Satyr

So I've been a life-long car-free individual (motorized vehicle free for that matter). I write this in the midst of travels throughout Norway, so perhaps this can explain the mood a bit better than my words.

Like other car-free individuals, I am also very enthusiastic about outdoor adventures (mostly ultralight backpacking, since I move a lot and don't have the funds for things like kayaking).

Train support is very good of course in Europe, but nonetheless some wilderness areas are not terribly accessible with public transit. Lately I have been overcome with the desire to just purchase a motor-bike so I could "wander" on my own during the weekends. There is so much of the world to see, and I feel at times hindered by my life-style.

Does anyone else ever feel this, and what do you do about it? In the back of my mind, of course, I know that I've learned more about myself and the world from my various bicycle tours than I ever could by hopping on a train. There is a great difference between a journey and just seeing something.

I would like to travel about in North America for some years, and am feeling a bit hampered by my lifestyle. Do any of you travel extensively in North America as a car-free individual? I do not actually have a license so renting a vehicle isn't an option. At least not right now!

ryanparrish

The adventure is in the tour. Have funn riding accross the state. Not the same as enjoying pure wilderness, I have a 1986 diesel rabbit that I park at my parents house for such things as going far away

maximusvt

After living in America most of my life and living in Italy for a year, I would much rather travel across Europe on bicycle... Recently I've been entertaining the notion that someday, I'll quit my job and go back to school, and in between the two I'll take a good month long trip to ride around overseas. Taking a bike across america is doable, but I'd imagine the roadways here wouldn't be as conducive to a bike trip, and the views not nearly as spectacular.

Roody

Interurban travel in many parts of North America is limited to commercial airlines (expensive) and busses (cheap but often inconvenient and annoying).

I take the interurban bus a lot. I meet many international travellers. In the summer, they seem more common than the natives on Greyhound busses. Most of them say they're having a great time, even though the public transit is inferior to nearly every country on earth.

I agree that this kind of interurban travel is the most difficult and limiting aspect of carfree living in the US, especially if your destination is a small town or rural area. Not only is it hard to travel between cities, it's also hard to get around in the smaller cities once you arrive, as local bus service is usually substandard or even nonexistant. I have been wanting to visit two small cities a couple hundred miles from my home, but I really can't think of any way to do this that doesn't involve an automobile.

jamesdenver

Rent - that's the easiest for me. In Colorado I go camping in remote areas, and while able to bike there, it's not doable overnight or weekends.

Renting a truck, throwing the crap in back, camping, then returning the truck is very simple, and I see it as still being a viable "car-free" option if eschewing a car for finances, city living, and lifestyle choices.

And for short vacations sometimes a car is a must. I just flew to Orlando, drove to Ocala (to see relative), drove through some swamps, and would have watched a space shuttle launch if hadn't been delayed. I did this all in about 40 hours. In on Saturday afternoon, out early Monday morning. Had there been regular bus service I'd definetely taken it, but I was off the plane and in a rental car within 30 minutes.

It's not "oil free", but neither is air travel, which I enjoying doing too.

Anyway my advice, rent when you can, works for me. I just choose my "home life" to be car free.

jamesdenver

I'll add too if more people rented on occasion, or services like zipcar or flex car expanded, that would be a greatly increase the "responsible car use" movement.

The US IS vast and spread out, and we'll never have rail service to small-mid market towns, but if more people followed my plan of "bike / transit in the city" / "car in the country" it would cut down car use significantly.

Most city and suburb folks, (like myself), only travel to remote areas like mountains, camping, beach every few weekends - and the major reason cars are needed in cities is lack of walkable and bikable neighborhoods, and proper transit.

Alekhine

I do a ton of bicycle camping/touring in North America and elsewhere in the world, car-free. Frankly, America isn't the best for touring, but it is still very very beautiful if you can look past its faults.

I recently purchased a Bike Friday folding bicycle, and one of the lovely things about it is that its charms cannot be matched by any motorized vehicle at all! It folds into an airline-checkable suitcase that also turns into a trailable container behind the bike, which enables you to take it anywhere in the world, and you can then do a "leap-frog" thing with a good inflatable kayak: Keep the kayak collapsed in the suitcase as you travel along the roads. When you reach a river or creek that you want to paddle down, dissasemble the bike and stow it in the suitcase, then inflate the kayak and put the suitcase in the front berth of the kayak, and off you go, paddling! Reverse the process when you reach a road you want to ride upon. It is truly liberating.

Caveat: A good Bike Friday will cost in excess of $1500 including the trailer, and a good inflatable kayak will also cost in excess of $1000.

Not sure if any of this helps, but cars and motorbikes really aren't necessary unless you're resigned to them, and they are so insufficient if you value true adventure and variety, in my opinion.

Alekhine

Unless there are no bike-able roads, you can get there. The touring forum can offer many suggestions about this. My preferred mode of travel is by bike, with camping gear stowed on the bike, and I can't think of a single place that is inaccessible if you have the legs for it and are willing to "stealth camp" for the night in between. Ken Kifer's site is a good start for realizing such goals.

Satyr

Some good ideas. For me, at least, the only appeal for the motorized transport is for shorter trips to wilderness, and seeing more landmass on roads not accessible by public transportation.

Though something always feels lacking if I just zoom by in a motorized vehicle. Last year I hiked for two weeks in the Swiss Alps and also took a train ride through some of the most beautiful scenery in the country. But the mere fact that I was not propelling myself up the mountain diminished the wonder. I noticed the same thing a few weeks ago when I hiked for just a day in the western Norwegian fjords. The train ride, though spectacularly beautiful, wasn't very exciting.

For some time I have been opposed to even learning how to drive, simply because I figured I'd never need to, but now I am starting to realize I don't want to wait around for friends just because I wish to hike in the mounains or leave town.

Alekhine

I understand. If you feel you must get a car, get one.

I do feel that a good strong touring bike with gearing that can accommodate most any hill or switchback, and with all the braze-ons and racks and panniers and piled high with camping gear is the way to go for the most satisfying adventures into the wilderness, even long-distance trips, but we all have different tastes.

I can accomplish so many things in one week on a bike that is specifically set up for camping, and even do camping that is less possible by car ("stealth" camping, for instance - literally getting off the road wherever I feel like without a trace). My Mercian tourer was custom made for me with this kind of travel in mind, and it is wonderful. The Bike Friday I talked about earlier in this thread is less able to handle weight, but the Mercian is a beast of a bike and quick on the road too.

When I was riding through Thailand last month, there was a moment that I am positive I wouldn't have experienced if we had been merely driving a car or bus through the country, where we joined in on a party whose drum sounds we could only faintly hear from the roadside. It turned out to be a town-wide celebration for a young man who was entering into Buddhist monkhood, whom they carted out above their shoulders dressed in beautiful white regalia. They were partying hard at 10:00 a.m, passing whiskey and beer around and dancing and laughing like children. They welcomed us right in on the party, although we decided not to get drunk with them all day and rode on after about 15 minutes of fun and acting like goofs. The village leader wanted us to join them at his villa in the mountains after the temple ceremony, but they wouldn't let us take our bikes, so we high-tailed it. Great times, and we would have driven right by it in a car, for sure.

Roody

Satyr, you might be interested in a book called Periodic Table by Primo Levi, a Jewish-Italian chemist and memoirist who is most famous for his writings about the Holocaust. Just before the War, when he was in college, he and a friend would just hop on their bikes and ride into the mountains, sometimes going more than 100 km. They carried only a few crumbs of food. In the summer they would take a rope and climb in the mountains. In the winter, they strapped skis to their bikes and skied off into the wilderness.

It seems a trip like this would certainly satisfy your need for excitement! (A more "modern" variant on this idea would be to take up mountain biking.)

Satyr

Don't get me wrong. Touring is actually my favorite activity (well maybe slightly behind backpacking, I don't know) and I have a fully rigged touring bike. I need little encouragement to get out and tour on my own, and like you, have had some wonderful experiences and met exquisite people while touring and staying in public parks or stealth camping (which is legal in Sweden), etc.

Like I said, I'm mostly interested in what people like me (want to really get out to wilderness) do on the weekends. Fact is, I rarely get a week off, and hardly a 3-day weekend, so trips to wilderness are limited. The only substitute I can think of is hopping on a bike on a Friday, peddeling about 30k-100km, then going on a hike in some wilderness, and return home on a Sunday.

Even given some form of motorized transport, I doubt I could do much more on a weekend. So maybe my concerns were somewhat moot.

I'm pretty strict in my lifestyles, but also rational. By this I mean that I recognize the inherent limitations in being motorized vehicle free, but still am pretty adamant about remaining so. There is of course a certain freedom in being car-free, but I think we here in this forum tend to overblow it a bit. The bicycle is an amazing tool, and can do a lot of unexpected things (like hauling kayaks), but some tasks just become onerous.

Satyr

Thanks for the suggestion! Maybe, despite being a cyclist all my life, I really am not fully aware of all the activities that can involve cycling. Well I guess the other half is a simple lack of motivation, and a lack of like minded friends with sufficient gear. My two best friends ride death-trap bicycles!

bragi

+1. Your methods are well worth emulating.