Music while touring
11-29-07, 10:59 AM
#1
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Music while touring
I think the problem of listening to music while touring should be solved with this bikes:
https://www.nytimes.com/2007/11/29/nyregion/29bikes.html
https://www.nytimes.com/2007/11/29/nyregion/29bikes.html
11-29-07, 11:07 AM
#2
Senior Member
We crossed the lone prairie in a herd of cyclists once. Did not need music or Sirus or whatever. The roads were so isolated, we rode in groupings of cyclists. Often , while on the bike you'd hear,a group sing. songs such as Home on the Range.
11-29-07, 11:47 AM
#3
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Mp3 and amplified speakers in my handlebar bag
After a year of riding through Australia, I like AC / DC in my handle bar bag
I do not listen to music all the time when we ride but I prefer it to traffic noise.
.
11-29-07, 12:02 PM
#4
Hooked on Touring
I CANNOT stress how important it is to have your ears fully available when touring. Sure you can have a mirror to see what's behind you, but unless you are looking at just the right moment, you may not see what's coming up from behind you. Your ears tell you. You learn to recognize normal patterns and potential trouble. Earphones are worse than just having the music in your handlebar bag since they more effectively mask ambient sound.
A response above says that music blocks the traffic noise. If you have enough traffic noise to be bothersome, that's when you should be listening to traffic more than ever. Sure, earphones are fine when you have 6-foot shoulders, but even the best of touring routes have sections with little to no shoulder.
Okay - so I'm a Luddite - but there's also something nice about touring when you research to have routes with practically no traffic and you ride in quiet. You know - quiet? There is something to be said about being understimulated in 21st-century society. If you do decide to ride with tunes and earphones, please keep the volume down so that you retain some of your early warning system.
BTW - I am a musician - have studied and played all of my life.
A response above says that music blocks the traffic noise. If you have enough traffic noise to be bothersome, that's when you should be listening to traffic more than ever. Sure, earphones are fine when you have 6-foot shoulders, but even the best of touring routes have sections with little to no shoulder.
Okay - so I'm a Luddite - but there's also something nice about touring when you research to have routes with practically no traffic and you ride in quiet. You know - quiet? There is something to be said about being understimulated in 21st-century society. If you do decide to ride with tunes and earphones, please keep the volume down so that you retain some of your early warning system.
BTW - I am a musician - have studied and played all of my life.
11-29-07, 12:19 PM
#5
Bike touring webrarian
I do most of my biking through San Francisco where, even with bike lanes, there are always cars zipping around you. But, I also like to listen to something (in my case, audio books) when I am riding my bike.
The compromise I have come to is to only insert on earbud (in the ear away from traffic). This works perfectly fine for audio books which have exactly the same audio on both tracks. When I want to listen to music, I have a plug that pipes the stereo into one earbud so that the music still sounds right. I got the plug at a Radio Shack after going on tour and listening to just the drums and bass on the Door's Light My Fire for 7 minutes!
I don't doubt that the books/music distract me somewhat, but having an open ear to traffic seems to be a good compromise for me.
Ray
The compromise I have come to is to only insert on earbud (in the ear away from traffic). This works perfectly fine for audio books which have exactly the same audio on both tracks. When I want to listen to music, I have a plug that pipes the stereo into one earbud so that the music still sounds right. I got the plug at a Radio Shack after going on tour and listening to just the drums and bass on the Door's Light My Fire for 7 minutes!
I don't doubt that the books/music distract me somewhat, but having an open ear to traffic seems to be a good compromise for me.
Ray
11-29-07, 12:54 PM
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TO maintain the proper 60/40 weight distribution, the big speakers should really go in front.
j/k
oh, and jamawani..... luddite!
j/k
oh, and jamawani..... luddite!
11-29-07, 01:26 PM
#7
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I think the problem of listening to music while touring should be solved with this bikes:
https://www.nytimes.com/2007/11/29/nyregion/29bikes.html
https://www.nytimes.com/2007/11/29/nyregion/29bikes.html
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Stuart Black
Plan Epsilon Around Lake Michigan in the era of Covid
Old School…When It Wasn’t Ancient bikepacking
Gold Fever Three days of dirt in Colorado
Pokin' around the Poconos A cold ride around Lake Erie
Dinosaurs in Colorado A mountain bike guide to the Purgatory Canyon dinosaur trackway
Solo Without Pie. The search for pie in the Midwest.
Picking the Scablands. Washington and Oregon, 2005. Pie and spiders on the Columbia River!
11-29-07, 01:36 PM
#8
Still on the road
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11-29-07, 03:48 PM
#9
Hooked on Touring
And we all make our own decisions about risk.
However, there are many newbie tourers here on the forums.
And people like their music more and more these days.
There's one more thing - you know your neighborhood and the streets.
When touring you come into strange towns with intersections
that don't seem to be where they are supposed to be, etc., etc.
I would never for a moment tell someone what they should or shouldn't do.
But I'll still beg. ;-)
11-29-07, 03:57 PM
#10
Professional Fuss-Budget
Wow, talk about no sense of humor. (Or not bothering to follow the link.)
The article is about a bunch of guys in Queens who are loading 200 lb stereo systems onto their bicycles and cruise around their neighborhood.
Sheesh....
The article is about a bunch of guys in Queens who are loading 200 lb stereo systems onto their bicycles and cruise around their neighborhood.
Sheesh....
11-29-07, 06:20 PM
#11
Hooked on Touring
Of course, one loses one's sense of humor when one sees a person get smashed by a car. Whether or not he was listening to tunes at the time, I don't know. He was somebody that I didn't know and kinda picked up riding with me a few years back. He was always yelling over his music. Like I said, not sure whether he had the tunes on when he was hit - but I suspect so. We did triage on the side of the road. The ambulance got there super quick. Fortunately, he survived.
