Some threads on training for a tour: (
Advanced search on word: "training" in the entire thread, in the time period of the last year)
http://www.bikeforums.net/showthread...d-conditioning
http://www.bikeforums.net/showthread...tour-body-wise...
http://www.bikeforums.net/showthread...ing-for-a-tour
http://www.bikeforums.net/showthread...d-after-a-tour
What I'm wondering is what kind of pace is typical, or reasonable in a day, for example if people are riding to be at a campsite 100 km away before sundown.
Depends when you start in the morning and when sundown is where you are at the time you're touring.
For doing 60 miles / 100 km each day, (lets say without significant wind or incline) what kind of breaks are people taking during the day? Do people ride continuous for an hour at 20 kph and then stop to rest for a half hour and then do another 20? Or is it necessary to be able to do 40 km straight for 2 hours without resting?
It's a tour, not a race. A certain speed and distance are not "necessary" on a tour. Do what you want to do. And as I said above, the distance you cover can be dependent on when you start in the morning and how late you go into the evening.
As for riding for an hour and then resting for half an hour ... for me, definitely not! I prefer to ride until I want to make a stop for some reason (photos, toilet, taking my jacket off, etc.), then stop for 5 minutes to do whatever it is. Then ride again until want to make a stop again, and repeat. I could ride 10 minutes between stop, or 2 hours, or anything in between. Again, it's a tour, not a race.
But I like to keep my stops quite short ... except if I'm having lunch sometime around noon, or if there's something really interesting to see or do that takes me off the bicycle.
And as I said in that other thread, after doing 100 km a day on long and short tours, that distance is all right for a long weekend tour or something fairly short. But I prefer to aim to do something shorter like 80 km a day. Not that I can't ride 100 km (I've done hundreds of rides of 100 km and longer), but on a tour, I like to have the flexibility to stop when I want to stop and take in my surroundings rather than staring at the road all day.