Quote:
Originally Posted by MarshaBrady1968
Please send me names/websites for bike tours, mainly budget-friendly ones. Open to hike/bike combo tours as well. Would prefer that they also rent the equipment, or it comes in the package. TIA!
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This thread was started last year - not sure if the original poster is still looking for this information. With the pandemic this year, many bicycle tour companies are have cancelled most or all of their tours. But hopefully next year will be better, and with that in mind, I'm going to answer this post in case others come along who are also interested.
For anyone looking for an organized bicycle tour, here are a few of the big things to consider:
- Are you interested in US tours, International, or both? Any other preferences on specific locations or regions?
- Tent-camping or motels? The original poster here said budget-friendly, and one can save a lot of money going the tent-camping route. On the other hand, I have the impression that someone who doesn't have their own bike (since the poster is looking for the tour company to supply them) probably isn't going to have their own tent to bring either.
- How much biking do you actually want to do? Some tours will do 20 miles a day of bike riding on flat terrain. Thus the bike riding itself will only take two hours per day or less, with the rest of each day taken by other sightseeing. Other tours will do 40, 50, even up to 100 miles per day of riding (which can take 4, 6, even 8 hours on the bike), and a hilly ride is harder and takes longer than a flat ride. Tour companies that offer a lot of tours will usually have varying level of difficulties, but some companies tend to cater to easier or harder rides, and some "mom and pop" operations will be just a couple that act as ride leaders and do a few tours a year. Operations like this can be the most budget-friendly. So it helps to know what you are looking for.
About bicycles: any international tours will include rental bicycles as part of the tours. With US tours, most companies expect you to provide your own. But in the US, if you need a bicycle, you can generally find the nearest major city to where the tour starts and do a web search for bicycle shops to find one that rents bicycles.
With all that said, here are various ideas for organized bicycle tours. I have done many of the rides found on bikingbis. The other companies or websites in my post, I may have done one or two of them but if not, I have had cycling friends over the years who have done them and recommended them. I believe all of these put on very good tours, keeping in mind that like I said above, different people are looking for different things in a bike tour.
https://www.bikingbis.com/across-state-bicycle-tours/
This tries to list tours in all 50 US states. Most (though not all) tours tend to be tent camping. Many of these tours are put on by some local group within each given state, so these tours tend to be the most budget-friendly of all bike tours out there. Most of these tours are 40+ miles/day with some being a lot harder - very few 20-mile/day type tours, but there are probably a few since there are so many tours to be found here.
https://www.adventurecycling.org/
This is one of the larger bicycle tour companies in the US (and they do some Canadian tours too). They have a pretty good range of amount of support and difficulty between various tours. They will be a bit more expensive than most of the tours on bikingbis, but they definitely are not the most expensive tour company out there either.
https://www.heartcycle.org/
https://www.pegasusbiketours.com/
https://planetultra.com/
These are smaller groups that may put on a dozen or so tours a year. These tend to be budget friendly. Mixture of US and international. Many of the tours change from year to year.
The above was mostly US tours with a few international tours in the mix. The following is most or all international tours (mostly Europe). Most of these are smaller companies that specialize in certain countries or regions.
https://bicycle-beano.co.uk/ -- One week-long tour a year in Wales.
https://www.bikeandthelike.com/ -- Mostly bike-and-barge (which tend to be easy) tours in Europe
https://www.cyclingjourneys.com/ -- a few tours a year in Italy
https://www.greenjerseycycling.co.uk/
https://www.iberocycle.com/
https://bikeridesfop.org/overseas-cycling-adventure/
Finally, the following site is the closest analogy I know internationally to bikingbis for U.S. This site assembles tours from many different local tour companies worldwide. I've seen prices per week ranging from under $1000 to almost $4000. Be sure to note whether a given tour is guided or self-guided.
https://www.biketours.com/find-my-tour/view-all-tours/
Hopefully that gives anyone viewing this thread quite a few options!
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