Originally Posted by
happycat
I am riding about 2 miles on a paved surface and the rest on a sort of packed dirt/pea gravel type wooded trail.
Pea gravel or crushed limestone? To me that makes a huge difference.
Pea gravel is like 1/4" to 1/2" individual stones. They stay loose and even your feet sink into it as you walk. I've not seen it used commonly on paths intended for bicycle use. If I did ride on it, however, I'd want to use tires that were about 2" wide.
Crushed limestone is a common bike path surface. When it's firat laid down it has a gravely surface that packs down until it's the next thing to black top only dustier. I live about 2 miles from Missouri's crushed limestone KATY trail so I ride on it quite a bit. 700 X 28c are my tires of choice for it. A little narrower is certainly do-able, a little wider is certainly OK. The 2" wide slicks on my beater bike are a little overkill.