[HN Gopher] Reasons to tour by bicycle
___________________________________________________________________
Reasons to tour by bicycle
Author : galfarragem
Score : 235 points
Date : 2022-06-19 09:22 UTC (13 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (kk.org)
(TXT) w3m dump (kk.org)
| nanomonkey wrote:
| I did a 3,000 km solo bicycle tour of S.E. Asia, started in
| Bangkok Thailand, headed up north to get my legs and then dropped
| back down once I was comfortable and headed off for Cambodia,
| crossed over to Vietnam and headed up the coast, headed east and
| into Laos to cross back to Thailand again. Best experience of my
| life. If I didn't have a dog, I would do something similar once a
| year.
|
| My general method was to ride for 4 hours, usually covering 100km
| (60 miles). Some days there isn't a good destination within that
| distance, or the terrain is steep, poor roads or an extreme
| headwind. On those days I'd put in more time or do distance
| (sometimes only covering 30 km). Once I got to a nice location
| I'd stay until I felt there wasn't anything interesting to take
| in, usually 1-3 days, and then I'd head back out. Sometimes you
| want to put in back to back rides, other times you just want to
| sit and relax on a beach.
|
| Food was terribly cheap while I was there, so I at at street
| stalls as often as I wanted. Portion sizes were small enough that
| you could sample a lot of cuisine. Fruit stalls were plentiful
| too.
|
| There is really no camping in S.E. Asia, due to land mines, etc.
| So you stay at guest houses, which were extremely inexpensive
| while I was there. People are extremely friendly and helpful.
| Some will try and become your friend simply because you'll buy
| them a meal, others to practice English or for the prestige. This
| was a bit annoying at times, but hardly insidious. Lots of
| children will run out and yell "hello" which gets tiresome on
| long stretches...but still rather cute.
|
| What people don't mention, is you have lots of time to your
| thoughts. My journals from this time period has _tons_ of great
| inventions and ideas for books, businesses and what not. My
| writer friends were jealous of the outpouring of long form
| writing that I was doing at this time.
|
| I highly recommend bike tours!
| prmoustache wrote:
| There are a number of bicycle tourers who adopted pets, mostly
| cats and dogs while travelling. It complicates a bit the
| "administrative" part to get accross borders but it can be
| done.
|
| Small ones can ride in the basket provided they have ample
| shades, there are dedicated trailers for dogs and there are
| even dogs who get used to jump in and out of a simple platform
| trailer to run or get carried depending if the road is flat,
| going uphill or downhill.
| wolverine876 wrote:
| Doesn't the added weight of a trailer have a significant
| impact?
| mjay23 wrote:
| Some day i am going to try this route (1000k through the entire
| Transilvania for hiking or bicycle, no cars). Maybe some of you
| would find it interesting :)
|
| https://www.viatransilvanica.com/traseu
|
| https://www.viatransilvanica.com/ghid
| shimonabi wrote:
| Coworkers that are cyclists often tell me they are always afraid
| on the road because the car drivers don't keep the proper
| distance.
|
| I myself have experienced some close calls and I only ride a few
| times a year.
| jacquesm wrote:
| Highly country dependent though.
| xtracto wrote:
| Ha! I was all excited reading the comments and thinking that
| maybe it would be a nice little adventure in my quest to
| become fitter.
|
| Then i remembered that I live in Mexico and going on a bike
| ride/camping would be a death sentence due to reckless
| drivers, robbers/muggers or drug traffickers.
|
| I'll keep doing stationary bike.
| stevenwoo wrote:
| I don't know the statistics but there are people posting on
| Reddit's /r/bicycletouring about going to or through Mexico
| with pictures of their trip, and people respond with
| similar fears to what you listed (which is my immediate
| thought as well.)
| alisonatwork wrote:
| I decided against cycling into Mexico when I was recently
| cycling across North America because I was worried about
| the security situation. I ended up flying to Panama then
| traveling down to Colombia, where I started touring again.
| I am not sure about the security situation in Colombia
| versus Mexico, but the statistics do show that it still has
| a fairly significant amount of violent crime. Unlike my
| more free-spirited touring in Canada and the US, I was more
| careful about where I went. I kept track of the local news
| every day and avoided towns and areas with political
| rallies or paramilitary activity. I never camped anywhere,
| preferring to stay in hospedajes for around us$10 per
| night. I also bought a cheap (<us$250) bike with only 6
| gears that looked similar to the kinds of bike campesinos
| rode around. And I spent more time on main roads with
| regular police/military checkpoints instead of taking any
| interesting back road I liked. The back roads I did take, I
| checked out on Google Street View beforehand, and leaned a
| lot on advice from local people. It was perhaps not as
| picturesque and peaceful as my riding in US/Canada, but it
| was still worth it for me. I met a few people down there
| who had greeted cyclists that had cycled all the way down
| from Canada, including through Mexico, so it's definitely
| possible to achieve, although different areas need
| different precautions. Perhaps it is wiser to do your first
| tour in a "safe" place so you get more comfortable with the
| process.
| mrbombastic wrote:
| Bold trip nonetheless! If you have some time to write up
| this experience and how you planned in more detail, I
| would definitely appreciate reading it and I am sure
| others would too. I am hoping to do some more travel like
| this in South and Central America and would be great to
| hear some first hand experience.
| alisonatwork wrote:
| For me the most important part of preparing for cycling
| in Latin America was learning conversational Spanish. I
| spent about 2 months studying in Panama to get a basic
| handle of the language, just going to school in the
| mornings and hanging out in local spaces in the
| afternoons where I could hear colloquial usage. Even
| though it's possible to get by traveling in other
| countries by miming your requests and using translation
| apps, it is much easier to reassure locals that you
| really are looking for a practical cycle route and not
| some kind of touristic detour if you can speak enough of
| the language they figure you're not going to collapse in
| a heap as soon as you can't find a McDonalds.
|
| In Panama I just rented bikes and did day trips. In
| Colombia I started doing that, then bought a bike once I
| realized the country was a better fit for how I wanted to
| travel. It seemed like there was a stronger bike culture
| there. By which I mean, there were relatively more
| utility cyclists - not sport/fitness cyclists, but people
| with baskets on the back hauling fish or produce from
| their angling spot or farm to the market. Aside from
| bicycles, a lot of locals also rode scooters or light
| motorcycles - this made me feel more confident on the
| roads because the ubiquitous trucks and buses were more
| used to sharing the road with smaller and slower
| vehicles.
|
| The big difference I found touring in Colombia versus the
| US and Canada is that towns with affordable accommodation
| and other services were generally much closer together.
| It wasn't uncommon for me in parts of Canada to have
| 100km between towns, without even a guarantee to find a
| grocery store much less a camp site or motel in the next
| place. Especially in the prairies it was necessary to
| carry a LOT of water, plus plenty of food like oats,
| nuts, tortillas and so on. In Colombia there are lots of
| small towns of under 20,000 people and they all have
| hospedajes (kind of like a European pension, or very low
| budget B&B-without-the-breakfast), bakeries and
| convenience stores. I barely even needed a food bag -
| every day I could get fresh pastries in the morning.
|
| Because the towns were close together, I took it easy and
| sometimes rode just 40km or 60km a day, which was well
| worth it because the temperature in some areas was around
| 36C - the kind of heat above which you really start
| feeling heat stroke after 2-3 hours on unshaded roads. To
| deal with the heat, I decided to pull over everywhere
| there was a roadside stall selling drinks. Usually it's
| fruit juice (watermelon is best), sometimes a lemonade
| made with panela, occasionally chicha. I figured anything
| with water and sugar was worth stopping for.
|
| To navigate I just used the standard combination of
| OsmAnd~ (OpenStreetMap) and BRouter tool for offline
| routing. But it's important to double-check on Google
| Street View when you have internet, because often the
| helpful bike routing tools avoid the highway, which
| actually in Colombia is what you don't always want to do,
| because the "highway" is sometimes just a reasonably
| quiet two-lane country road. On the other hand, some of
| the back roads look like well-maintained gravel, but due
| to heavy rain they can turn into very deep mud. I got
| stuck in one or two spots that looked okay on Google
| Street View but were a real adventure on the day - not
| even a car could make it through, horses and dirtbikes
| only. But the benefit of being on a bike is you could
| easily head down a back way and then cross the river on a
| small sampan designed for foot traffic, so sometimes
| taking those back roads paid off for the fun aspect. They
| were definitely the exception rather than the rule,
| though - most times I figured better safe than sorry and
| tried to stick to main roads, especially when a back road
| would require more than 50km (my theoretical limit for
| being able to walk/hike back out in case I had to abandon
| my bike).
|
| One thing I didn't do in Colombia was go deep into the
| Andes. The climbs are just ridiculous. Like 2000m or
| more. Personally I don't enjoy hill climbing, and I don't
| like cold temperatures, so when I am touring on bike I do
| everything I can to stick to the lowland and plains. I
| think going the hills would be a very different
| experience and might need different preparation.
| Although, I think the hills are also far more popular
| routes both for bike tourers and for sport/fitness
| cyclists, so there would probably be much better support.
| Down in the valleys you're going to find yourself cycling
| with campesinos and trying to get stuff fixed at a moped
| shop instead of a bicycle shop, but that was fine by me.
|
| I think the best way to go if you have the time is just
| head over to the country you're thinking of traveling in
| with some panniers rolled up in a duffel, rent a bike
| once or twice to see if it feels good, then buy a cheap
| bike when you're there. That way you haven't invested too
| much in some kind of "dream journey" that doesn't turn
| out to be what you expected. But perhaps that's just my
| way of travel, not for everyone.
| mrbombastic wrote:
| Awesome thanks a ton for the details, very helpful. I
| certainly need to get a fair bit better at Spanish before
| I embark on anything similar. And having taken a few
| fairly short hikes in Colombia in the heat I can
| definitely see heat stroke being a concern. Thanks again!
| jacquesm wrote:
| Great write up! I've done some walking there and really
| recognize the scenery description. My favorite drink:
| iced pineapple juice.
| roflyear wrote:
| Not just that, where you are even in your local area. In the
| city, it is kind of surprising and kind of not, I have found
| that you feel safer. Cars seem to know how to navigate around
| bikes. In the country, that is not true. You have trucks blow
| by you doing 10 over the limit and they get close to you,
| really close. It wouldn't surprise me to learn that many do
| not even see you - these lifted trucks don't have much
| visibility.
| jacquesm wrote:
| Big semis can even suck you into their wake if you don't
| prepare for it when they just finish passing you.
| alisonatwork wrote:
| This is so bizarre to me. I just recently cycled through Canada
| and the US and everywhere I went people (including
| sport/fitness cyclists) told me to watch out because cyclists
| get killed all the time... But in my thousands of miles of
| touring, the only time I felt a little worried about cars was
| in Louisiana where some of the roads are very narrow and there
| are railings along the side so there is nowhere to escape to if
| an inconsiderate driver comes too close. Took nerves of steel
| when cars zoomed past with just an inch or two of space. But
| the rest of the time I just cheerfully pedaled along the
| shoulder with my hi-vis vest on, only occasionally getting
| yelled at and coal-rolled by jackasses in pickup trucks. Most
| of the time drivers gave me plenty of space.
|
| What was much, much more terrifying to me than cars was dogs.
| In certain parts of the country, people's dogs would charge out
| of the yard and chase me down the road for a half mile, barking
| and snapping all the way. I even got bitten once or twice. I'd
| definitely rate pet dogs as a bigger hazard than cars, or at
| least a scarier one. More dangerous than bears and coyotes too,
| in my experience.
|
| My advice for cars is to wear hi-vis gear, ride in the shoulder
| whenever there is one, confidently take up a decent slice of
| the road when there isn't, keep an eye on your rear view
| mirror, pull over to let very wide trucks pass, and never ride
| main roads at night or in poor conditions.
| skeeter2020 wrote:
| I have the old flag from my bike trailer we used when the
| kids were small that I mount sideways on the rear rack,
| sticking towards traffic. It hangs out about a foot past me
| and encourages traffic to give me some space.
| saiya-jin wrote:
| The thing is, statistics is against you on this. You only
| need 1 instance of careless driver, 1 aggressive dog or
| clueless wild animal to have a relative high speed crash. In
| that case, your skills and experience will not matter.
|
| Its all nice in echo chambers with heavy survivorship bias
| where everybody claims how they are fine (but had close calls
| here and there, often not even realizing them), but its far
| from reality. If you want some counter-balance (which most
| folks in these echo chambers really don't want), talk to some
| ER folks, or orthopedics.
| alisonatwork wrote:
| Clearly riding a bicycle on roads designed for much
| heavier, much faster vehicles isn't the safest pursuit in
| the world. Of course you would be much safer sitting at
| home. But that's a calculation you make any time you decide
| to step out the door. The way some people talk about
| cycling you'd think that merely getting on a bicycle for
| longer than 10km means instant death. That's obviously not
| the case, because there are always far more people who have
| successfully cycled any given stretch of road than ones who
| have died on it. The question people should ask themselves
| is if the risk is worth the benefits for them. And, if they
| have decided yes, then it's certainly more enjoyable to not
| spend every moment on that road terrified of other
| vehicles, whose behavior you have very little control over.
| If you want to do it, just do it.
| twmiller wrote:
| How is that "counter-balance"? Obviously the medical folks
| are only going to have talked to people who've had
| accidents, where as the bike forums are filled with people
| who've had accidents, who've had close calls, and who've
| had no issues.
|
| For what it's worth, I've got thousands of miles on a
| touring bike under my belt. I've had close calls...but I've
| also had close calls driving, flying, and boating. I've had
| close calls swimming and climbing, too. If the alternative
| is to hang out in my basement on the computer where it's
| 'safe' all the time, I'd rather stick to the close calls.
| skeeter2020 wrote:
| You don't counter "heavy survivorship bias" as you frame it
| by swinging to the other end and talking to ER docs about
| their horror stories; humans don't process information by
| consuming extreme data points and then internally averaging
| them into some sort of model. You look at the data in
| aggregate and end up pretty much where the experienced
| touring posts here land, which is rare but real risks
| sprinkled across typically accident-free riding.
| "statistics is against you on this" is NOT the reality, in
| terms of likelyhood of accident or severity comparing car
| travel to bike travel.
| Jistern wrote:
| Velomobiles are expensive. They are recumbent bicycles or
| tricycles with a fairing (a hard shell) that decreases drag and
| protects the rider from wind, rain, snow, etc.
|
| Last I checked they were around $5,000 to $10,000 (five thousand
| US dollars to ten thousand US dollars) but they look kind of
| great for touring to me. You can find myriad velomobile videos on
| YouTube.
|
| Flags, pool noodles (yeah, pool noodles), and of course LEDs can
| make them highly visible.
|
| For commuting the "Rotovelo" looks like it might be a good choice
| because it seems like it can easily withstand bumps, bangs, and
| scrapes. See...
|
| Rotovelo Ice Hockey Match! https://youtu.be/F_wXHFab5XU?t=108
| em-bee wrote:
| during middle and highschool i did a 6 week trip from germany to
| the center of france and then back through switzerland. the most
| memorable day was where i spent half a day pushing my bike up a
| mountain, and then go down the other side in less than half an
| hour. another trip was two weeks around the southern half of
| denmark, and another two weeks all over luxemburg. the craziest
| trip was going from austria to the netherlands. the goal was to
| be in the netherlands for the summer, so i took my bike to truck-
| stops and looked for trucks that might have space for my bike and
| asked to hitch-hike. that got me a mix of hitchhiking and biking
| on scenic hiking paths. i switched from biking to trains when i
| discovered how much cheaper the trains in eastern europe were.
|
| before doing these solo-trips i was part of a youthgroup that did
| most of their trips on bikes. we were all middle-school kids, and
| in the evening we would split into groups of three and knock on
| doors seeking a place to sleep.
|
| another memorable trip was cycling through new jersey, wearing a
| cycling jersey depicting a cow on a bike. that was a trip with
| several dozen people, organized by the bike commissioner (or
| something like that) of washington D.C.
|
| now with family, i'd love to get back on a bike again and take my
| kids on new adventures.
| Finnucane wrote:
| Check out the tour logs on https://www.crazyguyonabike.com/
| syndacks wrote:
| I rode from CA to NYC and wrote a book about it. The writing was
| much harder than the riding! If anyone wants to read it lmk how
| to contact you and I'll send it.
| TexanFeller wrote:
| In 95% of the US traveling by bike is insanely dangerous. Drivers
| do not expect to see bikes and their habits are adjusted
| accordingly. For example driving on the shoulder to let someone
| pass. Noone expects to see a bike there and pedestrians aren't
| foolish enough to stand there, and a bike would be in even more
| danger in the road itself. In Austin the so called bike lanes are
| crossed over by car turning lanes. Zero chance of me biking on
| public roads until bike lanes are physically separated, not just
| some painted line. I've been to Amsterdam and places where it is
| safe and we are decades if not centuries away from that working
| here.
| Drunk_Engineer wrote:
| North America offers many off-road touring opportunities. For
| example, the Great Divide route runs 2,100 miles from Canada to
| New Mexico, running almost entirely over unpaved roads. And New
| York has the 350-mile Erie canal trail.
| TexanFeller wrote:
| Interesting! So maybe there is a safe place to try it when I
| retire and have the time.
| contingencies wrote:
| I have cycle-toured in Australia, France, Yunnan (a lot), Laos,
| Romania, Taiwan, and Thailand on many bikes, but always on fat-
| tires with a steel frame, and personally most enjoy discovering
| new places, being away from people in nature, and conquering
| mountains. Nearly every day was fun but the history, scenery and
| food in Yunnan are amazing, and conquering _Transfagarasan_ [0]
| (Romania) from the north was memorable. You don't have to camp. I
| have only once cycle-camped for two nights in a remote region of
| Yunnan, usually I prefer to stay in small town hotels (save
| weight, less baggage). Key advice for new cycle-tourists: break
| your bike in first with local trips to ensure everything is
| hunky-dory mechanically, bring spare tubes (patching is too
| tedious unless you are going super far), minimizing bike weight
| is less important than having good gearing, buy quality bags
| (cheap ones will break and are not waterproof), and disc breaks
| are a must (V-brakes will wear in no time and provide
| insufficient stopping torque for heavily loaded bikes). Also,
| it's not a competition: you don't have to spend all day every day
| on the bike. I prefer to do 3-5 hours starting early in the
| morning, check in somewhere, wash cycle clothing, eat and explore
| an area.
|
| [0]
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Transf%C4%83g%C4%83r%C4%83%C8%...
| hoten wrote:
| How do you handle the short term planning for such trips? Are
| you calling and booking hotels ahead of time each day or do you
| just show up in a town at whatever time and figure it out last
| minute?
| contingencies wrote:
| It depends. On or off the bike my philosophy for travel is
| generally to never pre-book anything unless flying
| internationally or going to some major city where walking
| around to find a hotel is too tedious/time
| consuming/expensive (on a "waste half a room-night" basis).
| This is less of a valid exception when cycle touring, since
| it is so easy to cover ground on a bike, but cycling around
| dense Asian cities is no fun like Europe. Usually, out of a
| city, it's always a combination of destination research and
| satellite view / Google Earth. I look for small roads, vague
| estimates of the topography, and major sites of interest en-
| route. Things frequently worth stopping for by bike that car
| people miss are numerous: bridges, views, caves, villages,
| botanic gardens, waterfalls, beaches, festivals, weddings,
| funerals, markets, landslides, bullfights, wild animals,
| botany, insects, roadside vendors, food, historic plaques,
| locals, kids, etc. To be really relaxed and up for anything
| you don't want to fix your timing, so forward planning is a
| no-no. Research is completed when you have a general idea of
| topography and a general idea of what to deviate, look or
| stop for en-route, and a couple of towns that might be viable
| for end-of-stage.
| matt7aylor wrote:
| I've just come back from a short (~400 mile) bicycle tour to
| visit some friends and have previously travelled by bicycle to
| conferences or events all over Europe.
|
| If you only ever travelled long distances by highway/rail/air it
| could be hard to appreciate how much richer the world feels
| travelling by bicycle. Instead of a dreary bubble between generic
| transportation hubs you are generally travelling along the old
| routes that connect all the places where life has been for
| millennia, the amount of history (in Europe at least), scenery
| and humanity you stumble across just in the course of a typical
| day covering maybe 50 miles is huge.
|
| The typical question people ask is "how long did it take?" but
| the experience itself is more fulfilling, this is very much not
| what it's about (and you can speed up with trains etc. if you
| really need to get somewhere). It's one of the only ways I manage
| to properly disconnect from the ongoing background stress weight
| of running a startup. I'll eat 5 meals a day, everything tastes
| amazing and come back healthier and lighter (in more ways than
| one). I'll be living cheap (though the large amount of food can
| start to add up) and free under my own power and direction and
| carrying everything I need to stay so along with me. I'll be
| meeting people along the way and connecting with their humanity
| and kindness in a way that just doesn't seem to happen quite the
| same when you aren't travelling by bicycle.
|
| It may not be for everyone but I want to live in a world where
| that experience feels accessible to as many as possible.
| discordance wrote:
| Love riding but doing that next to high speed cars and trucks
| sucks.
|
| That doesn't get to you?
| tpm wrote:
| But you don't have to do that, if you plan accordingly. There
| are dedicated long distance cycle paths, see e.g.
| https://en.eurovelo.com/
| ginko wrote:
| The "dedicated cycle path" along the Atlantic Coast Route
| near me looks like this:
|
| https://www.google.com/maps/@63.3222885,10.1328111,3a,75y,3
| 4...
| tpm wrote:
| That's sad. Though Slovakia is not much better, we do
| have some bright spots. This is the Eurovelo along the
| Danube: https://maps.app.goo.gl/yL3Picyo2ZTuDaZ3A
| aidenn0 wrote:
| Yes, when bicycling in my town in Southern California, I
| often avoid the marked bicycle routes in favor of less
| busy streets with no marked bicycle route.
| Lariscus wrote:
| How much traffic can you expect on that road? I rode on
| similar roads and it was actually quite nice.
| atari800 wrote:
| I don't know about conditions anywhere in the world except
| the USA. But I've ridden across the USA, on different routes,
| multiple times.
|
| When bicycle touring in this country, you don't usually
| (almost never, in my case) do bike touring on roads that
| carry heavy traffic. You ride on mostly empty roads that have
| very low traffic counts. Every state compiles Average Annual
| Daily Traffic (AADT) statistics. There are roads where you
| might see one or two cars an hour.
|
| Those are the roads to ride on.
| jmspring wrote:
| I've done a couple of tours years back in Europe.
|
| I did a few multi-day charity rides here in California.
| Some of those included stints on a stretch of 101. You
| realize how shitty our roads can be.
| matt7aylor wrote:
| It may depend a little on where you are but generally on a
| cycle tour, where speed isn't such a priority, you don't tend
| to be taking the same bigger roads used by high speed cars or
| trucks (or may even be on routes largely separate from the
| roads). It can happen on occasion that you might want/need to
| go down a slightly busier road, in that case being a bit more
| of an odd road user (heavily loaded bicycle stands out) often
| you get a bit more consideration but a bit of road confidence
| certainly doesn't hurt.
|
| I can't speak for everywhere but in Europe (where most of my
| experience is) I think you would be able to find plenty of
| routes without much traffic (checkout places like
| https://www.opencyclemap.org/ ) and ironically those routes
| would probably have much more to see on them than the routes
| that did have the cars and trucks on.
| saiya-jin wrote:
| Sucks as its properly dangerous due to simple statistics (you
| need just 1 out of 10000 drivers to not pay enough attention,
| be high, super tired, getting seizure or heart attack, etc.).
| Riding on roads without dedicated full cycle lane sucks,
| period.
|
| Another point - directly breathing all fumes from thousands
| of cars every day, lorries, buses and other diesel marvels.
| More than compensating a healthy activity with equivalent to
| smoking a pack of cigarettes.
|
| Fanatics always propagate their sports/activity as next
| coming of jesus, but as with everything there are pros and
| cons. Biking on standard roads has massive cons.
| mdpye wrote:
| I don't know where you live, but the other thing I've
| noticed people who have never cycle toured really fail to
| notice is how many thousands of small roads there are, at
| least in Europe, which link everywhere.
|
| Agrigultural roads that you'd never bother (or even want)
| to take your car down. Residential streets that only the
| residents would drive on.
|
| I'd guess that on the average 5 day cycling tour in the UK
| and Europe, I'd see less than 1000 cars total, and often go
| for many hours without seeing any. Its glorious.
| kazinator wrote:
| In any sort of mountainous Europe, or anywhere else,
| there is one road through the valley. The side roads will
| either be dead ends that go up some ravine, or else steer
| back to the main road.
|
| Any side road advantageous to a cyclist (good pavement
| quality, shorter distance) will have cars, unless it's
| brand new and nobody knows about it.
|
| You have to find the good side roads which are not usable
| to drivers, due to, say, obstacles that a cyclist can get
| around easily. If it's not obvious from the entrance to
| that road, you will need local knowledge.
|
| There is always a risk that if you go down some random
| side road, you may be backing out to where you started.
|
| Riding on roads outside of city limits isn't such a big
| deal that you'd bother, in the first place. It depends on
| the exact conditions. What is the visibility like? (Curve
| with rocky wall on one side, precipice on the other? Or
| field?) How wide is the paved shoulder? What are the
| speeds like?
| mdpye wrote:
| In Europe at least, this is true for a vanishingly small
| number of key mountain passes. And most of them have been
| bypassed with motorways on shallower grades which are
| significantly longer, but still quicker for cars to
| travel.
|
| Everywhere else, the pyrennes, the alps and company are a
| spiderweb of tiny towns with tiny quiet roads between
| them, in a ratio of about 5:1 against the larger main
| roads. I've cycled them, traffic isn't a problem.
|
| As for paving, on a tour I'll take a hard pack, unpaved
| surface with no traffic over a main road all day every
| day.
|
| And knowing where the roads go? That's route planning!
| Have a little look at where you plan to go before you set
| out each morning. Strava's heat maps are really useful,
| though understand that road racers do prefer the highway,
| and they cycle a lot!
|
| I do this every year, and traffic just doesn't come in to
| it except at the large terminal cities where we get the
| international trains or ferries from...
| em-bee wrote:
| on a few bike trips i followed hiking trails. checking
| that the trail is going towards my destination and not in
| a circle. those trails were not always meant for bikes. i
| even remember carrying my heavy dutch-style bike and the
| luggage over rocks at one point, but that only slowed me
| down. it didn't stop me.
| kazinator wrote:
| If you want to go from town A to town B, and there is a
| direct A-B road, then you almost never want the A-C-B
| spiderweb path going through town C.
|
| The A-C road may not be any different from the A-B one in
| terms of A-B being "main" and A-C being a "secondary"
| road, and the path will likely be longer.
|
| A road actually going to a neighboring town is a strawman
| example of a side road.
| skocznymroczny wrote:
| Agricultural roads often come with their own dangers.
| I'll take a busy street over a tiny road blocked by a big
| black dog staring you down menacingly.
| brudgers wrote:
| Yes, it does depend on where you live.
|
| The Great Salt Lake in Utah is the size of Lichtenstein.
| The Grand Canyon of the Colorado is longer than the
| Italian boot is wide. England is the size of Alabama.
| strken wrote:
| Australia is roughly the size of the continental US with
| a tenth the population and we still have lots of small
| roads in the populated coastal green bits, so I'm not
| sure what your point is.
|
| It can be harder to find a safe route somewhere in the
| country, I'll give you that.
| brudgers wrote:
| Australia like Western Europe can be traveled near sea
| level. For example, Bern, Geneva and Zurich are all less
| than 500m.
|
| The US is not like that. There are only a few routes in
| the west because the west is more than a thousand miles
| of mountains and deserts nearly all above 1500m and much
| of it above 2000m.
|
| It is hundreds of miles between north south routes in
| Arizona because of the Grand Canyon. And the eastern
| route goes from vast remoteness to vast remoteness,
| Navajo nation to the Great Basin (an internal drainage
| the size of France).
|
| I am not a general fan of American exceptionalism. But
| for geography, it holds. The average height of the
| Colorado Plateau is about 2000m...almost as high as the
| highest point in Australia. And the plateau is larger
| than Germany.
|
| I am glad it works on your machine.
| strken wrote:
| Hey, I've lived in the US, and it's big enough that you
| need to specify where you're talking about. If for some
| reason your bicycle tour is going to take you around all
| of Arizona, that's a problem. If you're Californian and
| you don't live in the Sierras, what you've said doesn't
| hold as much, nor if you live in the Great Plains or New
| England.
|
| This is vaguely similar to Australia, which has gigantic
| deserts with terrible roads through them as most of the
| landmass, but geographically bikeable population centres
| where everyone actually lives.
| atari800 wrote:
| "Riding on roads without dedicated full cycle lane sucks,
| period."
|
| Sounds like you live in a large city or something. I can
| ride 100 miles on rural country lanes where I live, and
| only see a handful of cars all day.
|
| Please don't comment on subjects about which you know
| nothing.
| thoms_a wrote:
| Every time a car passes you with a massive speed
| differential, you are gambling with your life. As long as
| you (and your family) are willing to accept that risk,
| then all the power to you.
|
| Also, rural roads aren't exactly known for their alert
| drivers. Drunk driving is far more common due to lack of
| taxis/ubers.
| cycomanic wrote:
| Good job on making the GP point. I seriously doubt you
| know what you are talking about.
| Doctor_Fegg wrote:
| In many places there's a network of tiny little roads that
| are a much more enjoyable alternative to riding next to
| traffic. This is certainly true of most of Europe, but also
| large parts of the US as well - I had a great cycling holiday
| a few years back in New York State and most of the roads were
| no busier than here in the UK. Ironically the single worst
| road was one south of Kingston which was a state-designated
| bike route!
|
| I run cycle.travel, a touring-focused bike routeplanner
| (based on OpenStreetMap data, of course) which aims to find
| these roads. It generally won't find as direct a cycle route
| as some of the bigger names, but by and large the route
| should be quieter and less stressful.
| https://cycle.travel/map - always happy to hear
| comments/suggestions!
| timed0 wrote:
| Just to say I love cycle.travel. I have used it for several
| medium-length tours with kids and it suggests good, calm
| routes.
| matt7aylor wrote:
| That is a great looking site, I'll give it a try and be
| sure to remember it for telling others. I love how you can
| pick a point and look for nearby campsites.
|
| Normally I plan my tour routes offline using downloaded OSM
| maps (something like velomap.org) in QMapshack. One thing I
| like doing on there is having POIs I can turn on/off with
| things like UNESCO World Heritage Sites, National Trust
| Sites, World Wonders from the Civilization games etc. so I
| can tweak my route to connect a few of those dots if it
| goes near them.
| eCa wrote:
| Another happy fan here. So far I've used it for a couple of
| 5-10 day tours to great success (I'm in northern Europe).
| In fact, I just finished one a couple of days ago.
|
| One thing I've noticed is the routing's great aversion to
| hills. As someone who doesn't mind them I would sometimes
| like to be able to toggle that. (It's not a big problem,
| cycle.travel is beyond anything I've tried, it certainly
| beats the 1:200 000 maps of old.)
| thunfischbrot wrote:
| This is a work of art. I check out different cycle routing
| options every couple of years and have never been satisfied
| with the high number of intersections with traffic lights
| and changes from road to bike path to sidewalk... Your
| routing algorithm taking into account Eurovelo routes is an
| amazing idea. Will test in the coming days!
|
| I suggest you show input validation hints before submitting
| forms, e.g. for the user name.
| hermitcrab wrote:
| Cool resource, but I could see a key that tells me what the
| different symbols on the maps mean.
| bbu wrote:
| thanks for creating cycle.travel, this is a really great
| resource!
| verisimi wrote:
| Yeah - I should get my grannie and her grandkids to come make
| the 200 mile round trip by bike!
|
| I hear what you are saying - if you love bikes long journeys
| are wonderful. I imagine motorcyclists or long distance runners
| could get the same buzz.
|
| > It may not be for everyone but I want to live in a world
| where that experience feels accessible to as many as possible.
|
| But let's not kid ourselves that this is a viable option for
| most people. And if you mean that we should get rid of even
| more roads for bike lanes, you are actually going to restrict
| people engaging with distant relations and friends.
| prmoustache wrote:
| > And if you mean that we should get rid of even more roads
| for bike lanes, you are actually going to restrict people
| engaging with distant relations and friends.
|
| That is utter bullshit. You could dedicate half the secondary
| roads to non motorized traffic and add a separates bicycle
| path alongside every highway and fluidity of the cars traffic
| wouldn't be affected at all. It would even improve.
| Xylakant wrote:
| Me, my father and my son are making the trip Berlin - Baltic
| Sea this year (we've made the return three years ago). It's
| about 360 km, so roundabout 200 miles. We'll have electric
| cargo bikes, granted, but the small one is just 5, so he
| can't be expected to ride that on his little bike. It's
| definitely an option, but a lot of people don't consider it
| as an option. One of the problems I believe is that people
| consider the start of their holidays to be when they arrive
| at the destination - the trip there is a chore. If you want
| to travel by bike, you need to consider the trip as part of
| your vacation.
| fock wrote:
| Maybe we should reevaluate wether it's actually necessary for
| a free and democratic society to have these distanced
| families as a norm. The societal model you describe
| essentially evolved in lockstep with capitalism (people
| moving into cities/generally moving for work) and I'm not
| totally sure that it has to be this way. We could just live
| more regional and still be free and democratic as well!
| Indeed, currently it looks like rootlessness proclaimed by
| you and others as the preferable lifestyle will take away our
| freedom and democracy with it.
| brudgers wrote:
| The freedom of movement is a marker of political liberty.
|
| Some people (but by no means everyone) are better off away
| from their family and the town where they grew up.
|
| Imagine that you are the fourth generation to move far away
| from your patents, as I am. There is not some community in
| which I have generational roots...and it was the prospect
| of conscription by the Tsar's army that started it all. Not
| capitalism.
|
| For me, employment someplace far away was the way out of
| where we weren't from and that wasn't for us.
|
| Some people have a reason to stay. Those reasons are
| sometimes the reasons for other people to leave.
| verisimi wrote:
| Of course, we don't have democracy. We don't contribute to
| the thousands of decisions that are made. We have
| 'representative democracy' where we choose someone (once
| every 5 years) to make all those decisions for us.
|
| We should re-evaluate what? The reality that the system we
| find ourselves in, means that families are distributed?
| Would you force people back together into the same region?
| ksplicer wrote:
| Many elderly can't drive for medical reasons. Safe bicycle
| infrastructure doubles as a safer place for electric
| wheelchairs. Decreasing car reliance with better biking and
| walking infrastructure and better public transit, such as
| buses or trains, would increase accessibility for the elderly
| not decrease it.
| DeathArrow wrote:
| >you are generally travelling along the old routes that connect
| all the places where life has been for millennia, the amount of
| history (in Europe at least), scenery and humanity you stumble
| across just in the course of a typical day covering maybe 50
| miles is huge.
|
| What stops someone doing the same thing with the car,
| motorcycle or scooter?
| unculture wrote:
| You can absolutely travel the same roads, but there is
| something about the speed you are travelling that opens you
| up to really noticing the little details of the landscape
| around you.
| arccy wrote:
| you're more isolated from the outside in a glass and metal
| bubble (car)
|
| and everything just whizzes by too fast to appreciate
| anything
| eckmLJE wrote:
| The faster and heavier you are, the more capacity for harm
| you have, and the more you must pay attention to just the
| road in front of you instead of the world around you.
| analog31 wrote:
| For many of us, imposing a physical or technological
| limitation on an activity changes the experience. I can't
| think of a good explanation. A person with exceptional self
| discipline might not need it, but some of us know that we
| aren't that person.
|
| The speed and physical inertia of a car seem to translate
| into a psychological speed and inertia. Again, I can't
| justify this on utilitarian grounds. I find myself driving
| faster than I would go if I'm on my bike. As angry as drivers
| get when they're stuck behind my bike at 12 mph, imagine how
| angry they'd get if they were stuck behind my car at 12 mph
| for no apparent reason.
|
| In the car, I don't stop to notice "little" things. To do so
| requires getting the car off the road, finding a place to
| park (if there is one) getting in and out. On my bike, I can
| come to a complete stop and be off the road and parked,
| virtually anywhere, in about 15 seconds. I get priority
| parking at the supermarket. ;-)
|
| I admit that I've become somewhat anti-tourist, perhaps
| influenced by the experience of a driving vacation in the
| British Isles with my family. It seemed like every coastal or
| scenic road was jam packed with cars and tour buses, and
| every square foot of space filled with parked cars. It's
| possible to find less-touristy places to visit, but now those
| places are getting crowded too.
|
| These days when my family goes on a vacation, we like to find
| a destination where we can ditch the car, and hop on our
| bikes. I actually miss my bike when I'm on a trip without it.
| throw0101a wrote:
| > _What stops someone doing the same thing with the car,
| motorcycle or scooter?_
|
| For the car:
|
| > _In a car you 're always in a compartment, and because
| you're used to it you don't realize that through that car
| window everything you see is just more TV. You're a passive
| observer and it is all moving by you boringly in a frame._
|
| > _On a cycle the frame is gone. You 're completely in
| contact with it all. You're in the scene, not just watching
| it anymore, and the sense of presence is overwhelming._
|
| * Robert M. Pirsig, _Zen and the Art of Motorcycle
| Maintenance: An Inquiry Into Values_
|
| * https://www.goodreads.com/quotes/313360-in-a-car-you-re-
| alwa...
| mynameisash wrote:
| When I started riding motorcycle, I remember having this
| amazing feeling of being connected to my environment. Even
| though I was on the same roads and going the same speed as
| when I was in a car, it was wonderful and quite
| inexplicable.
|
| You stop at a sign or light, and you put your foot down.
| You have the wind at your face, the sun on your back. No
| radio, no cell phone beeping at you. You wave to
| motorcyclists coming from the opposite direction.
|
| Not that riding is without its dangers or downsides, to be
| sure, but it can be wonderful.
| em-bee wrote:
| when doing solo-trips i tended to skip lunch, preferring a good
| breakfast and dinner. at best i might have a snack if i get
| hungry, that is if i got something to carry from breakfast.
| wolverine876 wrote:
| That conveys my own experience exceptionally well. IME, it's
| the same bicycling within cities, where you live or as a
| visitor. I know those places and their people so much better
| now.
| lambic wrote:
| What do you eat on these trips? Do you carry food with your or
| just stop at shops and restaurants along the way? How heavy is
| your backpack?
|
| I love biking but I don't love lugging tons of stuff around.
| durkie wrote:
| Yeah, just depends on where you're going. We just finished a
| 4-day tour along the Neckar river in Germany and didn't carry
| anything extra (except maybe some leftover pastries from
| breakfast). But then long days up in the north Georgia
| mountains will require several hearty sandwiches, lots of
| small snacks, extra electrolytes and maybe a water filter.
| matt7aylor wrote:
| Depends a little. Usually you are passing through lots of
| populated places regularly and so generally I would stop at
| bakeries (local/different ones if I find them) and
| supermarkets to get the bulk of the food I would eat in the
| day, as well as the odd restaurant in the evening. I also
| tour with camping and simple cooking gear so would mix in
| some cooking depending on time/budget/availability of other
| options. On my last tour, for various reasons, I ended up
| doing more wild camping which this time meant cooking less
| (more evening time spent in towns before finding somewhere to
| camp) but in say Scotland, would probably be carrying more
| food and cooking more when wild camping. Always useful to be
| carrying at least a little food with you just in case you
| conk-out and need the energy.
|
| An example of a breakfast I was having on my last trip was: 2
| croissants, yoghurt with chocolate coated peanuts mixed in, a
| banana and some fruit smoothie (which seemed on offer a lot
| this trip) and I might stop for second breakfast/early lunch
| and get a couple of pasties at the next town with a bakery
| (handy because you can eat these while cycling). In Italy you
| might instead be eating things like focaccia from local
| bakeries (perfect size for my handlebar bag), the landscape
| of what you eat changes with region, season and mood. You
| might be surprised though just how good very simple food
| (bread/cheese) can taste when you are doing exercise all day.
|
| One thing I would advise is that it is a lot kinder on the
| body to attach the bags to the bike if possible rather than
| carry on your back. I tour relatively heavy and I think my
| bike/bags together weigh about 40-45kg, just about liftable
| at a push if I need to, for example, get a small boat for
| pedestrians (though usually I'd take a couple bags off to
| make it easier). It's very possible to travel a lot lighter
| than this though, particularly if not camping, some people
| just take a change of clothes and a credit card.
| bergenty wrote:
| I agree with everything you said but for walking. Bikes can't
| go everywhere, biking in cities is dangerous and uncomfortable
| (irrespective of good or bad bike infrastructure) and it's just
| not as satisfying as putting one foot in front of the other.
| Yea it's much slower than biking but at least a magnitude more
| rewarding in my opinion.
| ksplicer wrote:
| Good bike infrastructure absolutely makes it safe and
| comfortable. Separated bike lanes is key. I also love
| walking, but this kind of rhetoric is just car-centric
| propaganda.
| bambax wrote:
| I did a couple of 2000+ km tours in Europe on a... motorcycle.
| It's not sports, it has a big carbon footprint and gas can be
| expensive, but you can experience some of the same benefits:
| take less traveled roads, stop anywhere, meet people.
|
| I ride a bike every day but only on short distances; on a tour
| I would be afraid of not being able to pack enough things
| (clothes, shoes...) But it's a neat idea.
| thoms_a wrote:
| Came here to say this. Bicycling is absolute madness to me in
| any location that doesn't have dedicated separate bike paths.
| You are maximizing all possible sources of risk by riding a
| bicycle on shared roads.
|
| I've ridden motorcycles since I was 16, and everyone always
| sees me as the daredevil. Yet, I still think bicycle
| commuters are the true madmen. Zero protection, can't keep up
| with traffic, your very presence is a psychological irritant
| to motorists which causes them to wish you harm, etc.
|
| But don't take my word for it: https://youtu.be/wM8Xli2KTzI
|
| My only advice to cyclists: put your bike on your car's bike
| rack, take to a bike path and enjoy. If you want to get on a
| road on two wheels, buy a motorcycle and wear every piece of
| protective gear you can afford. You (and your family) can
| thank me later.
| wpietri wrote:
| That seems like a lot of advice from somebody who has
| apparently never tried it.
|
| If you did, one of the things you'd learn is the extent to
| which serious cyclists minimize the risks, from route
| choice to gear to behavior. E.g., the first bike tour I did
| was about 150 miles. I found a mailing list of local riders
| and people were happy to discuss my route and how to handle
| safety issues.
|
| In any case, you're wrong on the facts. Motorcyling is more
| dangerous. Deaths per 100m miles traveled is circa 25 for
| motorcyclists [1], while it's between 4 and 13 for people
| on bicycles [2]. Given that recommended touring distances
| for motorcyclists seem to be around 300 miles per day
| versus 50 for bicycles, bike touring is going to be much
| safer. Which only makes sense; if I'm riding at 10 mph vs
| 50 on a motorcycle, that's 25 times the kinetic energy that
| needs to get dissipated if something goes wrong.
|
| [1] https://www.motorcyclelegalfoundation.com/motorcycle-
| acciden... [2] https://bicycleuniverse.com/bicycle-safety-
| almanac/
| dsizzle wrote:
| Source #2 indicates that "wrong-way" biking is more
| dangerous, but my intuition is that it's safer: I like
| being able to see the traffic that is closest to me. I
| guess whatever advantage that provides is more than
| offset by the accident being head-on, and having less
| time for the driver to react (and maybe there's an
| expectation aspect too).
| seoaeu wrote:
| The problem is drivers seeing you. If you are in a
| serious crash it is probably going to be because they hit
| you, not from you hitting them. Motorists look for other
| road users they may be overtaking, but usually don't
| expect to see oncoming traffic in their lane
| wolverine876 wrote:
| AFAIK: The most important safety factor is being seen by
| the automobile drivers, and a disproportionate number of
| accidents happen at intersections and turns, including
| driveways. The drivers in those situations have a large
| cognitive load; they are looking for cars, not bicycles,
| and will look where they expect traffic to come from. You
| want to be where they are looking.
|
| Next time you drive a car, notice where you look.
| Consider where a bicycle would have to be in order to
| noticed if you are in a hurry, distracted, trying to
| figure out where you are or where to go, not expecting
| them, etc.
| eCa wrote:
| Think relative speed. Even a bike touring cyclist will
| regularly travel at speeds around 40 kph (25 mph). If you
| then have cars travelling at 80 kph (50 mph).
|
| Also, you learn hearing the difference in sound a car
| makes as it moves over to give room.
|
| In short, I'd wager that < 0.5% of all people that have
| done any sort of serious biking would prefer to ride
| against traffic.
| dsizzle wrote:
| Per the reference in the article above
| (http://www.bicyclinglife.com/Library/riskfactors.htm) 8%
| of bicyclists were going against traffic.
|
| Yeah relative speed goes hand-in-hand with head-on
| collision and less reaction time and expectation that I
| mentioned. I do bike a fair amount, but not on major
| roads. I am coming to realize that going with traffic is
| safer, despite it being hard to see cars coming from
| behind you. I also didn't realize that it's illegal in
| most places to bike against traffic
| https://roadbikebasics.com/ride-with-or-against-traffic/
| snovv_crash wrote:
| You can get mirrors on your handlebars or helmet if you
| lack situational awareness. I did this for my bike and
| it's a huge help, the Spintech drop bar mirrors are sleek
| and unobtrusive.
| wolverine876 wrote:
| > one of the things you'd learn is the extent to which
| serious cyclists minimize the risks
|
| At a social event which happened to include many members
| of the local bicycle club, I observed: Almost everyone I
| know who bicycles regularly has been hospitalized due to
| a bicycle-car accident. Is that true? Yes, they all
| agreed, that's about right.
|
| IME, they don't minimize risks well. There's no safe way
| to ride in traffic unless it's moving near bicycle-speed.
| However, there are side streets, etc., so that risk could
| be minimized if they wanted to do it; you can cut
| exposure to cars by 90% easily.
| seadan83 wrote:
| The perception from driving is not true to reality. For
| example, most busy roadw are completely empty about 70 to
| 95% of the time. To explain, off-peak, most roads are just
| quiet. Further, there are a lot of roads, plenty of ways to
| go from a connector to something less used (arguably too
| many roads). Then, most traffic are in convoys created by
| stop lights. This I wan tg to emphasize, the person in a
| convoy with 2 cars on each side of them feel like they are
| on a congested street. They do not realize they are the
| first cars for 3 minutes on that specific vacant stretch of
| road, and they will leave that stretch of road vacant
| moments later. There are lots more examples of how it
| really is a different experience compared to what people
| think it would be from just looking out a car window.
| ervine wrote:
| I don't have a car. Cyclists don't need your advice, we
| know it's increasing our risk to ride around idiot drivers.
|
| Let's change the rhetoric from "cycling is dangerous" to
| "driving a car is a serious responsibility".
| seadan83 wrote:
| On the same hacker news page as this article, is this one:
| https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2022-06-16/why-
| franc...
|
| Seemingly, car traffic is just straight up dangerous in the
| US (to everyone). It's normalized how dangerous car traffic
| is, there are plenty of car crashes every day that kill and
| maim, yet we feel so comfortable driving we hardly pay
| diligent attention and have very absurdly low standards for
| who can get and keep a drivers license.
| Matthias247 wrote:
| The comment more sums up what is wrong with current society
| than with biking: people in 2T metal boxes feel entitled to
| own the road, plus get totally stressed out if they see
| anything that prevents them from doing it and perform risky
| maneuvers.
|
| The answer to that problem should not be pushing weaker
| participants off the road.
| contingencies wrote:
| _The Highway and Automobile culture are symbols of
| totalitarian cultures which deny people more sustainable
| and equitable alternatives for mobility and transport._ -
| Vandana Shiva (2004)
| cycomanic wrote:
| > Came here to say this. Bicycling is absolute madness to
| me in any location that doesn't have dedicated separate
| bike paths. You are maximizing all possible sources of risk
| by riding a bicycle on shared roads.
|
| > I've ridden motorcycles since I was 16, and everyone
| always sees me as the daredevil. Yet, I still think bicycle
| commuters are the true madmen. Zero protection, can't keep
| up with traffic, your very presence is a psychological
| irritant to motorists which causes them to wish you harm,
| etc.
|
| > But don't take my word for it:
| https://youtu.be/wM8Xli2KTzI
|
| Whatever one might think about the general premise, but
| this video is absolute rubbish. All the little example
| videos he puts in is of people riding on crazy tuned
| e-bikes or downhill bikes etc.. On the other hand the few
| instances of motorcycling videos show him just riding along
| in traffic, a bit disingenuous.
|
| > My only advice to cyclists: put your bike on your car's
| bike rack, take to a bike path and enjoy. If you want to
| get on a road on two wheels, buy a motorcycle and wear
| every piece of protective gear you can afford. You (and
| your family) can thank me later.
|
| Considering that the article points to bike paths off
| general roads your post is a bit redundant.
|
| I would still question your premise. You ride a motorbike
| beside the fact that motorcycle deaths and serious injuries
| outstrip cycling ones by quite a margin (it's right there
| in the video you posted). So I guess safety is not your
| main priority. Moreover, if we consider overall health
| benefits you will live longer if you commute by bike, so if
| health is your priority you should absolute bike.
| newaccount74 wrote:
| I did both, and I think motorcycle tours and bicycle tours
| are very different.
|
| On a bicycle, you'll be a lot closer to nature. A lot of
| paths I use are closed to motor traffic and you can't ride
| with a motorcycle.
|
| On the motorcycle, you can cover more ground and see a lot
| more different places in the same time. Also, cars don't feel
| as dangerous, so you can ride roads with lots of car traffic
| that I wouldn't ride on a bicycle.
| randomluck040 wrote:
| Also you can hit the twisties with the motorcycle :) I
| think both are very different as well for the reasons you
| have mentioned. I think it depends a lot on where you want
| to go in what amount of time. On a weekend on the
| motorcycle you can travel to another country in Europe, on
| bike it wouldn't be possible for me because the border is
| too far away. I believe it's two different philosophies,
| for me the motorcycle is the middleground between car and
| bicycle. Depending on the motorcycle you have a different
| kind of freedom compared to a car.
| Cockbrand wrote:
| > on a tour I would be afraid of not being able to pack
| enough things
|
| You can always start small with a weekend trip and see which
| of the items you packed you actually needed, and you'll find
| out which items you forgot to pack. If you take good note of
| these, you'll be a proficient and efficient packer very soon,
| and you'll go on trips that last for days or weeks with the
| exact amount of stuff you need. And at least in Europe, the
| next supermarket is never so far away that you can' t reach
| it on the next day in case you did forget something
| essential.
| jacquesm wrote:
| And the big one - for me - it's noisy! Bikes are utterly
| silent so you don't spook wildlife and the locals tend to be
| a lot more friendly than if you disturb their neighborhood
| with your motorbike.
| robin_reala wrote:
| I've got a bike with a belt drive and that's freakishly
| quiet. Would recommend if you're optimising for peace.
| jacquesm wrote:
| I really like the belt drives but I don't like the
| required split in the frame.
| Lio wrote:
| Yeah there's not much more magical than going round a bend
| on the bike and coming face to face with a stag.
|
| He looked at me and I looked at him, didn't seem spooked at
| all.
|
| Being able to ride the quietest country roads regularly
| makes me really happy that I don't live in a city.
| jacquesm wrote:
| A few weeks ago I almost tripped over a fairly massive
| wild boar, dusk at the Hoge Veluwe. Super impressive up
| close (and the most dangerous animal in Europe right
| now). Fortunately I have very good brakes :)
| deebosong wrote:
| I don't ride mopeds/ scooters/ motorcycles. I've done a
| couple of cross country road trips. I do cycle pretty much
| every day for fitness, fun, and challenging myself.
|
| But just like you did, I kinda feel like cross country road
| trips would be excellent on back roads via motorcycles. In a
| car, it's a bit disconnected and insulated. On a bike, it
| just seems way too slow and tiresome.
|
| Only things I'd want in a cross country motorcycle is: a
| machine that's under 50 pounds, has a max speed of 50 mph
| (I'd prefer to keep it at 20-30 mph), goes 300 miles per
| gallon, and costs under $3000. SO I GUESS I WON'T BE TAKING
| THAT CROSS COUNTRY MOTORCYCLE TRIP EVER THEN.
| bambax wrote:
| You're describing my first moped: https://www.mobylette-
| mag.fr/wp-content/uploads/2017/06/cara...
|
| They don't make those anymore, but they were incredibly fun
| to ride (and at the time, it cost 6000FF new, which
| translates to maybe EUR1000-1500 today).
| JKCalhoun wrote:
| Yeah, Honda Trail 150. But, of course, it's over 50 pounds
| and new over $3K.
| lifeisstillgood wrote:
| As someone who deeply agrees with this, and yet just spent most
| of the day in A&E thanks to a car driver who was not looking,
| we as a society need to rethink our built infrastructure.
|
| Over the next few decades we have to change so much
| infrastructure to solar / electrification that we have an
| enormous _opportunity_ to make it not just a question of
| survival but a better civilisation - more human.
|
| Cities where every child can cycle to school on car free paths,
| every worker can get to work on car free paths.
|
| Hell it even makes carbon sense to get rid of petrol cars in
| favour of diesel buses.
|
| The design of our lives environments is a force multiplier for
| our quality of life
| bojangleslover wrote:
| I get what you're saying but you ever tried biking in
| Amsterdam at rush hour? There's just as much congestion.
| Nobody's going to die in a crash though, I'll give you that.
| But the experience itself is more crowded.
|
| I think what you're looking for is a more rural existence.
| lifeisstillgood wrote:
| I do / have done the London cycle superhighway at rush hour
| - it's pretty much the same deal (although i would call any
| electric bikes "powered" and question if they should be on
| the same path / as powerful).
|
| The point is if there was a dedicated (about a metre wide,
| cut off from road traffic by a raised kerb) cycle lane not
| just through Londons busiest roads but ... well everywhere
| there is a car road.
|
| Just say if you want a car there you should also have a
| bicycle.
|
| We seem to think that the industrial revolution chnaged
| something - like globally there should be some kind of
| "profit".
|
| I think it's just we as a species get to still be at a
| subsistence level, just a higher subsistence level.
|
| NB- re london cycleways - yeah people do die. The cannon
| street path was opposite the LFB station and they did not
| have far to go to wash the blood away sadly.
| bee_rider wrote:
| > although i would call any electric bikes "powered" and
| question if they should be on the same path / as powerful
|
| Sort of agree, although an electric assist (for people
| who aren't in great shape, to get over hills) might be an
| exception. Limit it to 15mph or whatever.
| monetus wrote:
| Like the sibling mentioned, a pedal assist makes
| intersections safer - at least, it seems that way here in
| the southeast of the US. Barreling through a walkway and
| endangering the people around them is the problem, but it
| is kind of difficult to sell a bike with the potential
| for the former that doesn't have the latter as well.
|
| It would be so nice to share most roads - but like op
| mentioned traveling through the historical European
| sites, the greenways being built here are approximating
| that. It is changing our city government significantly.
| Hope it is yours as well.
| jacquesm wrote:
| It's still easily twice as fast as trying to do the same
| route by car.
| bluejekyll wrote:
| > I think what you're looking for is a more rural
| existence.
|
| Speaking for myself, absolutely not. The amount of things
| available in cities compared to rural areas is immense.
| I've lived in both.
|
| Theater, music venues, libraries, restaurants, beer
| gardens, good food markets, schools. I have all of this
| writhing walking and biking distance. You don't get that in
| rural areas without needing a car.
| AtlasBarfed wrote:
| Rural areas are actually bike-averse. No shoulders, high
| speed limits, drunk drivers, asshole angry white guy
| pickup truck drivers, conservative contempt for "liberal"
| bicyclists.
|
| They SHOULD be better but... no.
|
| Then again my urban experience is Minneapolis St Paul,
| possibly the most bike-able city outside of winter I've
| seen.
| em-bee wrote:
| i just saw the same in a documentary about biking in
| germany. major roads in rural areas have absolutely no
| space for bikes. cars go at the speed limit, and riding a
| bike from one village to the next is more dangerous than
| any city.
| dmarinus wrote:
| I'm daily cycling through Amsterdam (City center) at rush
| hours (8 am, 5 pm), it's busy but no congestion (longer
| than 10 seconds). But you definitely need some cycling
| skills and know your way around.
| cesnja wrote:
| Imagine how that would look if everybody was driving their
| own car.
| prawn wrote:
| Standstill?
| Tade0 wrote:
| > I think what you're looking for is a more rural
| existence.
|
| People tend to forget that while there are benefits in
| increasing density, they don't continue ad infinitum.
| bergenty wrote:
| That's not categorically good for everyone. This means we
| will need to have dense living conditions. A lot of people
| would much rather live in semi rural areas and have a lot of
| land and a lower density of people. That's pretty
| incompatible with not having good car infrastructure.
| bretthoerner wrote:
| The problem is that rural and suburban living is heavily
| subsidized in relation to urban living, which has economies
| of scale. This doesn't even factor in things like per-
| capita pollution. If people who would "rather" live a
| certain way actually paid their fair share (i.e. for
| negative externalities) it'd be a different story.
| bergenty wrote:
| Infrastructure is used for a lot of things including
| transportation of goods and produce. It makes no sense to
| further incentivize moving to cities/urban areas as they
| already have plenty on incentives already.
| bretthoerner wrote:
| > including transportation of goods and produce
|
| Forgive me, if your rural land is on a major interstate
| then I definitely agree! For every branch off that major
| arterial the road becomes more and more specific to a few
| number of people, who rarely pay the full cost of the
| road/utilities that service them.
|
| > It makes no sense to further incentivize moving to
| cities
|
| I'm not asking for any incentives. I'm asking to stop
| sending my money to highway expansion, road repair and
| other services to people who live very sparsely. Let them
| pay for the extension (and maintenance) of service
| themselves, and then they can decide whether they would
| "rather" live there.
| [deleted]
| habibur wrote:
| How long does 50 miles of cycling take in a day? As in total
| hours of cycling.
| Finnucane wrote:
| On a fully loaded touring bike, you're not going faster than
| 15 mph, so you could plan 4-6 hours of riding, depending on
| your route.
| bbu wrote:
| I've travelled ("overlanding") the panamerican highway for
| roughly 2 1/2 years and I've always admired the people doing this
| on a bicycle. Since I'm back I've done much more bike touring
| than before and I do enjoy it a lot. The best thing about bike
| travelling is that speed, you really do get a sense of the
| landscape and the changing of it. On the other hand, a quick
| detour up to a mountain that you saw from the coast is not an
| easy feat and you will have to skip a lot of things that are not
| on your route.
| AtlasBarfed wrote:
| Ye gods an electrified bike with a 50-75 mile range, assist/etc
| would make this so much more accessible for people: you can tow
| more, get up hills, fight headwinds like a pro cyclist would. And
| you can recharge over lunch.
|
| You could probably go 100 miles a day with the energy of a 20-30
| mile ride, and hold 20mph if you needed to regardless of
| conditions. And carry all the serious rain gear too.
|
| And the bikes are tougher, you can carry spares and tools...
|
| The only issue is the asshole drivers of America, especially the
| roll coal pickup trucks. And it is tough, because rural America
| is conservative and full of very angry pickup truck drivers.
| jacquesm wrote:
| I built just that (or rather, I built the battery and figured
| out how to hook it up safely to the existing system):
|
| https://jacquesmattheij.com/long-range-ebike/
|
| It does a shade under 100 miles on one charge.
| prmoustache wrote:
| Even better on a tall bike
|
| https://youtu.be/WcdA4D9IyLM
| groundthrower wrote:
| Have cycled from Northern Europe to South Africa, crossed Europe
| several times and also crossed US, New York to California. Best
| way to experience a country.
|
| Don't have time? Try to do a quick one and turn it into an
| adventure. One of my most exciting trips was going from Southern
| to Northern Europe in just a week.
|
| I recommend to pack lightly, and don't spend to much time
| planning on gear and routes - just do it otherwise you'll risk to
| postpone it again and again.. just do it.
| jacquesm wrote:
| > One of my most exciting trips was going from Southern to
| Northern Europe in just a week.
|
| Now that is impressive. Do you remember your route?
| simonebrunozzi wrote:
| Where one could find the equivalente of these great 8 bike trips,
| but in Europe, instead of US?
| stevenwoo wrote:
| None of these is exclusively on non car routes but a couple
| come close
| https://www.theguardian.com/travel/2018/jul/05/10-great-long...
| ch33zer wrote:
| Last summer I completed a cross-USA ride from Oregon to Virginia,
| over 3000 miles. It was the most fulfilling amazing experience of
| my life. My family is tired of hearing me start sentences with
| 'when I was on my ride'. That said it was scary at times. In the
| US some places are outright hostile to cyclists. I was flipped
| off, coated in exhaust by big diesel burning trucks (on purpose),
| and run off the road multiple times (not sure if intentionally).
| It truly is an amazing experience but the lack of bike infra in
| this country is so sad. My next ride is going to be an off-road
| one where I don't have to worry about cars.
| philips wrote:
| I did Oregon to Idaho and having to take even brief moments on
| freeways or riding on the shoulder with passing semi trucks was
| enough to convince me that cross country wasn't for me. We
| really need to complete the cross country trail.
|
| https://www.railstotrails.org/greatamericanrailtrail/
| tech_tuna wrote:
| Years ago, I rode from Boston to Seattle (with a nontrivial and
| unplanned detour through Canada) by myself. I may never do
| another cycling tour again (for a number of reasons) but it was
| one of the greatest experiences in my life.
|
| It all started out when I heard about some friends (brothers)
| who did the same and I know that I personally motivated at
| least 3 other people to do similar rides.
|
| Oh jeez, I could go on and on actually, but I will keep it
| brief, it was a wonderful experience overall. I am lucky and
| grateful that I was able to do something like that.
| jacquesm wrote:
| > I could go on
|
| Please do! Fascinating all these stories.
| jacquesm wrote:
| Agreed with all of these, and they don't apply just to the US.
| It's funny to realize that until the 60's or so bicycle holidays
| were the norm here, then it became car trips and after that
| airplane rides to ever more exotic locations. But not all that
| long ago it was just grandpa and grandma and their tent on a
| bike. A tandem if they were going for the fancy version (or if
| grandma wanted to do some knitting on the way...).
|
| As for the reasons themselves, I'd like to add:
|
| 7) friendships made on bike tours seem to last a life time
|
| 8) people help each other far more readily than when using other
| modes of transportation
|
| 9) the sense of accomplishment
|
| 10) the sense of immersion, which is far stronger than when
| looking at the scenery through the windshield of a car
|
| 11) the confidence boost from accomplishment
|
| 12) if you travel with others you will get to know them _much_
| better as people than when making the same trip by car or plane
| (their good sides and their bad sides)
| rambambram wrote:
| During corona time I suddenly found myself with a bicycle caravan
| project. It's like a big cart - one person bed size - for behind
| my bicycle. I recently finished this thing and am now planning to
| go for a test ride soon.
|
| https://theredpanther.org
| jacquesm wrote:
| Absolutely fantastic, what an amazing build!
| rambambram wrote:
| Thanks!
| kcindric wrote:
| I commuted everyday using my bicycle and did a few tours in my
| 20s here in Europe. Those were the best travel experiences I had
| in my life, especially when my partner joined me on one of my
| tours. But few months into my 30s I hurt my back (two herniated
| discs) and although I'm mostly fine now I can't ride a bicycle
| for longer periods. This depresses me quite a bit. I miss the
| freedom, views and the community.
|
| I started to think about buying a recumbent bike for touring but
| there's no one around me who owns or sells one to try it.
| cycomanic wrote:
| > I started to think about buying a recumbent bike for touring
| but there's no one around me who owns or sells one to try it.
|
| My mother used to have one. As long as you're not crossing the
| Alpes it is great for tours (the riding tends to be
| significantly easier due to less wind resistance), but not so
| great for commuting in the city (you're seen less, have less
| maneuverability, need more space for parking ...). I highly
| recommend searching out a place and maybe do a weekend trip to
| a city near you where there is a job to try it out, however be
| aware it takes a while to really feel comfortable on them.
| kcindric wrote:
| I heard riding up-hill is more challenging but it's still
| better than not riding at all. I'll probably have to ride
| 300-400 km to a more bike-centric place to find a shop that
| sells recumbents but there's no other option. These types of
| bikes are expensive though.
| wolverine876 wrote:
| In addition to other comments: They also are safer, at least in
| one significant way: Most accidents on upright bikes involve
| people flying over the handlebars.
| downut wrote:
| I have never ridden a recumbent. But for 7 years I had a
| regular cycling partner who rode one, for similar reasons. He
| was also an ultra cyclist (think 300 miles or more a ride). We
| did many centuries in the mountain West. Very hard to draft on
| the long downhill grades, but slow on the up. No big deal. The
| thing is the poser cyclists who sport the carbon and the kit
| and the electronics are almost entirely squares and will give
| you shade... but you just ignore them. It's the people riding
| across the country, enjoying themselves, not caring what other
| people think, that's the people I want to ride with.
|
| As for trying one out, I would recommend talking to your LBS
| with the best mechanical reputation. Every recumbent rider I've
| seen was the only one around, and because their rigs are non-
| standard they tend to have a very good relationship with their
| competent LBS. I suspect the local recumbent person would be
| delighted to introduce you to their ride.
| kcindric wrote:
| Thanks for the encouragement! Yeah, I didn't bother about the
| lycra warrior culture when I was touring, just bringing so
| much competition and rigidness in such a (to me) anxiety free
| environment was off-putting to me.
|
| My friend, who worked in a bike shop, told me that recumbents
| require a knowledgeable mechanic but if I find one he/she
| will be more than happy to work on such a different build.
| davem8 wrote:
| I quit my job as a data scientist in 2019 and spent about 6
| months cycling around Europe. It was a great move it really built
| my confidence and enforced my since of self reliance. I was on my
| own things would go wrong bike trouble, bad weather, difficulty
| finding a place to camp, loneliness, but I could overcome them
| all and realised I can solve any problem the world throws at me.
|
| I was a little worried about finding a job after, and having a
| gap on my CV but I easily found another data science job and have
| changed jobs no one even asks about it.
|
| If like me you have an urge to take a bicycle tour do it you
| won't regret it.
| vanilla_nut wrote:
| I've gotten really into touring in the last couple of years,
| and a Euro bike trip is in my plans for next spring/summer. Any
| suggestions for what season and where you'd recommend for a
| month-long tour? I'm currently thinking May, perhaps the
| corridor from Normandy thru Brussels onto Amsterdam. But I
| haven't visited enough of Europe to know if
| temperatures/wind/weather will be amenable for that.
|
| Of course I'm also considering dropping my job at some point
| and biking for 6+ months.
| eCa wrote:
| I would probably have gone with June for that, but on the
| other hand I once spent an entire July biking in Spain, which
| to be fair was a bit hot.
|
| To see historic weather I use wunderground.com, for example,
| here[1] is the weather for May 2021 in Amsterdam. I usually
| check a few years to avoid one-off years.
|
| [1] https://www.wunderground.com/calendar/nl/amsterdam-
| airport-s...
| LightG wrote:
| I have a similar gap in my CV.
|
| I've found that the companies/people I most want to work for
| are genuinelyhttps://news.ycombinator.com/threads?id=LightG
| interested in that gap rather than are suspicious about it.
|
| I use how they respond to it as a minor filter for those I
| don't want to work with.
| Hellbanevil wrote:
| Get a state license in anything, and say you were unemployed
| for those resume gaps. Most license requirements are easy to
| fudge.
| brudgers wrote:
| _It's not hard to cover 50 miles a day, or 300 miles in a week,
| which means you can see a lot. Yet stop in a second, anywhere._
|
| Nothing against bicycle touring, but while a bicycle may force
| slower travel, a bicycle is not necessary for it.
|
| A person can road trip in their car, truck, or van [1] at a
| similar pace. The daily cost of gasoline will be fairly
| low...less than about $20 per day even for a motorhome driving
| California.
|
| How a person travels is more a matter of time resources. At 300
| miles a week, it will take ten weeks to go from coast to coast.
| Few people have that kind of free time.
|
| And if you have ten weeks for travel, you will almost certainly
| have a life changing experience irrespective of travel mode.
|
| [1] or upon a motorcycle, moped, or scooter.
| bklaasen wrote:
| > A person can road trip in their car, truck, or van
|
| > or upon a motorcycle, moped, or scooter.
|
| Not quite the same thing; you're isolated from your environment
| by the noise and the cabin or the helmet. You won't hear the
| birdsong, the silence, the wind rustling in the trees. Much of
| the depth of the experience is in the total engagement with
| your environment from moment to moment.
|
| > Few people have that kind of free time.
|
| ...if they're selling their labour in exchange for money. Do
| you need to spend quite as much as you do every fortnight? If
| you're not living from paycheck to paycheck, spend a couple of
| years saving and then take time off to do a big trip.
|
| I did it during 2017; the mortgage payments continued and I
| lived on the rest. I had money left over at the end.
| brudgers wrote:
| Everyone can find moral superiority in their personal choices
| without much effort.
|
| Finding morality in someone else's orthogonal choices is the
| hard work.
|
| For me, the birdsong and the wind are there but for stopping
| beside the road for the sake of stopping.
|
| In those moments I am just there not even riding a bicycle.
| wnolens wrote:
| You can take a helicopter to the top of a mountain in
| 1/20th the time, step out and see the same view, but is it
| really a comparable experience to having hiked it?
| brudgers wrote:
| Hiking is a different experience. For you the differences
| might make it a better one.
|
| For someone else, the logistics of a hike might suck all
| the joy away.
|
| For others hiking may become a shopping exercise...gear,
| guides, supplies, permits and such.
|
| For still others, why hike up a mountain when you could
| go surfing?
|
| Some people don't want the burden of owning and
| maintaining a bicycle touring rig. They find more value
| elsewhere.
|
| YMMV.
| Lionga wrote:
| So you failed in "Finding morality in someone else's
| orthogonal choices is the hard work." by posting that van
| or car might be better?
| brudgers wrote:
| I don't think what how I travel is morally superior.
|
| I know it is better for me.
|
| Because the alternative to how I travel is not a bicycle.
| The alternative is more or less not traveling to the
| places I travel.
|
| And not traveling with a typewriter, six cameras, and a
| 61 key Yamaha.
| eCa wrote:
| That is a good point, and one I struggle to understand why more
| people don't.
|
| However! The pace can be the same by day or week. But the
| average speed while moving is different. One not necessarily
| better than the other.
|
| Travelling by car will eg allow more time sightseeing, walking
| around a city at lunch. While travelling by bike is more like
| you get to see a little bit of lots of things. And you can stop
| wherever and lift the bike off the road if necessary.
|
| For some trips, a car is better, for other, a bike. For other
| still, hiking or taking a train or a plane. I've done all five,
| and all have their pros and cons.
| rickspencer3 wrote:
| In, _cough_ , 1991, my wife and I did a bike tour in Europe for
| our honeymoon. We spent a total of 4 weeks in Holland, England,
| and Germany. We took trains and of course ferries to cover larger
| differences. We did less than 50 miles in a typical day, iirc.
|
| The thing is, back then, no GPS, no Internet, just maps and
| asking people for help. The trip was not particularly challenging
| and was very rewarding. It seems like such a trip would be even
| more easy and fun today with all of the extra context and
| information that you have with a smart phone.
| abyssin wrote:
| I agree! What I love about a bicycle trip is how little
| preparation it actually requires during the fair weather
| season. You don't need fancy equipment and a phone gives you
| all the information you need. The OsmAnd app is quite good.
| user_7832 wrote:
| This reminded me of a particular quote, I think by an Indian
| author. To paraphrase
|
| _" Cars are way too fast, the world speeds past in a blur.
| Bullock/ox carts are nice but not much faster than walking.
| Cycling, however, gives you time to say hi and be waved back,
| while being fast enough to be practical."_
|
| I wish I could remember the author (maybe Sudha Murthy, Ruskin
| Bond, Rudyard Kipling or even perhaps Roald Dahl?), perhaps some
| other HN-er might remember!
| oskhib wrote:
| I might be embarking on a similar trip next year--same route. I'm
| not familiar with the American climate; What would be the ideal
| time of year to do such a journey? February/March to July/August?
| nverno wrote:
| I did the northern route, NH to OR, July-Sept. It was getting a
| bit chilly towards the end, but the scary weather is storms you
| hit in the midwest in the open plains. Those tend to be worst
| in the late summer, I think. It's pretty terrifying on a bike
| in the middle of nowhere, with plains as far as the eye can
| see, when the horizon ahead turns black and you just watch the
| lightning bear down on you. People out there are really nice,
| though, and would often pull over and offer shelter.
| chrismorgan wrote:
| I strongly recommend a recumbent tricycle for solo touring. I've
| done multi-week cycling trips with my Greenspeed GT3 twice in
| America and once in New Zealand and almost once in Australia.
|
| Recumbent trikes are _much_ more convenient for these purposes.
|
| I've gone from basically not having done any exercise at all for
| several months to riding ~100km per day, ending up only weary in
| the legs at the end of each day, not in pain in at least back and
| crotch as you certainly would be on an upright bike.
|
| The inherent stability of a three wheel base means you can load
| quite heavily without it being in the slightest bit troublesome--
| you'll go slower, but won't have any balance issue. In each of my
| trips, it hasn't been _just_ a cycling tour, but I've had other
| gear with me too, as it has become my habit if I'm going to
| another country for any sort of work or conference to take my
| trike with me and explore the place thus. My typical load is well
| in excess of 20kg--panniers on a rear wheel rack, then pile other
| stuff on top and strap it all down with bungee cords. I have a
| fairly heavy tarp that I use to wrap the trike up for air travel
| (it folds in half), and then it serves as a ground sheet for
| camping.
|
| I am firmly convinced that trikes are considerably safer, too; as
| well as the inherent stability, there's also visibility, _your_
| visibility: you behold the world in front of you readily without
| needing to crane your neck, and, since you _can't_ really look
| over your shoulder due to the posture, you have a mirror that is
| mounted in such a way that it works well (which isn't my
| experience of mirrors on bicycles), so that you can easily keep
| an eye on what's coming up, and interact usefully with traffic
| rather than being blind.
|
| The only downsides I've really observed are: (a) being lower, you
| generally can't see well over guard rails at scenic points on
| bridges and ocean roads; (b) off-road cycling trails are probably
| not well-adapted to you (not that this _quite_ stopped me from
| taking things like the Timber Trail and the Remutaka Trail in NZ
| last year, though the GT3 specifically is very poorly suited for
| both with its extremely low clearance on its rear derailleur);
| and (c) three tracks instead of one generally leads to a rougher
| ride on very-low-quality surfaces, and more potential for debris
| punctures (in 2014, on my first cycling tour, I discovered that
| California in autumn has a particularly virulent type of thorn
| endemic, and that the slick tyres that the trike came with are
| eminently unsuitable--I averaged more than one flat per day,
| where on subsequent trips with Schwalbe Marathon Plus I've never
| had one).
| jacquesm wrote:
| Beware of what is apparently called 'leg suck' when riding a
| recumbent!
|
| http://www.bentrideronline.com/messageboard/showthread.php?t...
|
| I've had just that and trust me you don't want it happening to
| you (7 hour operation, fairly massive steel parts in my right
| leg+associated other hardware).
| chrismorgan wrote:
| Yeah, I wouldn't want to ride without clip-in pedals (which
| have all the advantages they have on upright bicycles, and
| lack the disadvantage of needing to unclip when stopping).
| kcindric wrote:
| Thanks for sharing this! I'm really interested in getting a
| recumbent because of my back injury (I talk about this in this
| thread) and I think I'll start exploring all the options. The
| only two things that are holding me back are a) these types of
| bikes are more expensive than regular ones, multiple times b)
| embracing that I can't probably ride a regular bike anymore,
| it's a mental thing, and it's a mix of grief and fear how will
| people perceive me.
| chrismorgan wrote:
| I'm not entirely sure why there's so definite a link between
| being unable to ride a bicycle and riding a recumbent
| tricycle, though I know it to be so from talking to local
| manufacturers. For me, I'm perfectly able-bodied, I just
| wanted to ride a recumbent tricycle because it seemed to me
| that they would be generally better (for comfort, enjoyment
| and safety), and I have indeed found it so.
|
| Fear not perception: as a generalisation, people _love_
| recumbent tricycles and their riders; my experience is that
| you will get an overwhelmingly positive reaction. I _have_
| observed negative reactions from drivers on a very few
| occasions (at a rate similar to an upright bicycle, I think),
| but overtly positive reactions from drivers very regularly,
| which is not common on an upright bicycle. As for
| pedestrians, well, if you're open to it people will talk to
| you about your vehicle very, very regularly, positively and
| curiously.
| hahamrfunnyguy wrote:
| I've had a couple of bikes stolen in my lifetime. One thing that
| would prevent me from enjoying the trip as much is a fear of
| having my bike and all my gear stolen.
|
| What do you do with your bike and gear if you want to stop and so
| some sightseeing?
| paulcole wrote:
| What kind of sightseeing do you mean? When stopped in a city,
| we left our bikes in the hotel so we could walk around. But
| when on the road, it's a lot of leaning bikes against a
| building while you go in to get food or whatever. Sometimes,
| we'd have somebody stay with the bikes while the others went
| inside. Sometimes, we'd lock up and sometimes we'd get lazy and
| hope for the best. But I wasn't riding in a high-theft area.
| downut wrote:
| When eating lunch, I look for a place with big windows and then
| I put my bike where I can see it from the inside. Also, attach
| your helmet with the strap through the front wheel and the
| fork.
|
| If I wanted to go on a hike, I would start the hike with the
| bike and then maybe 500' in I would veer off about the same
| distance and stash it out of sight.
|
| If I was in a city that had no organized storage I'd just stop
| at a bike shop and ask if I could stash it there for a few
| hours. If you were for real with panniers and stuff I can't
| imagine them saying no.
| bawana wrote:
| Humans and our ancient immune system are not evolved for living
| in the hives we call cities. Cycling (and the constraints of this
| transportation mode)will lead to a healthier, more robust, more
| productive civilization if we design for it. Cycling first should
| be our design directive.
| mahathu wrote:
| Sounds amazing, but when do you have time for that once you're
| working full time? Do employers usually offer unpaid time off?
| bbu wrote:
| since it doesn't require a lot of money you simply quit your
| job if you want to do that for an extend period or take unpaid
| leave if you can arrange something w/ your employeer.
| andrewshadura wrote:
| I can recommend a great bicycle tour planner,
| https://cycle.travel/ The map style is optimised for bicycle
| tours, it can automatically split the journey into day-sized
| chunks, find potential accommodation around overnight stops and
| much more. It also includes a blog engine, so you can blog about
| every part of your trip directly at the website.
| cranekam wrote:
| This indeed. I have crossed the Pyrenees twice and the Alps from
| north to south by bike. We chose the fast and light options,
| riding road bikes and staying in hotels, but still the feeling of
| crossing a large map entirely under one's own steam is gratifying
| and addictive.
| SQL2219 wrote:
| maybe you'll have no choice
|
| https://youtu.be/Slszva6kk90
| Ayesh wrote:
| Touring Europe cycling is amazing, I did Strasbourg to Montpelier
| on a Dutch bike, with short legs between Amsterdam to Nice. It
| was amazing, I had a good tent, sleeping bag, and a mattress. My
| trip was over 2,000km, including a climb to Ventoux (part of Tour
| De France in 2012 IIRC).
|
| One thing that's not mentioned in the article is to use Couch
| Surfing and Warm Showers. Warm Showers especially is amazing,
| because it is an amazing cycling community and you can borrow
| anything from small stitching kits to a full-on welding kits to
| fix bicycles. Full of amazing things and people in almost all
| euro velo routes.
|
| FlixBus will take bicycle on board on most buses (for 10 euros
| IIRC), and most trains will too on weekends and off-peak hours.
|
| Overall, it was a fantastic experience and I can't recommend it
| enough.
| InCityDreams wrote:
| But Flixbus can be so frustrating, too. Where i am, and
| 'locally' (within about 60-100km) i have yet to see space
| available for any bikes, when booking. There's places I'd love
| to be driven to, and then ride back.
| jacquesm wrote:
| That's impressive, to do those climbs on a regular bike.
| float4 wrote:
| Here's a dude climbing Ventoux on a _single speed_ Dutch bike
| (subtitles available):
| https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jvDp5uCD0Kk
|
| He also did it on a kids bike the year before:
| https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=49V4P_wkKTU
|
| I should mention he currently rides for a UCI ProTeam, which
| is one tier away from the highest level in the world.
| jacquesm wrote:
| We have our annual 'against the wind' contest here because
| of lack of hills, this year they coincided with a 9
| Beaufort wind which made for some interesting
| complications.
| rene_d wrote:
| If you enjoy reading about other people's bike travels, take a
| look at [1].
|
| The site allows long distance cyclists to write journals of their
| trips while they are on tour, some of which had me binge-read
| them for entire weekends.
|
| Also, the site carries a lovely craigslist vibe :)
|
| Focussing on the match-made-in-heaven which are cycling & food,
| [2] chronicles the experiences of a bloke in his mid-20s, who
| ditches his job at an ad agency (as well as his girlfriend) after
| becoming enamored with cycle touring, and travels through North
| and South America in search of the perfect meal.
|
| [1] https://www.crazyguyonabike.com/
|
| [2] The Hungry Cyclist, https://www.amazon.com/Hungry-Cyclist-
| Tom-Kevill-Davies/dp/0...
| contingencies wrote:
| Also strongly recommend https://mrpumpy.net/
| virgildotcodes wrote:
| I hate cardio, I grumble constantly when my girlfriend drags me
| out on hikes, and to be honest half the time I'm on a bicycle,
| touring, I'm in agony. The seemingly infinite hills in 95 degree
| heat will make you question whose stupid idea this was over and
| over.
|
| That said, there are these moments of bliss, finding yourself in
| nooks and crannies of the world that 90% of tourists never see,
| spending all day out in the sunshine, feeling the breeze,
| smelling the grass and the flowers, stopping to have daily
| picnics in random fields, next to lakes, overlooking beautiful
| mountain ranges... You're taking it slow, so you really take it
| all in. You're constantly ravenous so every meal you have is one
| of the greatest of your life. Maybe the exercise induced
| endorphins are boosting it all a bit too.
|
| Anyway, some of the best memories of my life are those I made
| while bicycle touring.
| ftcHn wrote:
| Best holiday of my life was riding the Pyrenees with my wife.
| Your comment about eating a meal after riding really rang true
| for me. Meals after a big ride are something special and when
| the French are doing the cooking... That's something to
| remember forever!
| jacquesm wrote:
| > and to be honest half the time I'm on a bicycle, touring, I'm
| in agony
|
| Is your bike set up properly? That can make a world of a
| difference, if your bike is not perfectly set up for your body
| on a longer tour it can really hurt.
| virgildotcodes wrote:
| I've gone to a few different bike fitters over the years, as
| well as physical therapists. A proper bike fit did finally
| fix my knee issues, but the agony I'm talking about is the
| kind you experience from riding up and down steep hills all
| day in the hot sun, the saddle soreness, the general full
| body aches, pains, cuts and scrapes like you've been getting
| beat up all day.
|
| That said I'm also a big whiny out of shape baby.
| locallost wrote:
| Hang in there and try to find something you like :-). I
| love riding and even though I dislike all the same things
| you do, for me it's more fuel than it is making me give up.
|
| With that said there are hills and there are hills - we did
| just the last 10km after our train ride recently but it was
| all uphill all the time. We took almost two hours because
| my family just couldn't make it. It was rough even for me.
| Going back was the a 30 minute breeze, we spent more energy
| braking :-).
| jacquesm wrote:
| Ok! It was just the first thing that came to mind. As you
| ride more you become tougher too, I find that after the
| cold season the first two weeks I can get really sore from
| the saddle but after that it becomes a non-issue. Wrists
| are another item (you can end up with these if you're not
| careful: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ganglion_cyst) and I
| wear gloves even in summer to ensure I don't end up
| wrecking my palms.
|
| The big trick is to keep your weight down, that makes a
| huge difference (for me, at least). Just a couple of kilos
| more or less and I feel completely different after a long
| ride (~70kg = everything is fine, ~75kg = I feel
| miserable).
| benoliver999 wrote:
| The stench of road kill also really helps
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