It worked but the photo is not very clear. Both bikes, my own and my wife's, are cro-moly (zona) tubes and forks, top and down tubes on the left bike have been reinforced, Mavic A-719 rims, XT hubs, 22.32.44 - 175mm, 9 speed 11X34, Avid 5 brakes, 105 front derailler, Dia-Compe brake handles, Continental Top Touring 2000, Shimano PD-540 pedals, Brooks saddles, arkels panniers. Picture taken at East Point during a recent 11 day tour of Prince Edward Island. While it rained for the first 3 days, we left the rain covers on to help with visibility (perhaps wishful thinking).

This is mine at Nerstrand Big Woods State Park near Nerstrand, Mn. I was out for a weekend ride so the big panniers got left at home.

it's an '85 Trek 620 frameset with some more modern components (eight speed drivertrain).

hi,
thats my cannondale in peru...and no! there is no photoshop...the bike which is enourmous is shown again but this time having a hard time under the brazilian heat...

optical illusion? that bike looks tiny

no kidding, it does..... must have been photoshopped in there...

Here's my rig from last weeks tour of the California coastline:

Highway 92 is a fun ride! I live in Montrose, and I've done a 3-day loop tour a couple of times from Montrose to the dam at Blue Mesa Res., then to Crawford, and back to Montrose through Delta. A lot of slow climbing when you're loaded up... Which way did you go? I might like to try reversing it sometime. I'm not sure which way would have the worse grades. It's a BEAUTIFUL area! I did it once in July (hot), with panniers, and once in mid-October with a BOB. The campgrounds had shut off their water for the winter, so I had to carry enough to get me to Crawford, plus cooking dinner and breakfast. That's a big advantage the BOB has over bags!

Okay, so I'm really new to this forum thing... I was replying to a guy who had a picture of his bike at the Currecanti Recreation area in Colorado. After I posted this, I realised that his posting was like a year or more ago! Maybe I'll catch on and get the hang of this.

Here are a couple of pictures of my bike. I replaced the handlebar bag on the picture for an Arkel, the rear panniers are waterproof Seratus and the front are 10-12 years old Arkel (I don't use them very often so they look brand new).

The bike is stock except for the new inline brakes and tires and the triple layer of handlebar grip.*One day I'll swap the large crankset for something smaller, but I already blew my budget for this year and plan on cycling mostly on relatively flat terrain this year.

I like the way I placed my headlights and blinkies... but to be honnest, it is mostly for esthetic reasons... one blinky and one good headlight would have been as good.

I also placed hooks on my rear rack. No need for hooks on my panniers and it is now much easier to instal them on these racks.

Okay, so these aren't "loaded" pictures yet 'cause I'm still waiting on the Bruce Gordon racks I ordered but here's my bike buildup so far. This is my first "real" bike & I plan on doing the Great Divide on it yet this year if I can finish fixing up my house, sell it & get out of town by September. Otherwise maybe I'll spend a few months in Baja, or something. Here's the rundown:

1987 Schwinn Cimarron MTB frame
Shimano LX crank, XT derailleurs (painted black)
36h Rhyno-Lite XL rims/XT hubs
Avid Shorty 4 brakes
On-One Mungo bars (okay but not too comfortable for long distance. Will try drop bars I have or maybe Albatross bars)
Dura-Ace bar-end shifters
Shimano road brake levers
Brooks Champion Flyer Saddle
Eggbeater Pedals (today was my first day with clipless pedals...only fell once!)
1.9" Schwalbe Marathon XR tires

Stay tuned for "loaded" pictures with Bruce Gordon racks & Jandd panniers. Cheers...

I thought that it looked tiny too. Folding bike?

Uh, look at the picture closely. The bike (a cannondale) is sitting in a depression (ditch, culvert?) several inches below the edge of the road and maybe a few feet behind the rider. If you look at the photo with the rider on the bike, you'll notice it isn't a miniature bike.

The wonders of optics. The person who took it must be fairly tall or standing at a high angle and shooting with a wide angle lens.

My Trek 4300 and my cousin's Raleigh P3000 loaded, in France Sept '04:

just came home form our 10 day trip aroung lake of geneva, we live in geneva switzerland, so there was no journey to or from the tour, that's what i enjoyed most, this and the fact that we were able to spend a lot of time with my girlfrind and with our dog.... a 14 year old "visla"
more pics to follow

You are my inspiration! I have a 1994 Schwinn Sidewinder, and I worry that it won't do everything I want it to do, especially when I look at the new "roadie," type bikes I see touring and on charity rides. I've always liked the bike, especially because it fits me so well. (I've bought it new.) I guess it will do just about anything, except earn the admiration and envy of the elite road cyclists I know, huh? :-D

Have a great day!

One problem I've run into with the MTB conversion is that the top tube is longer than most "road" bikes and I'm too stretched out with both the moustache bars & drop bars I've tried. I'm using about the shortest stem I can get and still need the bars to move back a couple of inches to be ideal. I might try the On-One Midge bars since they seem to have a much shorter reach than the Salsa cyclocross bars I tried. I might also still try Albatross bars, though I'm accumulating way too many sets of handlebars already (hello, Ebay!). I don't know of any better way to tell really what I want without all this experimentation, but at least I'll know for sure after trying all the options. Good luck on your bike!

But look at the bike in relation to the guardrail its leaning against. Have you seen a guardrail mounted that high off the ground? The bike in the left photo is a miniature. The photo with him riding is a different bike....

Don't know about that - I'll have to go to Peru and measure some guardrails before I can answer.

Now onto other pressing issues...

I wonder what the temperature was like for him to be wearing a face mask? It looks like he's weaing all those clothes in the middle of a desert!

Here's a picture of my recently acquired touring bike. It's the touring model from Marinoni (local brand from Montreal), the Turismo. The bike is a 2004 which I bought "used". It only had 500km on it and is still like new even after another 700 km since last month (when I bought it). For now, I've been riding it a lot for training/recreational riding, but still haven't had time to go on a trip. I'm planning a 2-week trip for next fall though. I put a Blackburn rear rack and a MEC lowrider on it. Not the best racks but pretty decent and CHEAP! 35$ CAN for both racks...

I had bought Serratus waterproof rear panniers at MEC, but they proved to be so bad (urethane coating started chipping off after only 2-3 rides!!!) that I had them refunded. Now I'm waiting for Ortlieb Bikepacker plus rear and front panniers. Has anyone tried them??? Are they durable?

Anyway, my Marinoni is the nicest bike I've ever had and rides like a charm... Highly recommended bike for anyone looking for a good touring bike that's also very nice to ride when unloaded (with 700x25 tires I follow my friends with racing bikes w/o problems). Here's the specs:

- Full Campagnolo Veloce 10speed (13-29) w/ 52-42-30 chainrings.
- Centaur front deraileur.
- Tektro Mini-V brakes
- FSA orbit headset
- Ambrosio Keba rims, 36 spokes / wheel
- tires for training : 700x25cc Continental Ultrasport
- tires for touring : 700x32cc Cadence Excursion

Happy touring to all!

New member. All the pics are great to see.
Pic #1: This is me just trying to fit in at Cancun International last summer.
Pic #2: Last weekend on a trip through Cape Cod.

Well it's only loaded up for an all day adventure, but here she is...

Here's my bike just before departing for a three-day, camping trip. I got the idea of using light-weight plastic tub as a top trunk because we use larger ones for car camping, and its a good way to keep camping gear easily accessible at the site. Plus it's waterproof!

Green beans fresh from the garden in the ziplock next to the bananas. I don't recommend carrying bananas that way. Two hours into the trip I discovered that the bungie corad had turned the outer banana into pudding, which was all over the lid of my trunk, not to mention my bed roll.

Unfortunately the book (Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance by Robert Pirsig--one of those books you figure you should have read by age thirty, but from some reason I just hadn't yet) fell out at some point and I lost it.

The other picture is at the Wisconsin/Illinois state line just after some rain.

My bike in the middle of a Paris to Rome tour