The Slow Miles Club is chasing a Guinness World Record one pedal stroke at a time

Most good adventures start in the same place don’t they? In a pub.

For New Zealanders Louie Tatom Cross, Alfie Duffy and Josh Stackhouse, the idea to ride the Silk Route eventually became what they call theSlow Miles Club. An ambitious bikepacking trip from London to Vietnam, which includes setting a Guiness World Record along the way.

The trio are currently riding across Europe and if successful will complet the “longest food delivery by bicycle.” They recieved a sponsorship from DoorDash to take a box of Yorkshire Tea from London to Almaty, Kazakhstan.

“We thought it’d be funny to do the trip with a DoorDash parcel on the front of my bike,” Alfie Duffy laughed during a call from Italy. “Then we thought maybe we could get a world record.”

So they emailed DoorDash. And after few conversations, somehow, the whole thing became real.

Delivering tea across continents

The record itself is official. The group met with the Guiness people in London and now they are carrying a carefully protected box of Yorkshire Tea from London all the way to Kazakhstan. It will eventually be delivered to a British expat named Roger living in Almaty.

“We’ve got about a three-tier defence system,” Josh Stackhouse explained. “The tea is inside the original packaging, inside a Ziploc bag, inside our pots we use to cook each night inside the pannier.”

In other words, the tea currently ranks somewhere alongside passports in terms of importance. DoorDash helped fund equipment and Guinness application costs in exchange for photos and videos documenting the delivery as it progresses through Europe and Central Asia. The riders admit the whole sponsorship arrangement came together surprisingly fast.

“It was pretty last minute,” Stackhouse said. “We were just trying to get sponsors and DoorDash came to the table pretty keen for it.”

Europe has been easy. Asia might not be

Right now the group is somewhere in Italy after already crossing through England, France, Belgium, Germany and parts of the Alps. The weather alone has been chaotic.

“It was hailing in Germany the week before,” Louie Tatom Cross said. “It was 35 degrees yesterday.”

So far though, Europe has apparently felt relatively civilized by bikepacking standards.

“Bike tracks, supermarkets every five kilometres,” Cross said. “It’s pretty casual through Europe.”

That probably changes later. The rough route currently heads through Slovenia, Croatia, Montenegro, Bulgaria,…