Machka 

Short tours are great for those of us who can only spare a few days from our busy schedules to spend on a cycling tour ... or for those of us who want to do a quick exploration of the area where we live or an area we want to learn more about ... and for those who want to test equipment, bicycle setup, etc.

When you go on a short hub-and-spoke tour, overnight tour, weekend tour, long weekend tour, maybe even a week-long tour, or something similar ... tell us about it here throughout 2016.

Where did you go? What did you see along the way? Would you recommend the area? What sort of accommodation did you use? What kind of bicycle did you ride? Did you learn anything new?

What short tours do you have planned for 2016?



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Past tours ...

2015 short tours:
https://www.bikeforums.net/touring/98...ort-tours.html

2014 short tours:
https://www.bikeforums.net/touring/92...ort-tours.html

2013 short tours:
2013 - Your Short Tours

2012 short tours:
https://www.bikeforums.net/touring/79...ort-tours.html

2011 short tours:
https://www.bikeforums.net/touring/72...ort-tours.html

2007 short tours:
https://www.bikeforums.net/touring/25...ort-tours.html



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Some attempt at definitions ...

Short tours can include quite a variety of different sorts of touring including, but not limited to ...

-- day tours (usually taking up most of the day and including scenic or tourist destinations)
-- hub-and-spoke tours (cycling or driving out to a destination which becomes the "headquarters" or "hub", and then doing day tours off in various directions from the "hub")
-- overnight tours (cycling out to a neighbouring town, campground, national park, etc, staying overnight in a campground, hotel, B&B, or whatever other choice of accommodation is available)
-- weekend or long weekend tours or several days or week long tours (similar to the overnight tour, but longer)

These tours can be credit card tours where no camping gear is carried and the cyclist stays in accommodations such as hotels, B&Bs hostels, etc., and eats in restaurants, cafes, etc., or they can be camping tours, or some combination of the two.

They can have a variety of purposes ... travel and exploration, a desire to get away from it all for a weekend, visiting family and friends, or in combination with work, school, or other events.

Lots of options!


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Also for reference ... longer tours!

https://www.bikeforums.net/touring/10...you-going.html

Machka 

Bump ... 'cause it has dropped to the second page ...

Happy Feet

Thank you Machka

Happy Feet

Went for a day tour today in cold but clear conditions.

I live on the western shoulder of Sumas Mountain, a large squat peak that overlooks two prairies. To the northwest is the Matsqui Prairie bordering the Fraser River, a world heritage site. Over the mountain to the southeast is the Sumas Prairie, a former shallow lake that was pumped dry during the early 19th century to provide fertile farmland. Overlooking it is Mt Baker, a dormant Volcano just across the border in WA state. Both prairies are bordered by dike systems and have long straight roads through them.

I rode over the hill this morning and then cut through the Discovery Trail system to connect with a smaller two lane country road. At one point this branches off to a blocked roadway that was abandoned due to an active quarry and washed out pavement. For years the landscape has been quietly reclaiming it in a way that shows what would happen if all the humans were gone. This then reconnects to a trafficked road and drops down to the Sumas prairie where I began following a dike system along the Sumas river, really more of a large irrigation system used for maintaining water levels via a pumping station. At 3 road I crossed over the Trans Canada Hwy and headed westward through the Sumas prairie to a much deserved and appreciated coffee at Starbucks.

In all I think the ride was about 40km's with some head winds on the flats and about 3.5 hours of riding and taking pictures. Rather than try to post pics individually I made a short video of them.

.be

PDKL45

I went for a day tour yesterday, to welcome in the new year and to put my Specialized AWOL through its paces on a longer ride for the first time. I live just north of Seoul, South Korea, and I wanted to try out a ride I have been designing, called (by me at least) the Seoul 4 Mountains Challenge, a ride taking in central, northern, eastern and southern mountains from the center to the borders of Seoul and dipping into the surrounding province of Gyeonggido in places (Guri).

I started early and rode down the Jung Rang Tributary Stream to the Han river, turning off the bike path to ride up a very smoggy Nam San (at the center of Seoul). Unfortunately the smog (thick PM2.5 dust combined with moisture) kept visibility down to a minimum and the normal sweeping views were missing. I rode down into the center of the city, past Sungraemun, Nam Dae Mun Market, City Hall, and stopped for coffee and a second breakfast before tackling Bugak Skyway, using an approach road I have never taken before, taking me past a palace I have not visited in the past. The ride winds up the mountain behind the president's residence in Seoul (the Blue House) and it is a popular climbing ride for roadies. I didn't stop at the lookouts, as the views were obscured by the blanket of soupy fog/dust sitting on the city. I stopped at the summit of Mt. Bugak for a short break and fairly quickly thereafter was descending back down into the controlled chaos of the capital city of South Korea.

I used a new (to me) bike path and some quieter roads to bring me back to the Jung Rang bike path and rode north, before turning off eastwards and riding up the road to Guri, taking time to ride the Mang Ou Loop around the shoulder of Mt. Mang Ou (there's a National Park at the top of the Seoul-Guri road with the cyclist/hiker friendly paved loop inside of it). Coming from an MTB background, I was eager to try out the middle 39T chainring for climbing on the relatively gentle gradient of the Mang Ou loop and I was happy to experiment with gears, just taking it easy and riding very sedately while I enjoyed the forest, weaving in and out of hikers. I rode back down to the base of the hill, near the entry gate (picture below taken at that time) after a quick break at the summit of the loop and then rode east, down into Guri and had lunch there, before riding back down to the Han river on the bike path network and riding westwards, back into Seoul, before taking Gwangjin Bridge to the south bank of the river and keeping on past Jamsil.

I turned south for a while, before taking a coffee break and going south-west on the Yangjae Tributary Stream. I turned north at Gwacheon, and had intended to ride around Seoul University on the fourth mountain for the day, but my legs were getting tired and the day was wearing on, so I kept going north past Sadang Station, meeting back up with the river bike path network, crossing at Banpo Bridge and taking the Jung Rang bike path home.

It was a 149.00 km ride (about 92-93 miles). Had I not opted out of the final mountain of the day, it would have been around 200kms, the intended brevet length day tour. Still, it was a good start to the year and a really good shake down cruise for my new(ish) Specialized AWOL Deluxe.

Happy Feet

Hey PDKL, do you have any pics of that ride? Sounds like some very interesting scenery.

PDKL45

The ones from Sunday are pretty much toast, as visibility was just awful. I do have the following pics from the various locations I mention at different times over the past few years, though.

Photos of Places mentioned in Original Post

Jung Rang Tributary Stream 1-2 years ago, after snow, looking south towards Seoul. Note snow covered bike paths on either bank. This photo is taken in Uijeongbu, where the 4077th MASH unit was supposedly based in the TV series.



Lookout near base of Bugak Skyway, looking back south towards Nam San, the mountain/hill with Seoul Tower on it, mentioned in original post as the first mountain of the day. "San" is "mountain" in Korean and "Nam" is "South" literally meaning "South Mountain" as it is south of the ancient Seoul city walls. Near this photo spot there are the remnants of Seoul's fortified city walls, where North Korean commandos infiltrated in the 1970s, trying to assassinate the President. There was a fire fight to neutralize them a couple of hundred meters down the hill to the left from this photo spot.



The summit of Bugak Skyway, the climbing road on Bugak San, the mountain behind the President's residence with my old bike, having just changed all the parts from my cracked Merida frame to a new Centurion Backfire frame. This is the last northward valley of Seoul, a very exclusive area, sometimes called the "Beverly Hills of Seoul." The far mountains are part of a large national park that stretches all the way back to Uijeongbu.


Mangou San, looking back at eastern Seoul from the Mangou Loop.

GlitterBiker

Hello - I live in north east Maryland; we're having a major snowstorm right now and I'm spending the day planning some bike touring in 2016. And that's how I found this site. I've read the 2015 Short Trips thread and am inspired!

The short, S24Os and "bike overnights" really appeal to me. Some ideas I'm considering:
-- Biking to a Maryland State Park for a night of camping
-- Driving to Cumberland, MD; take the train to Pittsburgh; and bike the GAP back to Cumberland
-- Drive to D.C. and bike the W&OD trail, and spend the night somewhere in Purcellville
-- Drive to the Eastern Shore (DelMarVa peninsula) and bike from campground to campground

My biggest constraint where I'm located is finding out how to get me and my bike across the Susquehanna River.

Machka 

Saturday 16 January -- 101.6 km training ride with approx. 560 metres of climbing ... and with the feel of a day tour about it, what with the ferry segment.


I cycled from home down to Kettering, then caught the ferry across to Bruny Island. Once there, I cycled down to Alonnah, and back to the Bruny Island Ferry Terminal.

That's the short story. Now the slightly longer version ...

Today was a lovely day with a high of about 20C, mostly sunny and a fairly strong south-east wind gusting up to 40 km/h. The wind started a little lighter than that, but got stronger as the day went on. This meant that I had a headwind on the way down, and a tailwind on the way back. That headwind had me worried for a while because I didn't realise how strong it was and was beginning to wonder what was wrong with me that I couldn't seem to get up any speed. At the turnaround point, I overheard a couple people in the shop talking about the wind and saying it had become quite strong. Oh ... heh heh ... maybe that's what was up! And on the way back, I definitely had speed!

The first 25 km was from home to the ferry, and that bit contained about half the climbing. So I had quite a hilly start to the ride. The remaining 75 km on the island, had the other half of the climbing, concentrated in the beginning, the bit right around the turnaround point, and the end. The middle gave me a bit of a break.

The traffic was pretty good. We've got a 1.5 metre law here ... motorists are supposed to give cyclists 1.5 metres. The vast majority of the drivers did that ... there were just two I can remember who cut it pretty close.

On the ferry ride over to Bruny Island, I met a couple who were also cycling and we chatted the whole way over and a little bit when we had disembarked. That was really nice. We also spotted a seal in the water doing it's body temperature regulation thing with the flipper out of the water. They were heading the opposite direction to do a bit of camping (cycletouring).

There were quite a few other cycletourists along the way as well.


At the end of the ride, I stopped by Rowan's orchard to see where he was in the process of wrapping up his day, and then I cycled down to the ferry terminal to wait for him. We rode the ferry back together and then I caught a lift home.

I was really pleased with two things in particular:

1) I managed an 18 km/h average rolling speed. That's the fastest I've ridden in a long time.

2) Last weekend I did a 77 km ride in a total time of 5 hours. This weekend, I did the 75 km on the island in about 4 hours 40 min. I knocked 20 min off that distance!

diphthong

a bunch planned for the southwestern united states so far. they will be all hub & spoke or day trips originating from a car/hotel.

have about six to eight 2 day/1 nighters (angeles national forest/los angeles, santa monica mountains/los angeles
death valley np, climbs of the tucson area mtns (kitt pk, mts lemmon & graham), palm springs/joshua tree np, santa barbara area, west side sierra climbs).


planning on hitting the central coast/carrizo plain (san simeon, paso robles, morro bay) area in spring over the course of 3 days/2 nights


5 days/4 nights in the eastern sierras after labor day in the "death ride" passes area, along with a june lake loop/eastern yosemite/mono lake century
and whatever hc climbs from bishop/lone pine/independence/big pine that the body will allow at that point.


5 days/4 nights in the southern utah (grand escalante nm, zion np, bryce canyon np, capitol reef np) area second week of october.
would also love to do north rim grand canyon again same trip weather permitting.

Jawbone

I'd love to learn more about ditch camping. The idea of just heading out somewhere, finding a spot at the side of the road and crashing for the night is very appealing. But I worry about, well, camping in a ditch. what have others done?

Machka 

We're back from a short tour. A short multi-modal credit-card hub-and-spoke tour that included planes, trains and automobiles ... and buses, cycling and walking!

Thursday 4 February we drove to the airport, parked the van, and unloaded our 'one piece of checked luggage' each ... our Bike Fridays neatly and compactly folded into suitcases. The first leg of the journey was a flight to Melbourne and a shuttle van to the hotel.

We usually select a hotel right at the Melbourne airport, but I thought I'd check around to see if there were other options, and found one. The two were about the same price, but the determining factor was dinner. The hotel at the airport offered us McDonalds or possibly a cafe in the airport, if any were still open by the time we got there. Not particularly appealing. The other hotel offered an all-you-can-eat buffet for a decent price ... and it was definitely the right choice. Delicious!


The next morning we caught the shuttle bus back to the airport, and then caught the Sky Bus (https://www.skybus.com.au/) to the Southern Cross station.

We were booked onto a direct train between Melbourne and Warrnambool, but unfortunately they've been doing work with the trains and so we were informed that the train would take us to Geelong, but there we would have to transfer to a coach. Inconvenient ... but free! Yes, the trip between Melbourne and Warrnambool was free because of this inconvenience!

Up till now we had been pleased with our method of transporting our bicycles ... neatly and compactly folded into suitcases. We had no issues getting them onto the plane, into the shuttle van, into the hotel, or onto the Sky Bus. No extra charges. No raised eyebrows. No heavy sighs. No refusals. But when we were informed of this change of plans to the train portion of our journey, we were immensely pleased with our decision to use our Bike Fridays!! If we had full-sized bicycles there's a really good chance we would not have gotten them onto the coach in Geelong.

The train portion of the trip was lovely ... the coach, not so much. Very crowded. They had to run at least three coaches to fit everyone in! But we got there in the end and acquired a taxi to our caravan park. Again, it was good to have the Bike Fridays because the suitcases easily fit into the boot of the taxi.

Once settled in our cabin, we walked to the nearby shopping area for dinner.


Saturday, Rowan built up our Bike Fridays so we could ride ... 45.02 km in total. Our first journey was a mission to find breakfast ... not as easy as we had anticipated and we had already logged about 10 km before we finally found a place.

Then we decided to explore the city ... up and down some of the roads and checking out the cycling paths.

"The Promenade links the historic breakwater to Logans Beach. The sealed pathway starts with great views at the 1890 Breakwater, passes Lake Pertobe, follows around Lady Bay (it can be tempting to divert to the beach), crosses the mouth of the Hopkins River estuary, and ends at the whale nursery at Logans Beach. The path is suitable for all forms of wheeled transport including bikes, rollerblades, wheelchairs and pushers."

Visit Warrnambool | Bike & Walking Trails

I really liked the Promenade ... mostly because of the proximity of the beach and the ocean. It was beautiful!

We decided to take in dinner and a show that evening at Flagstaff Hill Maritime Village: Flagstaff Hill | Home Page ... the Shipwrecked Sound and Lasar Show ... and of course we cycled there and back after the show. Dinner was good, the show was really good, and the ride home in the dark was lovely.


On Sunday we decided to take on the Warrnambool to Port Fairy Rail Trail ... 84.7 km in total. Victoria has a number of lovely rail trails, and we've ridden several of them. We had ridden some of this trail a number of years ago, and it was not particularly brilliant then, but I had read that they had made some improvements so we wanted to see.

https://www.railtrails.org.au/trail?view=trail&id=160
Port Fairy to Warrnambool Rail Trail

The first part of our journey was along the Promenade, mentioned above. That was nice. Then we headed out of town on a path of finely crushed quartz dotted with boardwalk bridges here and there as we made our way through marshy land. We enjoyed that part as well. The path was decent and we could watch the herons and ibis and other birds.

But then, we were plunked onto a fairly rough gravel road and it wasn't long before we were longing for paved roads again. Thankfully, we got to a paved lane after a few kilometres, and we opted to stick with the road the rest of the way to Port Fairy. We figured it would take us forever to get there if we returned to the gravel path and we were getting hungry!

Port Fairy is a favourite location of ours and we've been there several times. We would have liked to stay in Port Fairy this time too, but the logistics were a bit difficult. However, we checked out the beach and then cycled to our favourite fish and chips place. Sadly it closes for a while between lunch and dinner and we weren't prepared to wait 2 hours for it to open again. So we found another cafe ... and discovered that a monument to Graham Woodrup (well known in the cycling community in Australia) had been removed!! There had been some construction in the area, so we hope it will be replaced.
Graham Woodrup | Monument Australia

Feeling more energetic, we decided to take the rail trail back to Warrnambool. It is paved in Port Fairy now, but the moment it leaves Port Fairy it turns to crushed limestone ... a bit rough, but not too bad. And it was definitely an improvement over what it had been a few years ago. A few years ago, it was a narrow overgrown path, but now it is quite wide and fairly well groomed. There were several cyclists using it as well, so that was good to see. It is a gradual climb all the way to Koroit plus a slightly steeper bit on the other side of Koroit before the descent into Warrnambool.

Just before we reached Koroit, Rowan flatted and had to change his tube. We suspect that the replacement tube may have been mislabelled because it was a lot larger than what we expected. Bike Fridays take 20-inch tubes, and we have a suspicion that tube may have been a 24-inch tube. Nevertheless, Rowan stuffed it in and we got going again.

The trail is paved through Koroit, and then returns to crushed limestone again. About 10 km from Warrnambool, we intersected a paved road ... and decided to take the road back to Warrnambool. We had had enough of gravel. That last 10 km was much quicker, and we arrived back at our caravan park in time to freshen up a bit and then cycle into town to one of the Mexican restaurants for dinner.


On Monday we decided to go the other direction and check out a tourist attraction which we've seen from a distance before and was recommended to us again this time ... Allansford Cheese World: Allansford Cheese World - Warrnambool Our impression was a bit different from reality. Somehow I envisioned a whole lot more cheese ... or perhaps a variety of dairy products. Unfortunately the place has seen better days and was more or less a run-of-the-mill cafe and gift shop.

However, we ended up spending a bit of time there because Rowan flatted again, and this time it was because of the size of that tube, we suspect. He patched it, but because we didn't feel entirely comfortable with how well it was going to hold up, plus because time was getting on, we decided to return to Warrnambool via the Hopkins Training Route ... a cycling route so popular it is actually signed.

Back in Warrnambool we went to a different Mexican place for dinner ... which, incidentally, I've just discovered, has recently opened in Hobart too!! Then we cycled around town a bit in the evening because it was so nice out. 51 km in total. And actually Rowan had cycled a couple extra kilometres getting some supplies in the morning.


Tuesday was our last day so we did a short ride out to a bicycle shop, which didn't have much of interest, and then to the beach, and finally for fish and chips. 13.75 km in total. We packed the Bike Fridays back into the suitcases, and the process only took 1 hour!

Then it was a taxi back to the train station, where we were able to check our bags in, and then we were free to walk around town until the train arrived. The train was delayed half an hour because of some difficulties with one of the carriages, but fortunately, we had a train all the way back to Melbourne, and it was a lovely trip. Very comfortable and relaxing ... we do like trains. I even saw a kangaroo hopping along the track. I was hoping to see one. Tasmania has lots of different "hoppies" but no kangaroos. The biggest here is a wallaby.

We arrived in Melbourne quite late, but had a hotel right next to the station. We weren't sure what it would be like, but it turned out to be quite nice.

This morning, we were able to put our baggage into storage while we roamed Melbourne for a few hours on foot. Breakfast by the Yarra River. Exploring Federation Square. Checking out the shops along the Bourke Street Mall: Bourke Street. Listening to street performers, including a talented concert pianist.

Back at the hotel, we collected our bags, and walked up to Southern Cross station to catch the Sky Bus back to the Airport ... and from there, it was a quick hop over to Tasmania. Home again.


Six days of no driving, but a whole bunch of other methods of transportation, including 194.47 km of cycling + 11.5 km of walking. And 4 of those days were just cycling and walking.

We were very pleased with the comfort of our Bike Fridays, and the convenience of being able to pack them into ordinary suitcases.


Just a few photos so far, but there will be more: https://www.flickr.com/photos/machka...12198466/page5 ... the last few on that page, but the other photos in that album are from previous trips to that area.

Machka 

Photos so far ...

PDKL45

Love the photos and the ride report, I used to live down that way. Have you ever toured on the other side of Melbourne?

There is a rail trail from Wonthaggi to Anderson (the Phillip Island turn off) that goes over the old railway bridge at Kilcunda. With planning, you could do a really large loop from Melbourne, to Geelong. There are backroads from Werribee, so you could take the Metro train out there (I do not know about bikes on the trains, though) and ride down to Geelong past the You Yangs and on those roads by Little River and Lara, where Mad Max was partially filmed back in the day.

From Geelong you could ride down to Queenscliff to take the Ferry (bikes are free) over to the Mornington Peninsula, and you could take another ferry from Stony Point to Cowes on Phillip Island, link up with the aforementioned trail to Wonthaggi, take the coast road to Inverloch and then maybe head north to take back roads back towards the Latrobe Valley and Melbourne. There is some really beautiful preserved little pieces of the original temperate rainforest north of Leongatha, near Mirboo North, in gullies where it was too steep to fell the timber.

If you got back to Warrigal or Cranbourne you could meet up with the Metro train system, or just ride into Melbourne to the airport.

I may do that ride one day, but for now I am (very happily) thousands of kms away planning other tours.

*Edit to add that maybe you could continue on to Wilson's Prom and beyond to take a ferry home? I don't know if the Sea Cat still runs, but it used to go to Tasmania from the port just past the prom.

Machka 

We have toured on the other side of Melbourne. When I first came to Australia in 2004, my cycling partner and I cycled from Sydney, to Canberra, down to Bairnsdale, and then along the coast down to Wilsons Prom and over to Phillip Island to Melbourne.

Then I returned in 2008 to visit Rowan where he lived at the time north of Melbourne. We caught the train from Seympur down to Crib Point, then caught the ferry across to French Island and across to Phillip Island. From there we made our way down to Wilsons Prom and back.

After I moved to Victoria, north of Melbourne, we visited several spots out that way ... Lakes Entrance, Stratford, Toora, Wonthaggi (because we briefly considered moving there and wanted to get a feel for the town), Phillip Island. Most were hub-and-spoke style tours, but 2 or 3 of them were for randonnees.


And no, I don't think the Sea Cat still runs from down that way.

Happy Feet

Nice report and pics Machka

Machka 

Thanks ... and a few more ...

Happy Feet

Took a Friday off last week and decided to do a weekend trip to Salt Spring, one of the Gulf Islands off the BC coast. This same group is called the San Juan Islands in Washington State and is reached by walking on two ferries from Tsawwassen just south of Vancouver BC. Bike fees are pretty cheap, especially if you use a prepaid BC Ferries Experience card.

Naturally, because I booked the day off, the forecast was rain for the whole weekend but I decided to gamble and wound up with only one day of actual precipitation and a great Friday afternoon.

The ferry schedule had changed without updating the website so I arrived on Island later than expected and rode to the campsite in the dark.

The next day I backtracked to Fulford Harbour for breakfast and then biked around the island taking pictures. It started raining around noon so I stopped at Ganges, the main town, for lunch and to look in some stores. Camped again at Ruckle Provincial Park, where no one was collecting fees, and then caught the ferries to the mainland to ride Hwy 17 back home.

A great weekend that cost $30 in ferry fees, $20 for dining and $0 for camping.



.be

mrv 

PLAN: 5 days, four nights riding and camping with my kid on the Greenbrier River Trail in about a month: https://www.greenbrierrailtrailstatep...RT_map_web.pdf
- will follow up with at least a photo album, maybe a short report.
YES! The trail is only 80 miles long, but we're going to break it up into some 30~40ish mile day rides, set up a base camp at one of the state park cabins, ride out of the park and bike-about and head back. I want to make it low key and fun, not make it a death march, like my 115 mile day into a head wind riding through Ohio last summer....

hartlean

That would count as "Stealth Camping," as long as you're doing it in secret. I've done that quite a few times, up & down the East Coast of the US. If you search the internet for something like "Stealth camping by bicycle," you will find quite a few pages & sites where people are writing about it. It's developed into somewhat of a science.

If you try it, just do everybody a favor, ok? Please respect private property, to preserve a good reputation for all of us. Don't litter, make a campfire or otherwise leave a trace of your presence. Hope you have fun.

Happy Feet

Hey Machka, question about those little bikes. Do they work as well as a larger normal bike or are they slower because of the wheel circumference?
I like the idea of their packability but wonder if they would be taxing to ride over a long distance. Nice pics btw.

Machka 

They are Bike Friday Pocket Llamas and they seem to work just as well as a "normal" bicycle.

We have ridden a century (100 miles in one day) with them, as well as a number of shorter rides like metric centuries (100 km in one day) ... and even on that little tour, we did 84.5 km on the day we rode the rail trail. So we can cover reasonably long distances.

I did have a minor comfort issue with mine on the century, but it was solved by lower the handlebars a bit.

And they are as fast as I am. In other words, if I can do 20 km/h on a "normal" bicycle, I can do 20 km/h on a Bike Friday.

And thanks ... if you click the photos, you'll be taken to my Flickr site where there are lots more.

HTupolev

In theory, smaller wheels will have more rolling resistance both due to greater angular velocity on the bearings, greater tire deformation at the contact area, and less ability to just roll over and ignore bumps. Realistically, those tend to be pretty minor factors, and small wheels also carry benefits like lower rotating mass. Smaller wheels intrinsically lower your gearing, but this can be compensated for with larger chainrings. Ultimately it doesn't really matter that much.

Happy Feet

Thanks Machka and HT. I think I am going to try and test drive one of those. I have seen a few older folding bikes around and have always wanted to try my hand at restoring one.

Great pics on flickr!! I like that flagstaff town

Papa Tom

I don't know if this qualifies as even a "short" tour, but this summer, I will combine my two favorite Long Island rides into one 2-day excursion. I'll ride Syosset to Port Jefferson on day one and, due to the lack of reasonable accommodations there, probably ferry over to Bridgeport, CT and stay somewhere between there and Milford, CT. The next day, I will head back to Long Island and ride from Port Jeff to Greenport, on the north fork. The total ride is something like 120 miles. From Greenport, I will take the train home and go to work the next day.

This is how it is when you work eleven days a week.