History & Ethos
What we do
Sisters in the Wild creates community focused bikepacking experiences and events for women, trans, and non-binary people. Our mission is to build confidence and connection by sharing adventures on bikes in beautiful places.
We believe in the power of a bike ride with good people to create great things.
How we were born
Sisters In The Wild was born in Slovenia. A passion project of Neza Peterca, who had a vision of creating an environment for women to feel comfortable and push themselves to face personal challenges in pressure free and supportive surroundings. The inaugural SITW event took place in Slovenia in 2020, during a rare window of freedom during a year of lockdown, and brought a group of 12 together in the beautiful Slovenian countryside for 4 days of bikepacking, sharing hopes and fears, and learning from each other.
Neza met Charlotte Inman on that event, and they plotted to bring a similar event to the UK. The first Sisters In The Wild UK event took place in a field in the Lake District, bringing 70 women, non-binary and trans folks together for a magical weekend of off-road riding, camping, and connection. Since then, SITW has continued to grow from the UK, holding more events that strive to break down the accessibility barriers to bikepacking, build connection, build confidence and skills, and bring together good people to ride bikes in wild places. To date we have brought over 450 people through our events.
In 2022, the two arms of SITW merged into the UK based organisation that you now see today. Our roots may now be in the UK, but we look outwards to Europe and beyond. We look forward to bringing the SITW spirit across borders in 2023.
How we do things
Curate wild rides, for everyone
We believe that good things happen when you step out of your daily life and into the wild. Our riding routes focus on off-road and gravel trails and quiet roads, where we have stillness and space to escape the noise of everyday life, connect, and appreciate the challenge of the trail. Across our events, we offer rides options to suit a range of levels . From full day off-road epics, to beginner friendly guided rides.
Promote access and representation
We know that many barriers exist to getting into bikepacking. Some are financial, others related to confidence, location, family commitments, body ableness etc. We also acknowledge a skew of representation in the bikepacking community towards white, cis gendered, and middle income people.
We strive to be mindful of these factors when designing our events, and use our events as opportunities to do better. Whilst we continue to learn (and make mistakes!), you’ll find some of these features at the heart of our events:
Tiered pricing and free tickets - The majority of our events have tiered pricing, meaning we have some subsidised tickets available to those who would find the full price prohibitive. We use some of the money from the full price tickets to subsidise lower priced ones, and to help fund events for under-represented groups
Ring fenced tickets - We’ve trialed ring-fencing of tickets for our summer festival for under represented groups, and are committed to continuing to work with inspiring people in those communities to see whether this is something that can bring positive effects.
Collaboration - As we grow, we want to seek opportunities to collaborate with groups in under-represented communities to give more people an opportunity to try bikepacking. This might mean sharing resources, funding, and/or creating targeted events
Gear Loan - We have sets of bikepacking and camping gear that we can make available to people want to try bikepacking before investing in gear.
Ride sharing - We facilitate a space where people can connect before events to reduce transportation costs, through a Facebook group
Centre connection and community
We strive to create spaces at our events that give people to the opportunity to connect in meaningful ways, and make long lasting adventure buddies. Most people join our events solo, and whether it’s around the campfire or sharing meals, it’s important to us to create a relaxed atmosphere to let go of nerves and get to know each other. Our favourite moments are hearing of new adventure plans and communities being made between new friends as kit is packed away on the last day.
Foster confidence and skill building
We believe that being equipped with some basic skills to be self sufficient and confident out on your bike is key. Things like learning basic trail mechanics, building some off-road riding skills, knowing different ways to navigate; or sharing different tricks and hacks to pack for a bikepacking trip. Many of our events - like our Intro To Bikepacking Weekends, and our Gatherings, give opportunities for building these skills and confidence levels in safe, and supported environments.
Create paid roles for skilled people in our community
We believe in the need for women, trans and non-binary people in more skilled roles within the cycling industry. Whilst volunteers are a huge part in how we can do what we do at our large events, we are making it a priority to create more paid roles at our events that can be filled by brilliant women and nb/trans folks. This includes qualified ride leaders, mechanics skills teachers, photographers and speakers. It’s an evolving journey, but one we’re committed to progressing.
