Recommend me an alternative to MOAB please…

Some of my local biking mates are going to MOAB, but it’s £2000+ and I can’t help thinking I can get more value for money in Europe or perhaps Morocco.
If you’ve been to MOAB and it’s worth it – let me know! Otherwise I can’t help thinking that £1000 on a biking holiday closer to home and £1000 on a family week away in Centre Parcs Holland would be a better use of the families cash.
I’ve done the lots of Wales, Scotland and the Alps a couple of times and enjoyed it – what else can you recommend instead of MOAB, or is it really THAT good?

It is that good.

Nothing in Europe remotely compares to it; it is unique.

I’ve been twice; I’d love to go again.

A (bike) holiday of a lifetime for £2000? Go for it.

Fruita, Colorado

I think they’ve just OK’d recreational pot too 8)

Romney marsh

I did a BC tour with these folks, which was very good: http://www.sacredrides.com/

makes everywhere else I’ve ridden seem not so good though.

Also had a great week with switchbacks in Spain, but that was more about the riding than the whole ‘experience’

Have ridden French Alps , BC , quite a few other places but I’ve never ridden anything like Slickrock it’s just so unique . Combine that with Porcupine Rim, Magnificent 7 etc etc fantastic place

I thought Moab was brilliant

Try doing it cheaper?

Assuming you can find at least 1 person to ride with all you need is a bike and a book. Although a vehicle is handy

I’ve never been any where as easy to navigate. No we did have to think some times buts its not that hard

Moab holiday – £800 for flights, under £100 each for shared car hire, take your own bike on virgin for nothing, and you could get accommodation for 4 for under $100 per night if you went for a condo. Sure you cant go?

It’s almost worth it just to ride the Whole Enchilada trail alone.

the riding is very different to Europe though, dont go expecting uplifts and huge descents (with the exception of the trail above).

Moab, Fruita and Durango are all a close traingle of each other. Driving from,to Denver you can also get a spin in Winter Park, Breckenridge and Vail.

£2,000 seems expensive. You will need a flight, hire a vehicle(s) between you and then camp. The camping over there is great and can be had for free or very little.

I wish I had said camp

Do it at a cheap low frills place its more American

Gunnison/Crested Butte, Durango, Cortez, Moab, Fruita makes an awesome road trip. stay in cheap motels to minimise expense. The riding is very different to European riding.
It’s reasonably easy to navigate routes with some research via Internet- print off routes in advance and use the very friendly local bike shops for advice. I’ve done two trips and just booked to return next Sept 🙂

We stayed at a campground in Moab , they had some nice cabins there

Yossarian – I’m already part of the Romney Marsh Mountain Rescue Team…

Thanks for the advice on camping etc – but we’re going as a big group, so I’ve got to tag along with the group’s plans. We’re going with Trektravel.com as it’s being organised by our LBS who are Trek dealers and we’ll be on Remedys.
http://www.trektravel.com/trip/moab-ride-camp-bike-tour/

Looks like I’d better start getting stuff on eBay to pay for it!

Good man 😉

How long are you getting for the £2k?

I was just checking the all in prices for the White Room (my last Northern hemisphere holiday) which is going for about 575/week + flights and a meal or 2. Doing 2 weeks out there would be great but doing Moab with good mates would be hard to beat as a not going to get the chance again.

£2k is for 5 days of riding and EVERYTHING else. Beer, planes, transfers, food, bikes, etc.
We only have to rock up with shorts and a helmet…

£400/day……….

Probably still worth it, as it is unique. Think I did 5 months round Canada, Yosemite, Moab twice, Joshua Tree, colorado……….for 4k, but was slumming it.

We only have to rock up with shorts and a helmet…

You’d have nothing else left after they have taken the shirt from your back!

That is a LOT of money for 5 days of riding anywhere. I’d get a group together and do a trip for a lot better value if I were you.

Wow, having had a proper look at some of the details, thats way, way too expensive

plenty of established companies out there like Western Spirit that have great reputations at a fraction of the price after you’ve paid for flights

Hell, for that type of money two or three of you could do it in luxury and stay somewhere like red cliffs lodge

Moab is fantastic but I agree that £400/day seems expensive…. plus if I was riding in Moab I’d want my own bike etc…. I’ve just looked at the itinerary and all the stuff they mention I’ve done previously and I’ve not needed anything beyond a guide book and a car… all of those trails are well known and well sign posted…

Also if the 5 days is $1300 per person (-£730) then is the flight really £1300?

I also wouldn’t visit for less than about 10 days. That gives time to get over jet lag and spend a few days in Fruita as well.

So, yes Moab is worth it in general but I’m not sure that the trip you’re referencing is good value for money. I live in calgary and I can assure you that their Canadian rockies tour also seems somewhat pricy for what you get

Well worth a trip out there but as others have said £2k sounds very pricey.

We were lucky and flew into denver and stayed with friends in golden in Colorado. Rode lots of the front range, redrocks and the colorado trail. Then we drove over to moab and stopped off at grand junction and fruita on the way.

It was an amazing trip. We camped by the Colorado river one night and then actually camped on the slickrock trail. There’s some pitches up there. No water or eleccy and just a hole in the ground for your business. Theres a spring at the end of the procupine rim trail (by the Colorado river) to fill camelbacks and sunshowers and a youth hostel in moab you can use for low cost showering if you feel posh.

The sunsets were beautiful and scenery otherwordly. If you go into poison spider bikes in moab they do an uplift to upper poison spider trail, kokopelli, etc. They give loose directions too. It was over 100 deg F but the top of trails were snowed in even in may when we went. Oh we also went skiing on our day off at A basin in the Rockies.

Best Holiday ever really. Will forever be grateful to Kate and Mike who looked after us soooo well after we all met on a tour of mont blanc. If this really is your one chance to go then I’d do it if money is no object. There are only a few opportunities when the timing is right.

However having said that now being a dad I’d feel very bad using family budget to do it at that price knowing its possible for less. Especially if it means the family don’t get a holiday. Brave man if you do!!!

Thanks for the advice folks…
The £2k includes getting to LHR/LGW, transfers to Grand Junction from Denver (or hiring a minibus) and we’d be staying in the Best Western (Gonzo) in Moab for an extra night at the start, possibly one at the end due to the timings of the inbound/outward flights.

It all seems like too much dosh to me too, but I’m also told that the riding is epic. Decisions decisions…

I think I might go another year when the family funds are better – but I’m 40 this year so I might start another thread – epic bike holidays in Europe!! No doubt I’ll end up going guided in the Alps…

Thanks again for the input…

We spent 3 weeks riding in Moab, Durango and Flagstaff last October -total cost was about £2200 including flights, car, decent accommodation, beer, food and souvenir shopping. Obviously this would be more if you had to hire a bike. So, probably about the same price per week as a European guided trip.

We’re going again this year, it’s just a question of when to get the right weather to ride in Moab, but also to be able to access the higher up trails in Colorado.

This site is pretty good http://www.mtbproject.com/

I’d also recommend the Moab Outerbike festival in October this year.

…but Europe is great too!

I was on a round the world trip

My wife and I had a standard budget of $10 a day each

Although that didn’t count the car hire. Which I think was $600 for 6 weeks

That was in the 1990s

But if was amazing so if you can find $2000…

It is the irony of life. It so cheap if you can take your time and have no job. But then you have no income

When you have a job your out goings shoot up and you have less time…

I only post the photo as it was taken so close to agentdapdamit’s

[/url]
Porcupine Rim Trail[/url] by John Clinch[/url], on Flickr[/img]

I’m a bit late to this thread but…
we were out in Moab and surrounding area for 2.5 weeks in September/October 2013.
Flew into SLC and spent a few days at the beginning at Park City. Would recommend this for ~3 days riding.
We then went to Fruita for 5 days. Had a few days of good riding – Horsethief, Zippity-doo-dah, Joe’s Ridge etc – but Fruita is a pretty poor destination. It’s not a great place to stay for a holiday.
We then spent a week in Moab – and it wasn’t enough. We did Slickrock, the Whole Enchillada, Porcupine on it’s own, the Mag 7 trails etc., but didn’t have time to do lots of stuff we wanted to do. Also would have liked to do Enchillada, Porcupine and Slickrock multiple times.
And it’s a good place for a holiday trip.

So my summary would be:
-Don’t go for less than 10 days
-Spend almost all that time based in Moab
-Don’t go to Fruita for more than a couple of days

For a shorter trip stay in Europe

I spent three months mtb-ing the states and have to say moab is indeed a ‘must do / bucket list’ BUT there are also tons of great stuff nearby.

My favourite trails were Porcupine rim in Moab and Monarch Crest out of Salida which starts at about 11,500 feet and climbs to 12,000 and then descends to Salida which, if memory serves is 6000 feet.

As others have said, I think you could get the trip cheaper but in a group you usually have to go with the deal they agree and theres nothing better than riding with mates.

edit: Fruita was a diversion and good but not that good compared to other rides.

The ‘Luberon’ in the south of France is known as the Moab of Europe, I’ve not ridden there though.

10 years ago I did a package that took in Moab, Arches NP and some riding in the Wasatch near Park City (SLC).

I found the desert the most beautiful environment and the Wasatch was great too, well worth a visit and I intend to go back one day but don’t go if you’re going to be rushed, take your time, as Robespierre says.

£2k for five days of riding is ridiculous. As others have said, you could do it all so much more cheaply and for longer if organised independently: the US is ideal for DIY travel (cheap car hire, cheap fuel, lots of cheap accommodation, big and cheap breakfasts). I’ve spent a couple of weeks in California and Utah for much less and personally I’d prefer the freedom of deciding what I wanted to do each day. It’s not hard to organise(though getting all your mates to agree might be the tough bit).

£2k for five days of riding is ridiculous.

Hell yeah, especially as the first day will be spent getting over jet lag. I would not travel all that distance just to ride for 5 days in MOAB even if it was half that price, yes the scenery is amazing but the riding is no better than a lot of places closer to home: Colorado provencal near Apt, Terre noire near Digne les Bains just two (cheaper) examples.

I spent a whole summer riding in the pyranees for less than that (incl lifts)

Livigno

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L5bBE3cAkwY

Ever since my first Sedona visit, I’ve had trouble going back to Moab- Sedona has probably better riding (though no long descents like the Whole Enchilada) and more incredible scenery. There are lots of lodging options and if you’ve got a group of 4 or more a house rental through Airbnb and community meals in might work out cheaper. Phoenix is also a major airline hub and a shorter drive to boot.

http://singletrackworld.com/forum/topic/video-from-livigno-mountainbike-paradise

Moab is *THAT* good.
I’ve done porcupine rim twice now and its amazing.
Worth every penny 🙂

+1 with mbasiliare, Sedona also rocks (v red!) a serious contender to Moab for quality and quantity of amazing riding

http://www.trektravel.com/trip/moab-ride-camp-bike-tour/#dates-prices
5 days, £800 plus flights sounding better?

Did it as part of a larger tour in the US, spent a few days their was fantastic but really wrong time of year for riding in the desert.We stayed in very expensive digs (red cliffs lodge) but otherwise once your their everything else was cheap – pair of Turner Sultans were only £30 a day each.

mikewsmith – That’s the one we’re planning on taking, (see link previously in thread!) but after flights (£800-£850) transfers, extra nights accommodation, couple of extra meals out etc it will be £2K.
People are starting to drop out now after the initial “screw it -let’s do it for £800 plus cheap flights” now the actual figures are starting to be realised.
Our LBS has got us a discount of 25% on the TrekTravel price but even so – it’s still a lot that the ‘family’ can’t justify…