Ride along in this lyrical narrative essay by Juliette Pauli that’s part travelogue and part field report on what a bike community should look like. Capturing the spirit of Lael’s Croatia Rally, there’s no podium or ride timer, just shared effort along rough gravel with campfire nights and a moving village of riders choosing connection over competition…
Words by Juliette Pauli; photos by Exploro.cc
The morning light spills over the harbor in Trieste, catching on handlebars, helmets, and nervous smiles.
Sixty riders stand quietly, bikes loaded with sleeping bags, stoves, and courage.
We’ve come from all over—Italy, France, Spain, the U.S., Australia, Ireland—drawn here by something simple and rare: the promise of riding together.
There’s no start gun, no tension in the air. Just a shared pulse.
A collective breath before the road opens ahead.
This is Lael’s Croatia Rally. It’s part ride, part experiment in what a community can look like on two wheels.
Here, speed isn’t the point. You can go fast if you want, but you might miss everything that happens around you.
What really matters is attention. You take care of yourself by taking care of others.
It’s as simple as that.
As we roll out of Trieste, the group stretches and reforms like a tide. Some talk, others ride in silence. A flat tire becomes a reason to stop, share tools, share a laugh. Someone fixes a chain, someone else hands over a cookie.
It’s unspoken but clear: we move together.
The Road South
We leave Italy almost without noticing. A faint line of paint marks the border with Slovenia. Soon, the limestone hills of the Karst rise around us: white gravel roads, stone walls, tiny villages, a sky that feels too big. By midday, we’ve crossed into Croatia.
The climbs grow longer, the air turns sharp and pine-scented.
The Učka Mountains lift us into forests of beech and oak, then release us suddenly toward the Adriatic.
This is not an easy route.
The gravel is rough, loose, and unpredictable. One moment fast and flowing, the next steep and rocky.
You have to stay alert, to dance with the bike more than you fight it.
Some ride gravel bikes, others mountain bikes; both make sense here.
The challenge is real, but so is the freedom—to choose your line, your pace, your way of moving through the landscape.
Every descent feels like a gift, every view a reminder that effort and reward often arrive together.
That’s the duality of this country—sea and mountain, softness and roughness, everything in tension yet in harmony.
Each climb asks for strength; each descent gives it back as joy.
We ride to push ourselves, yes, but mostly to find each other.
In the quiet. In the laughter. In the shared fatigue that makes strangers into companions.
At night, the glow of campfires replaces finish lines.
Someone boils water, someone finds a flat spot for a tent.
We tell stories in mixed languages. The group becomes a moving village, small but whole.
Lael’s Vision
Lael Wilcox doesn’t organize races; she builds invitations.
After breaking records around the world, from the Trans Am Bike Race to the Tour Divide, she could have stayed in the realm of competition. Instead, she opened the door wider. Since 2021, Lael’s Rallyes have offered a new kind of adventure: open routes for women, trans, and non-binary riders where speed is optional, and connection is everything.
It’s not about who leads or who wins — it’s about how we move together, side by side, without anyone taking power over another. These riders aren’t beginners; they’re experienced cyclists redefining what strength and endurance look like when shared.
What Lael created is closer to a shared freedom than an event.
The freedom to ride at your pace, to choose your path, to stop when the view calls you. To be seen and supported, to exist in motion without being measured.
Each Rally becomes a small world that runs on trust and laughter, a collective rhythm that feels both rare and necessary.
In Croatia, it felt like the world was opening up to us.
The road wasn’t something to conquer, but something to share.
We weren’t chasing freedom; we were living it—shoulder to shoulder, holding space for one another.
Cres, The Island that Dances
Every Rally has a soundtrack.
Here, it’s the hum of tires on gravel, the hiss of a camp stove, the distant sound of waves.
The ferry carries us across to Krk, then Cres, where the terrain turns wild again. Steep, exposed ridgelines give way to forests and hidden bays.
The light here is different, almost metallic. The heat presses down.
That evening, we reach the port of Cres, dusty and exhausted.
A DJ is setting up in the square.
We lean our bikes against the walls, remove our helmets, and start dancing, first five of us, then 10, then 40.
Women from all over the world—sweaty, laughing, alive—dancing under the yellow lights of the harbor.
The locals join in. The music grows louder. The boundaries dissolve.
It feels like a small revolution in motion: joy, unfiltered and collective.
For a moment, the world seems to hold itself together through laughter and rhythm.
Freedom, Shared
Out there, freedom felt different. It wasn’t about escape or solitude. It was about presence.
The freedom of moving without hierarchy, without anyone taking the lead or falling behind.
We rode side by side, each of us carrying our own pace, our own strength, yet perfectly aligned.
There were moments when it felt like the world was opening to us, not because we were conquering it, but because we were finally part of it.
The road, the sea, the wind, everything seemed to flow with us instead of against us.
No one was trying to prove anything.
The terrain demanded skill—steep climbs, rocky descents, heat that pushed us to our limits—but there was power in that too.
We were here by choice, capable and unafraid, riding the same line as anyone else.
Out there, something shifts.
Without the gaze of men on us, everything feels lighter.
We move differently. Wilder, freer, louder.
It’s remarkable how fully we live when no one is watching us, when the only eyes on us are our own.
We were just moving forward, together, free and equal, holding space for one another.
That kind of freedom doesn’t shout.
It’s quiet, steady, contagious. It’s built on trust, not control.
And once you’ve felt it, it’s hard to forget.
What We Carry
Out here, strength looks different, but it’s unmistakable.
It’s in the way we climb, the way we keep pushing through heat, dust, and laughter.
It’s in the rhythm of a group that moves as one without losing its individuality.
We are not soft. We are solid. We take space. We build it.
We are experienced, powerful, and fully capable, not discovering strength, but exercising it together.
The Rally isn’t about proving yourself; it’s about realizing how powerful we already are when we ride together.
Each day shapes us: the climbs, the exhaustion, the bursts of joy. We grow side by side, not by shrinking, but by expanding. By existing fully, loudly, freely.
This experience made me think about intention.
Why do I ride? For performance? For self-improvement?
Maybe before. But now, it feels like something else entirely. It’s a way to create a world where we move as equals, where strength is collective, and where freedom has no hierarchy.
In a time when the world feels uncertain, building connection through a bicycle—across languages, continents, and lives—feels like an act of resistance and creation.
Where We All Belong
Maybe that’s what the Rally is about: learning how to belong while in motion. To be many without getting lost. To be yourself without standing apart.
Lael’s Croatia Rally doesn’t just redefine adventure, it redefines what it means to move through the world with power and freedom.
It’s not a story of gentleness, but of force, courage, and creation. Of women who ride, who take space, and who shape the world as they move through it.
On the final day, we slow down, almost unwilling to reach the end.
The coastline glows gold, the mountains fade behind us, and the sea stretches endlessly ahead.
There’s no ribbon, no podium. We roll to the harbor, drop our bikes, and jump into the water.
Salt stings our eyes, laughter fills the air, and everything feels exactly as it should.
Maybe that’s the real finish line: not the place we arrive, but the feeling that we’ve arrived together—strong, wild, and free.
Further Reading
Make sure to dig into these related articles for more info…
Please keep the conversation civil, constructive, and inclusive, or your comment will be removed.