October 9, 2018
Buying Bikes in Europe
For two reasons it was not possible for us to take our bikes to Europe with us as we have done in the past. Firstly we were going on a river cruise before our cycle trip so this made it impossible but also I wanted to use an ebike and flying with them is difficult and from NZ impossible
We had decided to start our trip in Hamburg so before I left home I had done considerable research on the internet of bike shops near the centre. There was one near the centre, Megabikes, that had a big range at reasonable prices including Kalkohofs which were I knew suitable for me. We got a taxi to take us from our hotel to the shop. Actually it was the wrong shop but we didn't find that out till later! The shop was BOC (they have branches elsewhere) we were delighted with it. They found a salesman with very good English who went to endless trouble. My bike is a Winora, this is made by the same company as Kalkohof, has a Bosch Active Motor and 400aH battery and disc brakes it doesn't have back pedalling brakes which many German bikes do. It has 4 levels of assist and 7 gears with a derailleur (we had not wanted internal gears because of the problem of changing back tires). The step through was very low. The tyres had special puncture protection. Cost 1999E which seemed very reasonable.
Ken's bike is just a regular bike (called Bicycles). He got the tyres changed to Schwalbe Marathon Plus Cost 549E. We also bought panniers for my bike, a computer for Kens, a cafe lock for mine, another serious lock and got them to fit our front bags that we had brought with us. They gave us such a good discount that we paid hardly anything for these extras. Paid by Visa
Rode them to the hotel then to Munich. We have been delighted with them. The only problem with Ken's bike was the stand and he had to have this replaced. The front mudguard rather dramatically fell off mine but this was repaired - no punctures in 2200km.
We had been unsure what to do with them at the end but eventually decided to store them in Munich. We both find them great bikes for touring and were able to leave all the panniers, helmets etc with them - travelling will be so easy next year without all that stuff Again the storage worked out extremely easily. Again I had researched it before cost for a year a bit over 650E
We just have to get back there!
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These days I only seem to find e-bikes interesting to look at. That has now extended to electric cars too. The Chevrolet Bolt seems most interesting. Lots of the topics, like getting batteries of different sizes and how the vehicle guesses (or not) your remaining range are familiar from the e-bikes.
5 years ago
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