Tour de Satoshi
A bitcoin anniversary bike tour from Florence to Frankfurt
Start in Florence (IT): January 3rd
Finish in Frankfurt (DE): January 12th
Backstory
On January 3rd of 2019 which marks the 10th anniversary of Bitcoin (Genesis Block), Vitus Zeller started a 10 day bike tour from Florence to Frankfurt. The tour started in Florence, the birthplace of modern banking, in front of the Palazzo Medici Riccardi and ended in Frankfurt a.M. in front of the European Central Bank (ECB).
It was a 1000 km bike ride with 10,000 meters of altitude with luggage in 10 days in unpredictable cold weather conditions through the Alps. Besides the sportive challenge Vitus' goal was to pay the night’s stays in a hotel with bitcoin. Upon arrival in each destination town, Vitus therefore needed to go from hotel to hotel and try to convince a hotel owner to let him stay a night in return for bitcoin. The final result out of nine nights was: Bitcoin 7:2 Euro.
Prior to starting Vitus published a one pager about Tour de Satoshi and announced it at a bitcoin meetup in Munich. One day before the start of Tour de Satoshi, while sitting in the train to Florence, he published a story on why he is doing this bike tour.
Vitus summarized every single day in his blog on medium as well as produced a short video about Tour de Satoshi.
Challenge
Part 1
Cycle in 10 days through winter from Florence to Frankfurt.
Day 1: Jan 3rd Florence — Sassuolo: 143 km, 2320 m altitude
Day 2: Jan 4th Sassuolo — Cremona: 107 km, 200 m altitude
Day 3: Jan 5th Cremona — Chiavenna: 177 km, 1060 m altitude
Day 4: Jan 6th Chiavenna — Chur: 92 km, 2210 m altitude
Day 5: Jan 7th Chur — Vaduz: 39 km, 30 m altitude
Day 6: Jan 8th Vaduz — Bregenz: 52 km, 30 m altitude
Day 7: Jan 9th Bregenz — Riedlingen: 94 km, 690 m altitude
Day 8: Jan 10th Riedlingen — Stuttgart: 94 km, 1110 m altitude
Day 9: Jan 11th Stuttgart — Heidelberg: 95km, 1020 m altitude
Day 10: Jan 12th Heidelberg — Frankfurt: 91 km 330 m altitude
Part 2
Pay the hotel stays with bitcoin.
Pictures
Day 1: Claudia, Vitus and Clara at Albergo Ca Venezia in Vergato
Day 2: from Vergato to Cremona was a 170 km long ride
Day 3: Vitus with Oreste, his host for the night at Casa al Lago in Lecco.
Day 4: Sandro and Vitus at Hotel Waldhaus am See in St. Moritz
Day 5: Vitus crossing the Alps at the Julierpass in Switzerland
Day 6: Arrival in Bregenz with frozen feet
Day 7: My hosts Angela and Markus at Rosengarten in Riedlingen
Day 8: Max, a fellow bitcoiner in Stuttgart who invited me for dinner
Day 9: After changing clothes at arrival in Heidelberg and before scouting 10 hotels!
Day 10: Happily hugging my wife after arriving at ECB in Frankfurt
Story to every stage
Day 1: Florence - Vergato
Day 2: Vergato - Cremona
Day 3: Cremona - Lecco
Day 4: Lecco - St. Moritz
Day 5: St. Moritz - Chur
Day 6: Chur - Bregenz
Day 7: Bregenz - Riedlingen
Day 8: Riedlingen - Stuttgart
Day 9: Stuttgart - Heidelberg
Day 10: Heidelberg - Frankfurt
Received donations
Vitus received 18 little bitcoin donations from fellow bitcoiners. With that he was just able to pay the seven bitcoin-paid hotel stays with btc.
Media & coverage
- Cryptonomist was the first news outlet to write about team satoshi. Here's the article about Tour de Satoshi by Marco Cavicchioli: Vitus Zeller: the “Tour de Satoshi” to celebrate 10 years of bitcoin
- Roger Bittel from Cryptowelt invited Vitus for a live video interview a few months after Tour de Satoshi: Interview mit Vitus Zeller - Bitcoin-Geburtstagstour für die Massenadaption
- Anita Posch invited Vitus onto her show Bitcoin & Co Podcast in German: Vitus Zeller, Initiator des Satoshi Freeathlon über abgefrorene Zehen und Bitcoin
