Top Touring Tips

[ASC1951]

Don't cruise on the hoods all day, it ruins your average speed. Get down on the drops, that's what they're for. If they're too low to be comfy, raise your bars.

On the drops all day for touring? Day riding maybe, but's going to be insignificant with touring panniers.

And if you raise the bars to be a comfortable height you will be:
a) back where you started from the aero PoV
now unable to use the hoods.

 

[Brock]

Orikaso fold flat tableware. Absolutely perfect for the weight conscious cycle tourist. Super light, Super pannierable, easy to clean and durable.

Not as gimmicky as they look and cheap too!

 

[Reckless Eric]

I think what makes cycle touring for me is not the bike I ride or the equipment I take, but the friends I'm with. My most memorable ride was down the west coast of New Zealand's South Island on a crappy locally built 10 speed. It rained the entire trip but we had a ball on what evolved into a 500km pub-crawl!

 

[goo_stewart]

Bungee cords - lots of them. Good for securing your bike on planes, trains and autos..., good for securing stuff to your bike, good for making a washing line, good for many, many things that you encounter.

I once used a bungee cord for securing my room in a dodgy Cambodian guest house. Useful things.

 

[Dave Davenport]

After finishing a meal at about 8pm in the only hotel/bistro in a small French village do not decide to go down to the nearby beach for half an hour with the intention of coming back to consume lots more booze and maybe a second pudding, as they'll likely as not to have shut up shop and buggered off home by the time you get back.
This may well leave you not only very thirsty but still a bit peckish after a 75 mile day and result in you eating your 'break glass in case of impending bonk' snickers bar whilst watching whatever happens to be on the one tv station you can watch on the 8" screened zapperless telly mounted 58 feet up your hotel room wall.

Secondly, try to avoid arriving at a ferry port to find it blockaded by French fishermen and having to spend two hours in a taxi (provided by ferry company) whose driver is constantly talking on his hand held phone whilst doing 130kph to get to the one that's open.

 

[Bigtallfatbloke]

learn to drive the gps before you leave....erm..and buy it a year before you leave

 

[dragon72]

When flying to 1st World countries, to reduce your luggage weight, don't pack anything that you can't buy when you're there. eg sun cream, toothpaste, deodorant, maps, corkscrew, tin opener etc.
Stock up on day one when you arrive.

 

[Bigtallfatbloke]

..here's one an American tourer showed be in Basel on Sunday.

If (like me) you have front low rider racks and panniers on a bike with no stand, you will no doubt know what it's like to have the front whell continueally move in on you as you try to load the bike, also how it feels to see your pride and joy fall to the floor in a heap....not to mention how hard it can be to lift a fully loaded bike back to it's feet again.

So either install a GOOD foot stand and accept the extra weight, OR cut a small wedge shaped piece of rubber, wood etc and use it to wedge your frontbrake in a locked postion. That way the wheel will not roll and the bike is much less likely to collapse. This guy had his 'wedge' attached to the bars on a string.

Another thing he showed me was a small screw he had added to his rear stay on the inside of the stay on the chainside. When removing his rear wheel he simply hooked the chain onto this screw and dropped the wheel out without worrying about the chain getting caught up or having to get his hands greasy handly the chain...as he used a stick/pen or pencil you hook the chain up first.

 

[Andy in Sig]

If you want to really enjoy touring, bite the bullet and get a recumbent tourer like the HP Velotechnik Street Machine.

 

[Ludwig]

Take a wind up torch. Secatuers are very good for cutting up sticks and things for making fires, tent pegs, poles or a clothes post for drying clothes. Much better than a knife. Don't leave valuables such as wallets, passports, phones or digital cameras etc in your panniers. Stick to the backroads and villages as much as possible.
Tour using a front sus mountain bike. You will travel much smarter and ride some amazing offroad wilderness routes.

 

[Brock]

Take a wind up torch.

Known as such because they 'wind up' everyone else on the camp site.
vVWweee vVWEeee vVWEeee vVWEeee.. SHUT UP!!! GET A BATTERY!

 

[Bigtallfatbloke]

Stand well clear of exploding french toilets

 

[Andy in Sig]

Take a wind up torch. Secatuers are very good for cutting up sticks and things for making fires, tent pegs, poles or a clothes post for drying clothes. Much better than a knife. Don't leave valuables such as wallets, passports, phones or digital cameras etc in your panniers. Stick to the backroads and villages as much as possible.
Tour using a front sus mountain bike. You will travel much smarter and ride some amazing offroad wilderness routes.

They all belong in the bar bag which of course you remove and take with you every time you have a cafe stop.

 

[Bigtallfatbloke]

Bar bag is th efirst thing a thief is going to try to nick I reckon. Which is why i put a second credit card and emergency folding stuff in th ebottom of one of the panniers just in case.

 

[Andy in Sig]

Bar bag is th efirst thing a thief is going to try to nick I reckon. Which is why i put a second credit card and emergency folding stuff in th ebottom of one of the panniers just in case.

I can see that but it is easy to form the habit of taking the bar bag with you if the bike is going to be out of your sight for more than a second. It's not as if the fittings are laborious: Rixen-Kaul clickfix or velcro or similar.