Long time  senior cycle tourist in the U.S., beginning to venture to Europe.  First trip, this past September, found us travelling with two Bike Friday suitcases, and two heavy duffel bags of camping gear/ kitchen/clothing. How do people pack/carry/ and transport this gear using trains, planes and taxis?

Airport trolley to the Metro (if applicable). Stack Duffel onto bike case and cross our fingers. Same thing but trickier with a full size bike box. 

So, can I assume that you're talking about the very beginning and end of the trip, where you're getting from your front door to the hotel room in the destination country? 

We also have Bike Fridays. We use boxes that usually are one-time usage boxes that are left in the airport or hotel where we unpack the bikes. 1 pannier is used as a carry-on in addition to the handlebar bag/backpack "personal item". The remaining panniers are packed flat in the duffel (ours are IKEA bags, they've survived 4 flights so far) along with gear. That carry-on pannier holds irreplaceable things for a 3-4 month trip, such as medications, clothing, etc. Our Ortlieb panniers all have shoulder straps. 

So, it's trip day. Your ride to the airport needs to be in a vehicle big enough for all of this stuff. Each person at the airport should nab a trolley, stack their bike box on the bottom, the duffel above, the carry-on pannier on top of that, sling your handlebar bag/backpack over your shoulder, and check in those bottom two beasts. You absolutely must make sure you have a 2-checked bag allowance or life is sad/expensive.

At the arrival airport there often is an option to get a van-sized taxi although we have stuffed ourselves into regular taxis whose drivers are good sports. Your hotel needs either ground floor rooms or an elevator or life becomes sad/onerous again. 

We have started biking in places where we have traveled by train to another location before unpacking the bikes but this was in a more relaxed country (Myanmar) where people stuffing things onto a train is just part of the routine order of things. We have also unpacked in the airport (also in Myanmar) and left the box and packing material where it could be disposed of/recycled. This is why we use boxes, because we're almost always leaving from a different location than where we started. 

Once you are on your bike with your panniers loaded,  it's all pretty sweet. You secrete your folded duffle into a pannier, you have a smallish bike that bus/boat/truck drivers are more willing to put on their craft, you have your sturdy panniers that you put into the bus hold with all the tractor parts or onto the train wherever they let you put them where you can keep an eye on them. With two of you, you have one person leaping off the train to ascertain that bikes are getting unloaded and the other one heaving panniers out the window or hauling them out the door or pulling them out of the undercarriage. It's very helpful to have two folks and usually a friendly onlooker will help out as well.

Now, we have zero experience doing this clown show in countries where people have a lot of rules to follow. We are older, we smile, we acknowledge the entertainment value of these silly small bikes, and things always work out. I'm not saying it's stress free. But so far no losses of bikes or panniers.

I'm assuming that you are paying to store or ship your BF suitcases in or to a hotel and that can bring a lot of peace of mind, unless they get lost in shipment, which has happened to Scott and Rachael Anderson. But we've done fine by buying full-sized bike boxes and cobbling them down to a 20x30x12 inch box that is under the size limit and good to go. It does mean taking a few extra days at the end of the trip to do that, hunting down a bike shop, making sure they're open, getting a large box back to your hotel, disposing of leftover cardboard in a responsible and polite manner. It's been worth it to us. 

I hope this is helpful!

Larry,

Andrea is spot on in her reply. What she's laid out is pretty much what we do. However, we do it with full size bikes and in countries with lots of rules (think Germany and Switzerland) and everything works out just fine. The IKEA bags are great!

Andrea,

Thank you for your resonse. Through your explanations, we relived our just past trip to France and Swizerland. Camping gear sent home earlier than expected, and extra help stowing gear on four train rides one day with elevators and short connections. We pulled our suitcases, as trailers, which worked well, but have decided less gear is also easier to manage. Not a problem with AMTRAK in the U.S., or vehicle transport, but first trip in Europe did cause us to wonder how we could blunder along like beginners.

Thank you again for your very concise answers.

Larry

Oooooohhhhh, you know I didn't even think about the suitcase trailer scenario, which of course is a central tenet of Bike Friday awesomeness. Personally I would be hopeless with a trailer and on the roads we seem to end up on the trailer would be hopeless too, having gotten tipped into a rice field or turned into a free ride by some little farmer kid. If a trailer works well for you, by all means, do that, but I have zero expertise there. 

I DO have agreement with you on bringing less gear, which is a goal that is sadly more aspirational than fully realized. 

Just to add one more point of view.  It’s true that we did lose one pair of suitcases, but we felt complicit because we gave UPS the wrong address for the hotel.  We’ve shipped them many times now though using UPS Mail Boxes, etc or DHL, and for us this is definitely the way to go - unless you’ve got a round trip plan of course and can just leave them at your starting point.

Thank you Scott,

UPS did solve our woes, and was actualy a suprise  due to our lack of knowledge in a foreign country. Love Andrea's response to trailer towing, as I did clip a post a bit close and bent one axle. Several days of wearing tires thin before complete axle bend straight, led to sight seeing and familiarity to an area possibly overlooked..also a bonus. 

Larry

If we made as many trips as you and Rachael do, in the places you travel, the suitcases would be the right investment, for sure.  I would have had very little confidence in shipping them between the particular points we were traveling though, so that would limit us to a round trip, and we’re not super confident in getting reliable storage there either. 

Hi Larry

My wife and I did almost exactly this scenario with our two Bike Fridays on a tour of Japan a few years ago.  Andrea’s answer pretty much nails it. We stored the suitcases at the first hotel we stayed in. Van taxis, or maxi taxis were sufficient to get from hotel to stations, or hotel to airport.

A Japan specific problem to contend with is that they don’t permit bicycles (or luggage trolleys) to wheeled in the platform areas after you’ve past the check in barriers. This means lugging the bagged bikes, and the bagged panniers, very long distances within the station precincts. It’s a major physical challenge. The stations in major cities are vast. 

Rarely did we see Japanese passengers with large pieces of luggage. We learned too late that it’s very common to have hotels arrange for luggage to be freighted to the next accommodation.