my touring bike (in progress, story of my life) is going to have a double. Not because I'm particularly strong, but because I don't have a big chainring. The truth is, I don't use super high gears. My crank has a 42 tooth big chainring, which doesn't sound like much but a 42x11 is a higher gear than the 52x14 we all used BITD. I live in the mountains and I rarely find a use for the 11 in the back. This is a pretty common combination on current mountain bikes. My small chainring is a 24 or something like that, but if I ever go touring I'll have something like a 36 in the back. I wonder if this is what the bike shop person was suggesting to the OP. My LBS suggested I go with this combination. My MTB may have a single chainring with the SRAM system. That seems like a pretty good idea.