Fine tuning

Disclaimer – this is another post about the bike and the gear I am using so possibly not very interesting to most people, read on at the risk of your own boredom.

So, after 700 miles on the new bike the setup has slowly evolved into what I think is pretty much perfect for what I need. On the first overnight trip with the camping gear a few issues popped up.

First of all the balance of the bike fully loaded. While it was unruly but manageable in the dry it became marginal once the roads got wet, with the tail of the bike feeling very loose and coming around on down hill sections under braking. Secondly it showed that the original rear wheel sadly wasn’t strong enough to deal with the load, eventually loosening the spokes and creating play in the rim.

So, first of all the most important job was to replace the rear wheel. I got in touch with my local bike shop ( K Cycles ) who sorted me out with a new wheel from the Raleigh Pro build series, Its a Mavic A119 on a Shimano Deore hub. After a bit of a mix up with the price the shop also threw in a pair of low mount pannier racks which helped sort out my other issue.

With luggage I seem to be like a goldfish, whatever space I have I grow to fill up. So with that in mind and the thought of the luggage weight limit (and a potential fee for excess baggage), I opted for a pair of small Ortlieb roller city front panniers. These will be used for the smaller lighter items like clothing, and any items I may need to had in a hurry like my wallet, camera lock etc.

Now I am aware that Ortlieb have a reputation for being very good, but the most expensive out there. So I was amazed to find that not only was there a limited choice of small panniers from all suppliers but that the Ortlieb were the cheapest! Some manufacturers small bags were actually more expensive than the larger ones which I still don’t understand.

One other thing I have discovered over the past months riding is that sadly my Handlebar bag isn’t waterproof. This is a deal breaker unfortunately as I wont have many chances on the road to dry my gear out if there is periods of continued rain.

I have taken a chance on an Altura Vortex waterproof front roll. Now this is pretty much just a dry bag with attachments for the handlebar and stem, and nowhere near as useful as my previous bar bag but it is lighter, guaranteed water proof, and, as I got it in a sale it is much, much cheaper than a fully waterproof bar bag with pockets and a mount it can unclip from.

So fingers crossed that’s all that is needed, other than new cables and brake pads just before I leave pretty much everything else is how I want it to be. Just a case of riding loads with the new gear to get used to it and find any potential issues.

The final setup,… hopefully

The point of no return

So after months of saving I finally have my flights booked! I had initially tried booking back in April without realising that flights are only released 11 Months prior to the date of departure, so after a tense couple of months waiting watching the prices of flights rising slowly I headed back to Trailfinders in Liverpool to see what was available.

After a bit of back and forth between my options (and deciding I didn’t want to fly via Qatar due to current political issues ),  I decided to go with Cathay via Hong Kong. Its a little over my budget at £609.00 return but after going through all the luggage allowance details with the very helpful staff at Trailfinders (Charlotte was a great help, calling up airlines for confirmations on allowances) it seemed to be the best bet for travelling with the bike.

Had to stop for a quick pint and dinner at a local to calm my nerves haha

So after years of dreaming about doing something like this I’m finally committed to it, I wont lie it’s very scary but exciting at the same time. Its all starting to feel very real and very near in the future.

Trailfinders have been excellent (no I’m not on commission sadly) and the mobile App they have for keeping a track of your booking details is excellent, lots of information there with flight numbers, confirmation numbers and everything being available offline as well (excluding live flight data obviously).

Very impressed by the Trailfinders app

Hopefully I will have more interesting news over the coming few months with more overnight training rides planned soon.

Robb