERTS RECOMMEND?

Andrew Appleyard from our partner, Exodus:

“I do love cycling in Rajasthan just after the monsoon season; it is incredibly green and beautiful. The birdlife is just absolutely phenomenal in October.”

Sophie Hartman at our partner Chinkara Jounrneys specialising in Central India cycling vacations:

“I love Central India in October – it is still hot, but is green and lovely after the monsoon – but cycling anytime between October and April is lovely. May and June are pretty full on, heat wise. People also often underestimate how very cold in can get in rural central India in the December and January – literally woolly hats and gloves and hot water bottles for nights and early mornings – but then gloriously sunny days.”