Off (and on) road touring.

Sat here on crutches – again – awaiting MRI scan for knee and my mind is wandering.

I’ve always fancied a touring bike. But I also fancy the idea of being able to link up the roads in Scotland by the many “dead end” roads and estate tracks. These maybe would be a bit too rough for a 700c wheeled tourer.

The obvious thing would be to use a hardtail mtb that could take a rack (I don’t fany using a trailer). Or a 26 inch wheeled tourer – something like the Surly LHT (26 inch wheels for my size).

I quite fancy something like this <http://www.pbase.com/image/83943401&gt;

What are you multidayers using?

Let’s see some pics, I have quite literally been stuck on my arse for 5 weeks now!

Why not just use a touring bike and adjust the way that you ride off road – look at the Rough Stuff Fellowship and Wayfarer.

I suspect that the kona Jake i used for the tour of nz would handle that no bother. unless you plan to take in singletrack

did 3500kms on and off road , about 400k was off road on dirt tracks and with some (limited) singletrack , the bikes were a handful loaded up

We have taken our tandem on several mainly off road tours. I have also used an old road race bike on cyclocross tubs. anything is possible.

Sounds like you’re after the kind of thing I do most of the time. I use an Inbred with coil sprung u-turn forks with lockout and have a steel pannier rack at the back with Ortliebs plus a bar bag on occasion. I reckon a Long Haul Trucker would be pretty decent too, but front suspension is very handy for really rough stuff. If you need any hints or feedback for routes, let me know, as this is what I do every spare weekend!

Here’s a random selection of my bike or friends on their poor imitations:

I wouldn’t let wheel size bother you. My Kona Sutra, a Dew Drops or a Specialized Tricross would all be fine on most of these rough tracks. The first two also have discs, which you might prefer for heavily-laden off-road touring.

OTOH – a normal hardtail MTB with either rigid or lock-out suspension forks and skinnier tyres would also be fine – e.g.

Ahaaaaa! Jose is the bloke I was asking about over the weekend. The Inbred against the post is what I remember.

Jose are you running a disc on the rear? I can’t decide whether it’s a small disc I’m looking at or a smaller disc. Also, do you have any problems with heel clearance against the pannier?

I’m wishing I’d kept that Inbred I used to have now. Might have to loose a bike to make room.

That should have been small disc or your cassette.

Sorry for the late reply, I’ve had busy week starting a new job. The Inbred has a BB7 on the front and an SD7 v-brake at the back. I couldn’t be bothered with the faff of getting the rack to fit around a rear disc brake and it’s easy to lock up the back wheel with a v-brake anyway. My friends in the pictures both have Tubus Logos which come with spacers for moving the legs of the rack out a wee bit to clear their rear disc brakes. Seems to work well for them but it can depend on the profile of the brake used, I reckon.