newbert

For those of you who travel from place to place by car, and bring your bike/trike, where/how do you securely store it when staying overnight at a hotel? I ride a recumbent trike which does not fit into my car. (I use a trike rack). I'm considering attending a few events or rallies next year, but I'm concerned about safeguarding the trike overnight.

Any thoughts or advice would appreciated.

Thanks!

Bearhawker

I like to stay at motels so I can back the car up to the room at bring the bike in.

mev

If you were touring with the trike - would you bring it into the room? If so, I'd try the same thing if I were transporting it.

Tourist in MSN

Lower budget motels often have rooms that you enter from outside, not an indoor hallway. Several decades ago I used to have to stay in cheap motels for weeks at a time for work, I often had electronic equipment that I had to bring into the room at night to charge up batteries, etc., I always tried to make reservations for a ground floor room.

I am thinking of a Cat Trike 559 when I ask this question, as a friend of mine has that model. I think it is too wide to roll it through a normal doorway, but I think it might fit through an extra wide handicap access door. I have no clue if you can request a handicap access room if you do not have a disability or not, every state probably has different rules.

In other words, I have no clue if this is a viable option, but that is what I would research if I was in your situation. Next step would be to pull out a tape measure. Your state building code should have a code width for handicap access doorway width.

For work, I had a handicap access room for one night, but in my case there was only one remaining room available when I rented it, so I was not taking a room away from someone that was disabled.

staehpj1

I have wheeled my bike into rooms in motels both with outside access and ones where I had to enter through the lobby. I have had a few offer a safe place to store the bike but usually declined. The rare times when I accepted their offer were when there were three if us and the space was especially tight or there was some other special consideration. The other time I can think of off the top of my head was a hostel where they had a policy against bikes in the room, but had a nice secure place to store them. The hostel was the only time I recall that they ever insisted that there be no bikes in the room.

If the trike doesn't fit in the room that is a different issue. I'd bet most places would offer a safe place to park it.

I do typically ask for first floor room in the typical motel with outside access, but don't sweat it if I get a second floor room.

skidder

No trikes, but I bring my bicycle into the room. Hotels haven't been a problem as long as its clean (clean your MTB before you get to the hotel if its seen a fun day in the backcountry ), and bring a tarp or plastic sheet to rest the wheels on (prevents black marks on light-colored carpet).

staehpj1

I have on ocasion asked if they had some rags and a place to wash a bike before bringing it in if it was exceptionally muddy, explaining that I didn't want to muddy their carpets. The rare times I did this they offered some old towels and pointed me to an outside faucet. For a moderately cruddy bike I never worried, unless I needed to roll down the halls of a more posh hotel. BTW, I found the more fancy places to actually be more accomodating, the opposite of what I expected.