While checking out some possible hosts on the WSL, I checked out some of the polls. I feel I must put in a disclaimer that these are not scientific polls, because they are voluntary. The resident statistician would insist. So if you are wondering how accurate these polls are or don’t even care in the first place, keep reading anyway.

According to this survey, most of the cycling tourists travel solo, followed by as a couple, then with friends and then with a larger group. I can proudly proclaim to be a member of each of the groups, well, in a few months that is, probably one of the few times that I would be a member of any such prestigious group. Being a member of a survey group is pretty exciting to me.

We have led lots of high school students on bicycle tours in various parts of the world. NZ, Baja, the Yucatan, Ohio , Michigan, Indiana….. Guess that we have led adults as well since I used to volunteer for AYH as it was then called. Our little group toured on the Seaway Trail starting at the hostel in Cape Vincent. We headed east to Massena and it seems that we stopped at every attraction and park along the way. We crossed into Canada at Massena and then followed the Heritage Highway back to Kingston where we took a ferry, crossed and island, took another ferry and returned to Cape Vincent. It was a fun time with a group of adults, little kids (ours) and a few teenagers.

We stopped to do fun things like milking a cow. This youngest member of the group is now in grad school in aeronautical engineering. See where bicycle touring will get you?

I traveled solo for several months in New Zealand and along with friends. Now that I think of it, we have never toured as a couple as described in the survey. That will be a new experience for us and one that I am eagerly anticipating. I can hear the bike behind me shifting into lower gears when I have no lower gear to shift in to. I feel the pressure to pick up the pace and shift up a few gears when climbing hills. I feel the shield around me protecting me from passing vehicles. I can expect to have my flats changed and my tweaking done for me. I cannot change a flat as quickly as Robert who can do it in just a few seconds and that includes pumping it back up and putting all the panniers back on the bike. In that same time, I maybe could have figured out which of my tires was flat.

This entry was posted on Tuesday, January 9th, 2007 at 9:04 pm and is filed under General. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.