Ideal European area for touring with a touring recumbent?

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A strange question because the idea behind a touring bike is that it's suitable for going places. As a noob recumbent rider, despite into my 4th year of ownership and veteran of a summer commuting and 2 weeks touring on one, I find I am not good on hills, tight turns and tbh haven't got confidence downhill yet.

So I'm wondering what type of terrain would a touring recumbent like HPV SMGT or even azub six suit most? They're heavy, fully suspended and designed to be fully loaded for touring. Not speed machines, not that aero compared to other, speedier and lighter recumbents.

I am good on hills with an upright bike but not with my SMGT. I'll admit to the Brittany coast that I toured on it I struggled on the hills. IMHO I wonder if the flat areas of Belgium and Netherlands suit them better. Not too flat or open as I doubt I'd like a head wind on it when fully loaded with 4 panniers.

I'm interested in what terrain or areas you think suits your recumbent best but especially touring recumbents.
 

Peter Salt

Bittersweet
Location
Yorkshire, UK
Presumably, you don't want it to be too hot. Iceland ring road?
 

Cathryn

Legendary Member
Personally I’d always start with France! The Loire Valley could be a good option. Netherlands is gorgeous and has excellent infrastructure. Also consider some of the flatter options in Germany, which is brilliant for touring!
 
OP
OP
T

Time Waster

Veteran
All nice areas but my query was really about whether the bike type influences the location because the location and terrain suits the characteristics of the bike?

I doubt you'd take a velomobile recumbent on an alpine tour but you might take a light road bike travelling light on a credit card tour. Similarly you might prefer to take a touring recumbent heavily loaded to somewhere where you're not climbing many hills or you're generally heading downhill. I doubt we'd like touring Devon and Cornwall coastline fully loaded with family on my recumbent.

My son and I had our first overseas tour on uprights in the dunes North of ijmeuden ferry terminal. Not 100% flat but having seen a few recumbent its seems a good area for them. Saw my first fully loaded recumbents and velomobiles on that trip and more than a few over the two weeks. Not seen them at all on our Brittany trip (I used my bent and struggled a bit on hills) nor on our Belgium trip inland/ east of Zeebrugge on a clockwise tour.

I think parts of Netherlands, flatter parts of Belgium, danube route and perhaps a river/ canal based route in France (downhill on the river path).

Are there flat parts of Germany? Denmark I think has a flat area that's basically paths through dunes. Can't remember where but a former friend of my partner was Danish and told us it was probably a good cycle touring area for us.

The river Danube cycle route I believe goes a great distance through Europe without a very significant height gain which makes it a reasonable option with cheaply rented low geared bikes (3 speeds for example) and possibly my recumbent too.

Any other places? What suits different bikes better? Have you taken the wrong bike for a tour? Do you choose the bike you take for where you're touring? What influenced your decisions?
 
All nice areas but my query was really about whether the bike type influences the location because the location and terrain suits the characteristics of the bike?

I doubt you'd take a velomobile recumbent on an alpine tour but you might take a light road bike travelling light on a credit card tour. Similarly you might prefer to take a touring recumbent heavily loaded to somewhere where you're not climbing many hills or you're generally heading downhill. I doubt we'd like touring Devon and Cornwall coastline fully loaded with family on my recumbent.

My son and I had our first overseas tour on uprights in the dunes North of ijmeuden ferry terminal. Not 100% flat but having seen a few recumbent its seems a good area for them. Saw my first fully loaded recumbents and velomobiles on that trip and more than a few over the two weeks. Not seen them at all on our Brittany trip (I used my bent and struggled a bit on hills) nor on our Belgium trip inland/ east of Zeebrugge on a clockwise tour.

I think parts of Netherlands, flatter parts of Belgium, danube route and perhaps a river/ canal based route in France (downhill on the river path).

Are there flat parts of Germany? Denmark I think has a flat area that's basically paths through dunes. Can't remember where but a former friend of my partner was Danish and told us it was probably a good cycle touring area for us.

The river Danube cycle route I believe goes a great distance through Europe without a very significant height gain which makes it a reasonable option with cheaply rented low geared bikes (3 speeds for example) and possibly my recumbent too.

Any other places? What suits different bikes better? Have you taken the wrong bike for a tour? Do you choose the bike you take for where you're touring? What influenced your decisions?

There are about 40 German river cycle routes, and there are huge swathes of Germany which are flat, or at least not mountainous.
eg the river Main cycle route, described as "Mainly flat terrain, suitable for children, majority of route suitable for trailers". That last point about trailers indicates to me that it'd be suitable for tandems, trikes and other forms of cycle propulsions such as recumbents. The River Elbe cycle route runs for over 1200km from Czechia to the North Sea and there are many many others too.

I think my choice would be the Oder-Neisse route,, which runs along the border between Germany and Poland. It's described as very well marked and not much used.
When I lived in Berlin I did a bit of exploring round various parts of the ex-DDR and went to Poland a couple of times; of course that was only a few years after the Wall came down.
I'd love to go back and see how that bit of Europe has changed, a generation on from the 'fall' of the Iron Curtain, and the Oder-Neisse route would cover quite a few places I was familiar with, 25 years ago.
 
Great calls, @KnittyNorah. Elbe frim Dresden to Bremen: 500 km, 50 metre height difference. Oder-Neisse beautiful country and Berlin to Poland is one of the best routes I have ever ridden. The Main has quite a few hills and at one point there's a 20km 12% lump if I remember correctly*. Along the German North Sea Coast is also great for touring.

* Can't remember if I did the red or the white Main.
 

Ming the Merciless

There is no mercy
Location
Inside my skull
A heavily loaded touring recumbent and heavily loaded upright touring bike have the same challenge. There’s two things, your fitness how much power you can produce, and gearing, how low does your gearing go that enables you to keep pedalling uphill without falling over. Velo mobiles are trikes and there is no danger of falling over. know few who who have toured in velo mobiles in the Alps without issue.

I found that to develop more power on my recumbent I had to commit to riding it at least 80-90% or so. It’s not enough to occasionally ride it, and mostly ride your upright bikes, as recumbents uses different leg muscle emphasis for developing power. If you work on it, you’ll find you get up hills just as well as on your upright bikes.
 
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Great calls, @KnittyNorah. Elbe frim Dresden to Bremen: 500 km, 50 metre height difference. Oder-Neisse beautiful country and Berlin to Poland is one of the best routes I have ever ridden. The Main has quite a few hills and at one point there's a 20km 12% lump if I remember correctly*. Along the German North Sea Coast is also great for touring.

* Can't remember if I did the red or the white Main.

I think the German cycling trails are an absolute treasure of which we are largely - and sadly - ignorant here.

I used to go (horse) riding at a stables just outside Frankfurt-am-Oder and had some mild and pleasant adventures in that area, including getting misdirected on elaborate winding tracks in some marshland, and ending up in Poland by mistake - and having to be escorted back to where the border was supposed to be by a very stern-looking Polish copper on a motorbike, where we met with two equally-stern looking German cops. All the cops clearly felt I was either very thick, or lying, when I insisted I'd seen no border markers. We followed my hoofprints and - no border markers! However all ended up in laughter when, guddling about in the reeds for the missing marker posts at the point where they MUST be, one of them fell into a muddy ditch ...
I was waved on my way - so as not to witness their further humiliation, I imagine - and when I got back to the stables just said yes thank you I've had a lovely ride ...

The Berlin - Copenhagen route was just being mooted as a possibility when I was leaving Berlin and of course now it is a full-blown 'thing'.

The Spreewald SE of Berlin is so very, very pretty, too - and inevitably there's a Spreewald radweg now. But you really need to take a canoe or a kayak to tour there. Or a pedalo maybe?
 
Location
España
It's not clear to me if you're looking for a general chat about matching bike to terrain or recommendations of where to take your recumbent touring

The river Danube cycle route I believe goes a great distance through Europe without a very significant height gain

There are parts between Passau & Vienna that are not flat at all! Further east the surface is poor, I believe.

As well as terrain, infrastructure maybe needs to be considered as well?
I recall cycling in France, Velodyssey, and remember layered barriers on cycle paths near road junctions that would have been a PITA on a long, low bike.

NL (except Limburg) would be very suitable but there can be some sharp turns on dedicated bike paths. Belgium too.

I'd imagine logistics are a factor too. How to get to where you want to go and to get back. Also accommodation and bike storage/security.

On a recumbent I do wonder about dogs. There seems to be a feeling of vulnerability to dog attack?

I find I am not good on hills, tight turns and tbh haven't got confidence downhill yet.

To be honest, this is no different to any bike tourist starting off. For anything that can fall into the "anxiety" category there are two options:
Live with it and choose destinations that won't aggravate that anxiety - a whole load of work and what happens if a change of plans is needed?
Or
Tackle the sources head on and remove them. Then you can go anywhere you like (within reason).

As pointed out above climbing muscles can be developed. Tight turns can be practiced and doing begets confidence. I'd be surprised if there are no YouTube videos on the subject.

Good luck
 
OP - if Germany does interest you, have a look at this site - www.schoene-radwege.de (beautiful cyclepaths). The site isn't totally up-to-date (where is, after the past couple of years?) but it gives a very good overview of what is, or at least was, available in Germany. There are some annoying 'download pdf' type junk ads but wait a moment and they disappear.

You can look up River Cycle Paths A-Z . Round Trips A - Z, Lake Cycle Paths, DayRides and Themed Cycle Paths

The start of each page has a small map with half a dozen of 'the most popular' routes, scroll down past that and you get the full list with name, region and length. Click on the ones you're interested in for more details.

Computer auto-translation does a pretty good job with German I find; although my German's pretty good I struggle with some vocabulary so often find myself using auto translate to make sure I've not missed anything vital, historical/technical stuff in particular.
 

a.twiddler

Veteran
I'm inclined to agree with @HobbesOnTour. I've never been a great climber whatever I ride but with gearing tailored to what suits me I get along OK. With poor opportunities to get out and rotten weather this year I expect my climbing muscles are pretty flaccid. However, I would normally say, just ride it. That way you get used to your recumbent's peculiarities, develop confidence in it and reduce your anxiety levels. It helps that I've been cycling long enough to be able to fix or bodge stuff well enough to keep me going so I'm less likely to get stuck anywhere than I might be otherwise. Dwelling on things that might cause you problems to the extent that it takes away the pleasure of doing anything doesn't help anyone. Time was, if I'd not ridden it for a while I had to get re acclimatised to mine but now I find I can just hop on and go.

If you look back, I am sure that you can remember things that caused you problems on your recumbent that you now deal with without thinking about it. It's the same with hills. I'm no super hill climber but normally I can just settle back and twirl the pedals until I eventually get to the top. No matter how flat the route, you are bound to come across some uphills. You can plan it so that you're not spending all day grinding up a succession of them, which will wear you down, but it helps if you can start by accepting that the odd hill is not a life threatening event. It's not a crime to walk up the last bit. Then there's the recumbent whee factor going down the other side. The more you ride, the less you'll need to walk.

It's all about changing the things that you can change (ride more, which makes you get fitter and develop more confidence, so you start to enjoy the downhills. Practice tight turns in an empty car park) and accepting the things that you can't (eg in my case I'm not fast, even slower uphill, no spring chicken any more, being a terminal shortarse etc). I've mastered my great long USS recumbent which has the turning circle of a super tanker and I find it really enjoyable to ride which with the fervent evangelism of the not-so-recently converted I hope to encourage others to do with theirs.

If you still have doubts after all that I wonder if you could have a go at riding other types of recumbent to see if they suit you better, even a trike, though it's often hard to arrange a test ride. Maybe after all this time, (Aargh! Heresy) recumbents are not for you? Some people just don't take to them no matter how hard they try.

Perhaps arranging to do some touring in the UK so that you're not too far from home would help boost your confidence before considering going farther afield?
 
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