The vast majority of my rides are solo, so when I can do a group ride, I often jump at the chance!!
I don't mind riding solo, but it gets really lonely out there, and I often long to see even one other cyclist off in the distance ... or something to let me know that I'm not the only cyclist on the planet.
So the first thing I liked about this tour is that there were other riders out there!!
But the thing with this tour is that the riders don't all ride bunched together in one big group ... we were spread out all over the place There were many times when I rode alone, but I could usually see a rider or two a ways ahead of me, or behind me if I looked back ... and every so often I'd ride with someone and chat for a while. I found that aspect
really nice. By the third day I was riding with a small group who I'd gotten to know. And that was nice too.
Another thing I liked was that we could all ride at our own pace, with people or by ourselves as we wanted. There's no pressure. The official start time on the first day was 8 am, and we had to check in by then, but we could leave whenever we wanted to leave. They had scheduled times (which were really quite flexible) for meals, and they warned us that if we rode fast, we might arrive at our destination earlier than our gear (not a problem for me, or for 95% of the riders), but other than that we were on our own. I spent my first evening swimming at Radium Hotsprings, and then lying in my tent reading (wonderfully relaxing), and the second evening wandering around Golden and taking photos, and then chatting with a bunch of other cyclists. Basically I did what I wanted to do.
Third, they provided food like I have never seen on a ride before. I have various dietary issues (no milk, no peanuts, very little meat), and the vast majority of organized rides I've been on have provided very limited food selections, and heavy on the peanut butter. I've ended up paying full price for the ride ... and then eating all my own food. (A little pet peeve of mine). But the GT tour was GREAT!! They provided a lot of food (piles of it!!) and a wide variety of food ... and good food!!
For a very low price they provide camping spots, all the food you can eat, and sag/baggage support. You can do the whole tour lightly loaded ... luxurious!
At Radium, there was a volunteer who drove a van from the campsite to the hotsprings and back all evening long. I really liked that, because if you're familiar with Radium, getting to the hotsprings is a bit of a climb, and after a long day's ride the idea of climbing back up to the hotsprings is a bit daunting, so being shuttled up was very nice.
They had a mechanic van in case anything went wrong with the bicycles ... and Don took photos like he always does on rides around Alberta so we've got keepsakes of our ride. This was the year I rode:
http://www.elbowvalleycc.org/Photoal...es/default.htm
Plus it was a beautiful ride ... the mountains are gorgeous!!
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What didn't I like???? Ummmmmmmm ... I don't know. I really enjoyed myself last time and thought they put on a very good event. If I had to find something, I might say ..... that the meat at the dinner on the second day could have been well done (I'm not fond of medium rare), and there could have been a word of instruction regarding the camping on the second night to let us know that we could just go in and pick our sites ... a group of us sort of stood around chatting for a little while wondering what we were supposed to do before someone came along and told us to go ahead. That's about it!! Nothing significant.
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I should mention that if the tour were a couple weeks long, I might start finding the group thing a little wearing, but spending 3 days sort of with a bunch of people isn't bad at all.