Posted by: reggie1
Re: Round the World starting Spring 2006 - 04/25/05 03:28 PM
Hello Andreas:
Yes, then is is possible to do the tour, in Africa for example, on a touring bike. That is one tour that seems likely worth trying. Another one of interest is the Point Barrow, Alaska to Tierra del Fuego expedition, partly because it is long and exotic, and partly because it would make for a good book, and also because prices south of the border are known to be substantially lower
than in the USA. An English cyclist from Manchester who recently spent three months cycling Mexico said that his cost there was about four to five dollars a day, US dollars that is.
He was saying how he could purchase a foot-high stack of burritos for two dollars, and that a motel room could be had for four dollars. Of course, we are not talking the Ritz here, but when on tour who needs the Ritz.
Yes, the roads in poor developing countries can be too rough. Cycling in Ukraine was challenging like that because many stretches of road were so patched up, occluded, cracked, pot-holed, and gone to the dogs that it was necessary to use the hard-packed earthen pathways aside the roads to get reasonable milage in comfort. One sees so many of the old, green, military style motorcyces with the side cars in that part of the world. The side cars are necessary because the roads are so rough they are needed for stability to remain upright at any speed worth traveling.
The P.R. China has good roads for cycling. I would recommend
the smaller back roads. Main commercial arteries of transportation may be more direct lines between A and B, but for that same reason they are primary conduits for commercial traffic, commercial traffic meaning many large and extremely polluting trucks, not to mention all the other traffic that will choke the life out of the cyclist. One day of cycling these open gas chambers called roadways will leave your face sooty, your clothes saturated with the stuff and your lungs searching for relief. Roadways in Ukraine were extremely polluted, far and away a mulitplicity of times worse than anything I have ever seen anywhere in the world, so far.
Yes, then is is possible to do the tour, in Africa for example, on a touring bike. That is one tour that seems likely worth trying. Another one of interest is the Point Barrow, Alaska to Tierra del Fuego expedition, partly because it is long and exotic, and partly because it would make for a good book, and also because prices south of the border are known to be substantially lower
than in the USA. An English cyclist from Manchester who recently spent three months cycling Mexico said that his cost there was about four to five dollars a day, US dollars that is.
He was saying how he could purchase a foot-high stack of burritos for two dollars, and that a motel room could be had for four dollars. Of course, we are not talking the Ritz here, but when on tour who needs the Ritz.
Yes, the roads in poor developing countries can be too rough. Cycling in Ukraine was challenging like that because many stretches of road were so patched up, occluded, cracked, pot-holed, and gone to the dogs that it was necessary to use the hard-packed earthen pathways aside the roads to get reasonable milage in comfort. One sees so many of the old, green, military style motorcyces with the side cars in that part of the world. The side cars are necessary because the roads are so rough they are needed for stability to remain upright at any speed worth traveling.
The P.R. China has good roads for cycling. I would recommend
the smaller back roads. Main commercial arteries of transportation may be more direct lines between A and B, but for that same reason they are primary conduits for commercial traffic, commercial traffic meaning many large and extremely polluting trucks, not to mention all the other traffic that will choke the life out of the cyclist. One day of cycling these open gas chambers called roadways will leave your face sooty, your clothes saturated with the stuff and your lungs searching for relief. Roadways in Ukraine were extremely polluted, far and away a mulitplicity of times worse than anything I have ever seen anywhere in the world, so far.