Post your bike. - CycleBlaze

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Post your bike.

Kelly Iniguez

I have Jeff's approval for this open ended question that I hope will have you looking back through your camera rolls for your favorite photos. 

One of my  pastimes is to check out people's bikes - what are they carrying, where is it loaded, etc. People can be in the photo, as long as they don't block the view of the bike. Just kidding! Sort of.

 I will open with my most current touring version. In 2020, we bicycled from the Mexican border to the Canadian border, through the Rockies. 

Monument Valley, 2020. The bike is a 2010 RANS Stratus XP, with a K style frame.
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2 years ago
Wayne EstesTo Kelly Iniguez

Here are  bike photos on my profile page, spanning from 1988 to the present. My first touring bike was a 1987 Trek 520. The lugged steel frame was made in Trek's original factory in Wisconsin.

1988 at the Rio Grande gorge near Taos, New Mexico.

In 1998 I switched to a Speed Ross short wheelbase recumbent made by Peter Ross in Cornwall, England.

2000 in the eastern Sierra Nevada near Bridgeport, California.

The Speed Ross frame broke during a bike tour in Canada, so I replaced it with a 2007 Bacchetta Giro 20 which is made in Florida.

2010 in Colorado's San Luis valley.

In 2014 I quit camping and eliminated the rear panniers. This is the setup I have used since then.

2018 at Grand Canyon National Park in Arizona.
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2 years ago
Rachel and Patrick HugensTo Kelly Iniguez

Thanks Kelly, nice idea and Wayne.

1992-94 Looking back to Africa at Gibraltar after cycling two years.
1999-2000 South America Santiago Chile to Ushuaia, from Buenos Aires to La Paz Bolivia. Same bikes.
2006-07 Cycling home from Alaska after a year in Asia. Same bikes.
2015-17 RTW....same bikes.
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2 years ago
Gregory GarceauTo Kelly Iniguez

Thanks for the chance to show off my bike, Kelly.  I know you picked out a couple pictures of it for your previous, highly-successful article but I can't remember exactly which ones they were.  This time, I picked out my own faves.

Meet my bike, "The Reckless Mr. Bing Bong," pictured from behind.
Partial front view
Side view
Finally, a shot that includes me with my bike.

I've had many bikes in my life, but The Reckless Mr. Bing Bong is my only touring bike . . . so far.  I don't treat it particularly well, but it continues to serve me without fail.

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2 years ago
John SaxbyTo Kelly Iniguez

Thanks, Kelly -- what a good idea, and what a good choice of background for you and your bike.  Majestic.

Below, a photo of my Thorn Raven-mit-Rohloff, Arkels fore and aft.  This photo is taken at a mid-morning stop in front of a maintenance depot for a rural municipality a day's ride south of Ottawa.  It's not an exceptional photo in any way, EXCEPT for the fact that I took it in early September, 2020, partway through a four-day mini-tour along the Rideau Canal south of Ottawa.  The closest I got to a tour in that COVIDian year.

My Raven is now in its eighth season -- I bought it in the spring of 2014.  It's been a wonderfully comfortable and reliable bike, and is probably capable of a lot more than I can ask of it.  I've named it "Osi" -- short for Osibisa, the name is my homage to that splendid Ghanaian band.  Their Woyaya song was anthemic during the 1980s, most of which I spent in Central/Southern Africa, and I've found its sentiments wholly appropriate for cycle-touring: https://www.youtube.com/watch?...

Osi the Raven, restin' in the morning sun near Chantry, Ontario, Sept 2020


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2 years ago
Jeff LeeTo Kelly Iniguez

I've toured on three bikes. 

First, my Cannondale T-400. Built in 1995, I think. I purchased it for $100(!) in 2006.

North Dakota, 2008
Illinois, 2012

Second, my Wabi Lightning SE single speed. This very light bike with its single 48x16 gear (or 48x19 gear if I flip the wheel over) is obviously extremely inappropriate for touring, but I've done some light touring with it nonetheless. Because I'm dumb, I suppose.

This is the most beautiful object I have ever owned.

Finally, my Salsa Fargo. My wife originally bought it for herself, but it was slightly too big for her. Even though it's a Medium size, and should be too small for me, I like the fit. I used to think the Fargos were among the ugliest bicycles ever made, but this one has grown on me.

Natchez Trace, 2018.
Wyoming, 2019
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2 years ago
Mike JamisonTo Kelly Iniguez

Oh that's a fun idea Kelly! Here are two photos, the first with the non-photogenic member of the family (Me) standing with my and my wife's touring rigs ... Both Seven Expats ... Mine is on the left, a steel frame with the Granny Smith paint job which my wife REALLY wishes she had grabbed first. Her bike, built a year after mine, is a titanium frame to ease the pain of losing that sweet green color. There's also a solo pic of Margaret on her bike, simply because the camera likes her way more than me.

Me looking super grumpy for some reason. Our Minnesota tour back in 2017
Margaret on the same trip commemorating us moving to a new map segment.
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2 years ago
Lyle McLeodTo Kelly Iniguez

Our Current bikes .... don't have any digital picture of our more ancient ones. 

All pic's show the bikes 'in use' and loaded for self sustained touring, i.e fully equipped for camping. We are getting soft though and really only camp when the conditions are great, or we have to.

Our tandems ... several European trips and 1/3 of our 2015 Cross Canada trip

The Prairie Slayer. Bilenky custom tandem. Rohloff and S&S couplers. Notice the organic stand! Somewhere east of Drumheller Alberta on our 2015 Cross Canada ride https://www.cycleblaze.com/journals/ltkk2015/
The Prairie Slayer's sister bike. Identical except for paint and component colours. We did a few trips with the kids until they outgrew the bikes (and sitting behind us). This bike saw very little action since 2012 and we moved it on last fall to another couple who promised to show it appropriate love and affection. This photo's from a short 3 day trip from Jasper to home (Canmore) in 2012

Our single bikes. Toute Terrain Silk Roads

Toute Terrain Silk Roads (Rohloff, Gates Carbon drive). Inaugural tour, cross Canada 2015. We rode these bikes from Victoria to Calgary, switched to the Prairie Slayer in Calgary and shipped these to Sudbury via Greyhound. Reversed the process when we got to Sudbury and then rode these the rest of the way to St John's . Picture is at the southern end of Sunwapta pass on the Ice-field Parkway in Banff. https://www.cycleblaze.com/journals/ltkk2015/
The Tout's (and Kirsten) on the Bodo ferry, Denmark. This is from our last tour in 2019, Copenhagen to Lecce. https://www.cycleblaze.com/journals/lecce/
Seriously thinking of an upgrade ... Toblach / Dobbiaco in the Dolomites. 2019 Copenhagen to Lecce https://www.cycleblaze.com/journals/lecce/
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2 years ago
Brent IrvineTo Kelly Iniguez
2000 Cannondale F1000SL

One of my three bikes, this is the one I used on the last tour I was on in 2019 (until you-know-what happened in the world), along the Prague-Vienna Greenway route (this was taken in the suburbs of southeastern Prague.)

Though the bike is a few years old, most of the components have been updated within the past few years. The Arkel panniers and rack bag have been in use for about a decade now and still hold up well. Some great additions to touring comfort are the Brooks Flyer saddle and the Jones handlebars. Otherwise, the bike is a mix of XTR, LX and Deore, with Marathon Supreme tires.

In case anyone is wondering about the little wheels just above the rack... In previous tours I brought along a luggage trolley to manoeuvre the bike box on arrival and departure. Extra weight, yes, but very useful. Last year we printed out a wheel system to attach right to the bike box which is small and lightweight.

Yet to be used on tour, this is my new idea for moving a bike box around. The wheel itself is made of HDPE from food containers which I melted and shaped to fit into the bracket.
Small, light and easy to 3d print.
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2 years ago
Scott AndersonTo Kelly Iniguez

Too tough!  Maybe it would be easier if Rocky and I were like Racpat and had ridden the same wheels for the past 30 years, but we’re much flightier than that.  We have two bikes each now but still love all the dearly departed, and it’s hard to choose or play favorites.  We’ll keep it simple and just look at the most recent four generations, which takes us back to about the turn of the century.

In 2000 or 2001 we replaced our Cannondale R900 touring bikes we’d been riding for the last decade after I managed in the space of about two months to ruin both of them by driving them into the garage on the roof of our Subaru Legacy.  For months I drove the car with the trays of our Yakima roof rack bent up like bull’s horns as a sort of public self-shaming.

We replaced them with more upscale models: Rachael got a T2000, but I bought a beautiful T1000 with a metallic paint job that turned from hunter green to chocolate depending on the light.  They carried us on at least a dozen tours over the next decade, through Italy, Croatia, Austria, Switzerland, Spain, France, Japan, Scotland, Australia, and finally Greece.

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Those Cannondale years: in our ryokan in Gujo Hachiman, Japan in 2007; in Andalucia, 2003; and somewhere else I lost my notes on.

In 2009, we took our first tour of Greece.  Our Cannondales flew free on the way over, but we were shocked to be charged $300 each to get them home.  Not long afterwards we retired them from overseas touring and bought our first Bike Friday New World Tourists.  We figured we’d get our money back in saved excess baggage cost in about 4 years.  We did that, and then some.  In the next 9 years we rode them on anther 15 or so tours: to the French Alps, Southern Spain and Portugal, the Pyrenees, Taiwan, Sicily, back to Greece, Corsica and Tuscany, and to many shorter excursions in America.

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Our New World Tourists visit Gibraltar and Portugal, above. below, Rachael contemplates the start of the assault on Mount Ventoux while I conquer the snowbound summit of Galibier.

We finally retired the Cannondales in 2016, donating them to the Community Cycling Center.  Rachael replaced hers with a Surley Straggler that she’s still not fully at peace with, and I celebrated my 70th birthday by buying the bike I’d wanted forty years earlier but couldn’t afford at the time: a Rodriguez Adventure.  I love this bike, and if it weren’t for the hassle of flying with a larger bike I’d ride with it everywhere.  Instead, these two remain in storage in Portland while we’re out of the region, and see use on local rides and short tours. 

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Rodriguez and the Straggler do the Northwest. Someday we’ll roll out the front door on them and take them someplace really special.

Finally, in 2017 we decided it was time to start over with new Bike Fridays.  Still New World Tourists, and essentially the same design but with disk brakes.  Three months later we sold our home and went vagabond, and they went along for the ride: to Greece, Albania, Yugoslavia, Slovenia, Italy, France, Spain, Portugal, Taiwan, and still counting.  They’ll be our rides for our upcoming tour from Minneapolis to Rome.

Three views of Rachael’s BF: pushing the slow route through Basilicata; testing out how well it works to tie your shoelace while straddling your bike, in Puglia; a minor portage in Sicily.
And three of mine: in Puglia, Basilicata and Calabria.
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2 years ago