Cycling adventures for everyone
Some thoughts on putting a cycling adventure in your 2024 plans
When the weather bites, cyclists take their love for pedaling inside. They tune up their bikes, pick up new skills and tricks, get lost in cycling reads, and map out the year of fun on wheels. By keeping the fire burning indoors, they're ready to conquer the roads and trails come warmer days.
Charting my bike adventures is one of my winter rituals. It sparks not just my rides but helps make my other goals come to life. Want to join the cycling adventure crew or step up the level of your adventures on the bike? Here's some motivation to get you ready to pedal.
See the opportunities for adventures, not the constraints that get in the way. Alastair Humphreys
Limitations become opportunities
Time. Time is precious. Work, home, and family commitments influence how it is spent. Prioritize commitments and look at opportunities for a better self. Life needs space to grow. Nothing changes or happens without priority. Give change the time it deserves.
Money. Before hitting the road, dive into your finances. Set a realistic budget that meshes with your overall financial plans. Remember, adventure on wheels comes in many price tags. Adjust your plans to fit your available funds
Experience. A few or many miles? Hills, flat expanses, or some of each? Roads or trails? Gravel or pavement? Answering these questions leads you to an adventure that can comfort or challenge you.
Comfort. Sleeping under the stars or pampered indoors? The optimal overnight setting depends on your travel vibe. Rough it or pamper it and choose the flavor for a happy day on the bike.
Drive. For speed lovers, a cycling tour may be about the miles conquered, lungs burning, and legs screaming. For the discoverer, it's a slower roll through landscapes while taking in the people, places, and culture. It could be something in between.
Solitude. Solo journeys offer time for introspection and connection with nature at your own pace. Tours with friends or others bring camaraderie with shared experiences, challenges, and victories. Organized tours take on logistics with the organizer's expertise and knowledgeable guides.
Adventure. Set your sights on adventures that make your wheels and mind turn. Embrace the comfy cozy, chase the uncharted, or something in between. You do you.
Your bike is a discovery. Your bike is freedom. It doesn’t matter where you are when you’re on the saddle; you’re taken away. Doug Donaldson
Start dreaming
Google. Search “bike tours” on your laptop, tablet, or phone. A plethora of information appears. Commercial bike tours are excellent sources for discovery. Leverage their experience in planning in building good itineraries. Their offerings target places cyclists want to explore.
Retail. The outdoor recreation economy knows the power of bicycle touring. Retailers such as REI and Trek offer in-person education, blogs, organized outdoor adventures, and videos to encourage people to explore the outdoors.
Stories. Online journaling through blogs and websites such as Crazyguyonabike and Cycleblaze presents journals from many perspectives from around the world. Vlogs, where you can experience tours in action, are popular on Facebook, Instagram, and TikTok.
Books. My favorite winter bike activity is reading books on personal stories of bicycle tourists. I am drawn to around-the-world or cross-continent adventures. Most are self-published and vary in quality. They are inexpensive, offer personal insight, and are worth the read.
Recommendations. Don’t overlook the value of speaking to others in your cycling circle. Local bike shops can share stories of customer travel and connections to fellow cycling travelers.
Things do not happen. Things are made to happen. John F. Kennedy
Chart your course
Turn those opportunities and dreams into reality. Book a tour or use your research to roll out on your tour. My experience is that no bike tour is a bust. Good ones live on. Bad ones live on. Sometimes the worst of times teaches a valuable life lesson. Go into this with an open mind.
This year's adventures on the bike began today!
Tom on the Trails
If you ride a bike, you are a cyclist. If you explore your world on a bike, you are a bicycle tourist. Tom on the Trails
