Originally Posted by late
Hi,
I would suggest you look closely at other small companies. Since Rivendell was mentioned above, let's talk about them.
While they describe the Romulus as an all around bike suitable for light touring; they make very rugged bikes. It would be fine.
There really should be more choices between $1K and $2K. i don't really know a thing about this one, but I was doing a search and found it...
http://www.sheldonbrown.com/harris/koga/index.html Harris Cyclery is a very good bike shop. Also take a look at the Heron which can be seen at the Harris site.
Not to mention that for fully loaded touring Rivendell makes the
Atlantis which is suitable for off road style "adventure touring", fully loaded tours, punishing commutes and all around general purpose use. It looks like the Rivendell price increase they been talking about has kicked in but you should be able to get a suitably equipped Atlantis for ~US$2500. I personally really am in agreement with the Rivendell philosophy, and also am a big support of small manufacturers that handcraft small batches in high quality. Hopefully I'll be doing a major tour in a year or so and that it'll be on an Atlantis.