I toured on a custom Lippy touring bike. Had all the special eyelets. 27x 1 1/4" tires. Rode it from Utah to Colorado. It also had a BAD shimmy at high speeds. 37/49 with 13-30freewheel.
I toured on a Maserati road bike made of Columbus tubing and had steep angles 74degrees head/seat. Rode it down the coast of Ca. then took the train to Redding and rode it around Shasta, down to Tahoe, and back to the Bay Area. I put on a Blackburn rear rack, replaced fork with longer rake road fork and used 700x28 tires and carried 13lbs of gear. It was a much more secure ride than the Lippy. 42/52 with 13-28 freewheel.
If you're skinny, fit,young and carry very little gear you can ride a different bike than if you're older, fat or carrying more gear.
I was basically making sequential long distance fast training rides and not really touring and smelling the roses.