For nearly twenty years, Leonardo Corradini has been traveling by bicycle and turning the road into a place of reflection and storytelling.
Through Life in Travel, he has shared not only routes and landscapes, but a philosophy built on slowness, empathy, and trust in people. First of all, introduce yourself briefly for those who don’t know you yet!
Hi Lele, I’m Leonardo Corradini, a bicycle traveler, blogger, and manager of the website lifeintravel.it, founded in 2007 and dedicated to bicycle travel and cycle touring.
How did the nickname “Life in Travel” come about, and what was the initial idea behind the project?
Life in Travel was born at the beginning of 2007, when I left for a one-year Working Holiday in Australia. During that year, I used its pages to tell my story, which ended with a 4,500 km, two-month cycling journey through New Zealand.
“The road is an excellent teacher.”
Your experience in Australia is often mentioned as a turning point for you. How did it influence your vision of “slow” travel?
Yes, as mentioned, more than Australia it was New Zealand that marked a turning point. Not so much because it changed my idea of traveling—mine has always been tied to slowness and exploring lesser-known places—but because it represented the beginning of narrating and sharing that philosophy of travel (and life).
What was your first real bike trip, and what did it teach you?
My first bike trip dates back to 1998, when two friends and I, freshly graduated, crossed Tuscany over the course of a week. Nothing extraordinary, but that’s when I realized that the bicycle was a means that could open many doors. At that time, even in Italy, cycle tourists were few, and people went out of their way to help you.
What emotions or moments make you say, “This is why I travel this way”?
I think the strongest emotions can be grouped into two categories:
– the empathy you find in people when you’re struggling, whether on a bike or on foot
– the wonder of finding yourself in remote, isolated places, on roads where few foreigners have passed before you and where Nature still prevails over unchecked human development
What technical or mental difficulties do you feel you have overcome thanks to cycle touring?
From a purely practical point of view, I learned the art of making do, of living with the essentials. From a mental perspective, traveling by bike has taught me—and gives back to me every time—trust in people, something that is often lost when you stay stuck in the rhythms of modern society.
How have you seen Life in Travel evolve from 2007 to today?
There have been many changes. From a personal blog, Life in Travel became a reference point for all bicycle travelers in Italy and a collector of stories shared by anyone who wanted to tell their adventures.
Today, social media have largely replaced that function, and Life in Travel remains—or tries to remain, in my vision—an island to land on when you get lost in the sea of not-always-reliable information on the web.
“Traveling by bike has taught me, and gives back to me every time, trust in people.”
I know you’re not alone in this project—“behind every great man there’s a great woman.” Tell us about Veronica.
Veronica was the true soul of Life in Travel. The name itself shows how the blog was initially more general: I talked about all my travels, not just those by bike. When I met Veronica in 2009, she immediately understood that bicycle travel should be our core focus. She took charge of the editorial plan and shaped it to make it more professional and clearly defined.
Today our paths have separated, and I remain responsible for Life in Travel, but much of what it is today is thanks to Veronica.
What is your creative process when publishing guides, stories, or itineraries?
Almost all our content—aside from a few sponsored articles that help us make a living—comes from direct, personal experience. The first step is therefore to live that experience, that territory. Everything starts there, so the creative process mainly comes from planning routes, excursions, and trips.
Ebooks, books, and larger editorial projects are the synthesis and consolidation of years of travel and pedaling.
Is there a place or itinerary you will always carry in your heart?
There are two. The crossing of the Andean Altiplano from Nasca to Salta, passing through the Salar de Coipasa and Uyuni, the Ruta de la Joya, and the Atacama Desert—remote, isolated places, guardians of deafening silences.
The second is the north-to-south crossing of Eastern Anatolia in winter: the hospitality of the Kurdish people, the constant struggle with the cold, and passing through mythical geographic points such as Mesopotamia, the Tigris, and the Euphrates. These experiences are unforgettable and will remain indelible pages of my life.
Tell us about a particular episode you experienced during one of your long journeys.
On a bike trip, memorable episodes happen every day, and choosing one is always difficult. I remember in 2010, when we crossed Southeast Asia over 11 months. On our second pass through Thailand, we were forced to stop for 15 days due to the monsoons: nonstop rain, morning, afternoon, and night. When we left Surat Thani, the countryside was devastated, and people had moved all their belongings onto raised roads and were forced to live there.
At one point, we reached a dangerous-looking bridge. We stopped to decide what to do, and immediately a young woman came out of a makeshift shack by the roadside holding a baby. She had lost everything, yet she walked toward us holding a small bottle of water and offered it to us. That mixed feeling of shame (for our privileged status) and gratitude (for her unconditional generosity) I can still physically feel today. It’s a sensation that helps me keep a steady course even when life sails through stormy seas.
Have you ever had moments when you wanted to give up everything? How did you deal with them?
Yes, of course—on almost every trip. Moments of discouragement are part of the journey. There’s no method to face them, no antidote. When they come, I personally think about that woman from the episode I just described and about the hundreds of people like her I’ve met along my travels. I think about how privileged I am, that I can choose to give up and return to the comfort of an easy life. Most of the time, I realize that what discourages me—the difficulties I face—are infinitely smaller and more trivial than what most of the world’s population deals with for their entire lives. That helps me overcome those small moments of hardship and keep going.
The Life in Travel community is very active. What kind of relationship do you have with your followers?
The relationship with our community is wonderful. Episodes of hatred or envy, so common on social media, have happened to us fewer times than the fingers on one hand in 20 years of activity, while expressions of gratitude are countless and constant.
What is the most meaningful feedback you’ve received from a reader or from someone who started traveling thanks to you?
There isn’t one specific example I want to single out, because they all matter. Some people show their gratitude by sending us a gift, others simply by writing an email or a message, and I’m sure there are also those who keep their gratitude to themselves. The most meaningful feedback is the consistency with which people continue to trust us, even as the years go by.
Do you feel in any way responsible for inspiring people to travel in a more conscious and sustainable way?
Awareness of this responsibility has become more tangible over the years, and I must say it often creates an inner conflict. In recent years, cycle tourism has grown exponentially, and maintaining a balance between the sustainability of this growth and the desire to introduce as many people as possible to this wonderful way of traveling raises doubts about my work—doubts I still haven’t resolved and have been living with for some time.
On the site you write: “We try to make our dreams come true without leaving them in a drawer for too long.” What does this phrase mean to you today?
Dreams tucked away in a drawer are what make our lives incredible and full. Having dreams and working hard to achieve them is a powerful engine. But you can’t live only on unrealized dreams, otherwise they turn into frustration.
Dreams need to be taken out of the drawer, used, and renewed—just like clothes when the seasons change. There are always some clothes that stay in the drawer for many years, others that never come out, but that’s part of the game.
When you’re not traveling, what role does the bike play in your daily life?
The bike plays an essential role. I’m lucky to work remotely, so I don’t need it to commute, but I own four bikes: a MTB, a touring bike, a road bike that I use less and less, and this year also an e-MTB. I usually manage two or three rides a week, and since I live close to the mountains, I’m fortunate. Without those rides, I’d be much more stressed.
What are you really looking for when you set off on a journey?
Every journey has its own purpose, and every stage of life makes us look for different things. Today, when I travel, I look more for silence, distance from civilization, solitude. In the past it was different, and surely in a few years it will be something else again. That’s the beauty of travel: a chameleon that changes its skin according to how we feel at the moment.
Do you have any new itineraries, books, or projects coming up that you can preview?
Starting in 2026, I’ve begun planning group trips to the most beautiful places I’ve crossed. At the same time, editorial projects linked to the Life in Travel Family continue—an annual subscription system that allows loyal readers to receive one ebook per year—as well as the Life in Travel Diaries, printed volumes featuring travel stories by me and others.
