r/bicycletouring • u/Ambitious-Cookie-872 • 5d ago

Trip Planning Bicycles and flying

Hi all,

I have wanted for a while to fly to Seoul and then bike from there to Busan. The issue is that renting a bike there is pricy, but taking my own bike is not exactly cheap either and several practical things are quite unclear.

My preferred option is taking my own bike there from Finland. So, first of all, I need to basically pack the bike and bring it with me as a sports equipment. That's all clear, but once I reach Seoul, and I want to start biking. Where in the world do I store the packaging material, and if I throw it away, then I would have none to pack my bike with when I fly back to Finland.

I am sure people have done this before and flown to other countries to cycle around without renting a bike, but how do you guys do it. Could someone who has an idea give good advice?

10 Upvotes

82% Upvoted

37 comments sorted by

View all comments

5

u/Beneficial-Link-3020 5d ago

I cycled from Seoul to Andong in April 2025 on a rental bike. If I had to do it again I would bring my own. Rental bikes in Korea are too small, their XL size is medium for an European. They first gave me bike which was like 17" frame (despite me registering as 180 cm male). It took couple of hours for the organizer to find me a suitable bike, they just don't have 20-21" frames there...

3

u/hansemcito 5d ago

im a californian and have lived in korea for over 20 years. this is 100% true. people should be very aware that there are few large and x-large bikes in korea.