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E-Bikes is a generic term that drags all bikes with an electric motor into a single group. This page endeavours to provide explanations of the different types of e-bikes and how they compare to the many types of self propelled bikes on the market. Are All e-Bikes The Same Over recent weeks and months I have noticed that many authors writing about e-bikes have tended to lump all electric bikes under the banner of 'e-bikes'. However, doing so ignores that there are actually many different types of e-bikes and they each play a very different role for those that ride them. A few years ago, I first encountered an e-bike as part of an organised cycle tour in Italy with cyclists from the Netherlands leading the way with the introduction of their heavy hybrid style e-bikes. Merida eSpresso 300 SE EQ 504Wh Electric Hybrid Bike One of the riders dropped her bike while trying to put it on its stand and we jumped to help lift it and almost strained our backs the bike was so heavy - in excess of 30kgs. These bikes were predominantly made from steel and weighed a lot before the electric motor and the battery were added. The batteries were large, heavy rectangular boxes that sat on the rear rack and the idea seemed to be that the rider could utilise the motor from the start to the end of the day to help them keep up with the riders on ordinary hybrid bike. Pedalling was still required, but the effort generated great rewards including being able to join in tours that otherwise were out of the cyclists' reach.The next cab off the e-rank was the e-mountain bike which were lighter and offered access to steep terrain for those that had loved to mountain bike while they were younger/fitter/more agile. All of a sudden riders seemingly lost to mountain bike riding were returning with a vengeance. These bikes were still heavy compared to manual versions, but the weight was decreasing and riders were starting to see e-mountain bikes weighing in close to 20kgs and offering some fabulous riding. In 2021 my partner and I tried the e-mountain bikes at the Otway Caravan Park in Victoria and we really enjoyed the experience.Depending on the e-bikes in question, the control panel can have a number of settings ranging from minuscule assistance through to it almost becoming a motor bike. The bikes we rode in the Otway National Park had settings of 1-5 and our guide suggested leaving it on 5 so that climbs and switch back corners would be a doddle! And they were - we really loved the experience and as our ride was only for an hour there were no issues with the batteries lasting the journey. Riding e-bikes on the top setting is a sure recipe to running the battery flat really quick. Riding an e-Mtb in the Ottway Ranges Given the above, I wonder whether it's time to differentiate between e-bike models just as we do with manual bikes? If its good enough to talk and write about hybrid, mountain, gravel and road bikes and the myriad of other manual bike styles, why keep trying to encompass all electric bikes under the one banner of ebikes? As a Strava user, I certainly get frustrated that I can choose from a range of categories for manual bikes, whereas there is just the title e-bike for all electric bikes. I don't think it will be long before first the type of electric bike is properly named and, second, before the various bike computers like Garmin and exercise programs like Strava develop software that can keep track of usage over different modes allowing riders to compare like with like in much the same way as they already do by allowing a manual endurance road bike to be compared with another. Merida Smartmotion G3 ECity However, in Europe we have ridden hybrid e-bikes, like the Merida eSpresso above, that are better suited to long, comfortable rides. These bikes look like flat bar road bikes, but the overall weight has come back under 28kgs so that the battery life will sustain a 70-90 km ride predominantly riding in the economical mode with sports and/or turbo used to counter strong head winds and steep climbs.And then in 2019 came the e-road bike and a year or two later, its cousin the e-gravel bike. As riders get older, fatter, injured, etc. the love of riding road and/or gravel bikes needs to be tempered with the ability to do so and keep up with other riders around you. The bike manufacturers saw an opportunity and they started releasing e-road bike models in earnest from late 2019. These bikes look like regular road bikes but with big rear wheel or pedal motors and batteries trimmed down and inserted into the diagonal post from the pedals to the handle bar. The results have been great for those of us that want to be able to ride on roads, trails and paths with those that are younger, trimmer or fitter, or just enjoy going for a ride and not being hampered by the conditions. These bikes are constantly being improved, with manufacturers playing a balancing role between weight and performance. The latest Trek e-road bike, for example weighs in at around 11.25 kgs, but the light weight battery has a reduced range under a 100kms, whereas the Specialized Creo range includes bikes around 12-13kgs and a range of 120kms plus and an opportunity to add a range extender weighing 1kg and adding 50% to the range. As road bikes are often ridden at speeds above the 25kph maximum for electric assistance, the batteries can well and truely exceed their promised ranges. On a relatively flat ride, for example, my Creo can achieve close to 200 kms on the main battery just by riding only in economical and spending a lot of time riding at an average speed in excess of 25kph. Given the above, I wonder whether it's time to differentiate between e-bike models just as we do with manual bikes? If its good enough to talk and write about hybrid, mountain, gravel and road bikes and the myriad of other manual bike styles, why keep trying to encompass all electric bikes under the one banner of ebikes? As a Strava user, I certainly get frustrated that I can choose from a range of categories for manual bikes, whereas there is just the title e-bike for all electric bikes. I don't think it will be long before first the type of electric bike is properly named and, second, before the various bike computers like Garmin and exercise programs like Strava develop software that can keep track of usage over different modes allowing riders to compare like with like in much the same way as they already do by allowing a manual endurance road bike to be compared with another.

tourdemature is a blog set up to provide older persons with information about cycle touring options around the world, as well as to help people to understand the unique nuances of the addition of e-road bikes to to the range of bikes available to riders. In addition the blog contains lots of reviews of cycle tours, e-road bikes and bike accessories. Tour de Mature A site providing mature cyclists with a range of bike related information to assist with buying bikes and accessories or finding an appropriate bike tour. If you would prefer not to scan the whole web site, you might prefer to use the buttons provided below to give you direct access to current relevant topics. Just click on the button and you will be taken to the appropriate tab. Do you need riding experience? What bike options do you need to consider? The latest reviews of Tours, Bikes and Accessories What do you need to consider when preparing for a tour? Readers' Forum - an alternative to Social Media Are all e-bikes the same? New Arrivals Ankle Fusion Surgery -what's the impact on cycling? (Oct 2026) VIEW ALL Have a look at my article concerning how to utilise e bike modes if and when derailleur problems arise! (Oct 2026) VIEW ALL

What's the difference between a hybrid, a flat bar and a drop bar bike and which one would best suit you? The Hybrid Bike Wikipedia suggests that a Hybrid Bike blends characteristics from more specialised road bikes, touring bikes and mountain bikes. The resulting "hybrid" is a general-purpose bike that can tolerate a wide range of riding conditions and applications. Many cycle stores will put new riders on hybrids to start their cycling experience and this was certainly the case for Mary and I. We started with Avanti hybrid bikes which had a low entry cost and provided us with a very comfortable ride. These type of bikes usually weigh 13 to 16 kg, have a flat bar handlebar, either calliper or disc brakes, and up to 30 gears using a handlebar based gearing system like the Shimano Tiagra 3 x 10 speed below . They also often have mudguards, one or two panniers, a large soft seat, 32 mm tyres, and suspension for the front fork. As you can see in the photo below, Trek, like a lot of bike manufacturers, has converted to using disc brakes. The flat bars on a hybrid are super comfortable, but they aren’t aerodynamic or fast. They also often arrive with a kickstand which can be very useful for keeping your bike upright where there are no practical places to park the bike. Hybrid bikes are easy to ride and are popular with so called 'weekend warriors' who like to join walkers, joggers and riders travelling around popular spots like parks and lakes. Touring companies such as Girolibero and French Cycling Holidays provide either cross bar or step through hybrid bikes to their guests, with step through popular with both males and females as they are easier to get on and off for novice riders. From my experience, this is the most common type of bike offered by on and off road cycle touring companies.

Is joining a cycle tour simply a case of showing up and the people running the tour will organise everything or are there lots of things that you may need to do to ensure you have a good time? Is the tour your only activity during your travel or do you have to work out how to get to and from the tour? Will you be collected when you arrive or will you need to make your own travel arrangements? List goes on and this web page provides a check list of matters to consider. And When U Do - What Next? Food and Drink: Food and drink quality and choice varies across all tours. The price of the tour will provide some indication of quality and choice, but of course this can't be guaranteed. On cheaper bike and barge tours we have experienced alla carte service with great meals prepared by the crews' speciality cook, while on others the cooking was done by the captain and crew and was fairly ordinary buffet style meals. Land based tours provide a mixture of dinners prepared by the hotel you are staying in and/or being taken to restaurants to try local cuisine. With French Cycling Holidays, for example, dinners are usually a highlight of the day with the guides taking extra care to find great food and excellent wines. Breakfasts can also vary with some boats or hotels offering a wide range of choices while others serve up the same fare every morning. When we first started bike and barging we would join the other riders every morning after breakfast packing our lunch for the day - usually a bread roll with meat and/or cheese, a piece of fruit and a small box of juice. After a couple of tours we decided that this is a recipe for boring eating and we stopped preparing our lunches except on days when advised that we would not have a purchase option. Companies like French Cycling Holidays will at the start of the tour offer participants the chance to have picnic lunches on days when the local food choices will be poor or non-existent. Sometimes the cost is built into the tour and on other occasions you are given the choice of joining picnic(s) and contributing your share of the cost of the picnic at the end of the week. Otherwise, we check out the local options near where we stop for lunch and usually really enjoy trying local specialities that otherwise we might never try. All tours we have done have provided free water every day, sometimes the water is bottled and other times you fill your water bottle from water provided by the guides before and during each day's ride. Most, but not all, tours include a free water bottle in your welcome package. After experiencing a tour that didn't we now always bring our own reusable water bottles with us. In addition to possibly contributing to the cost of providing picnics, it fairly common on smaller barges and boats for a tab to be kept for drink purchases over the whole tour, with participants given their bill for their costs over the tour on the last night so that accounts are cleared before you leave the vessel. Coffee Coffee, the go to drink of many cyclists, whether it is drunk before, during or after a ride with friends, part of a meal or something to end the day. Riding locally the challenge is usually to find a coffee shop that is open and prepares a good coffee of the type that you like. As an Australian, I have become used to purchasing espresso coffees from a speciality coffee shop with trained baristas and as a cyclist I look for coffee shops with good coffee that welcome cyclists and that have somewhere suitable to stack or lock bikes within eyesight. Once I travel overseas, the 'coffee' challenge becomes harder. A tool that I use to help me locate suitable places is Google Maps which can help you find somewhere that is open and serves coffee, but reviews don't usually give you a sense of the coffee preparation or style. I haven't had to use Google in Italy as the coffee options there are prolific and usually you can tell how good the barista is by looking at the coffees they have already prepared. A tip for novices, though - a latte in Italy is a glass of milk and the standard coffee options are espresso and cappuccino. If you want a latte try asking for a cafe latte, but you may be delivered a black coffee with milk. If you drink piccolos in Australia try asking for a doppia (double) macchiato and see how you go. The other thing about espresso coffee is that the coffee names vary from country to country. One country's espresso is another's short black; a piccolo is called a cortado in several countries and a a cafe latte in Austria could result in a tall thin glass with milk coffee and a straw. I used to rely on an app called Beanhunter but it changed its focus and coffee reviews got older and irrelevant. If you have a coffee app that you swear by, please send me a review with the web address and I will add them to this page. Laundry Laundry is an important consideration when cycle touring. We now each pack three sets of riding clothes when packing for one or more tours. That is three jerseys, three knicks, three pairs of socks three base layers, three caps to keep the sun off our heads. By having three sets we are able to wash a set after a ride and provide two days for it to dry. If you are on a boat or staying at hotels for multiple nights you can leave your clothes to dry in your room while you are out riding, but if you are changing rooms on a daily basis, you have to wash straight after you return to the room from your ride so that the clothes can start drying overnight. Then they go into a plastic bag for the transfer to the next room (unless there is room in the van for clothes to be spread across the back seat to dry during the day) where they can spend another night trying to dry before being used again. A useful tip given to us was to wring out the clothing by putting items in a towel and then twisting the towel to remove as much water as possible. Then hang as much washing as possible on hangers in the wardrobe and close the wardrobe door so that the dry heat of the wardrobe helps to dry the clothes overnight. We have found it rare to have access to a laundry with dryer in our hotels, but we can advise that at the Lake Garda Bike Hotel in northern Italy all cycling guests are given a large mesh bag into which all of a day's dirty cycling gear can be placed and then deposited at reception before 7pm. The clothing is washed and dried overnight and returned before 7am the next day. An absolutely fabulous service which frees you up from the usual practice of washing clothing in the bathroom basin which is time consuming and messy! Joining a Tour For most tours, you are usually required to make your way to and from the vessel or starting point and depending on the departure and arrival locations you may find yourself having to arrange a series of transfers including finding the nearest cheap airline airport, working through train options (noting that in France and Italy for example you can only book three months in advance) and possibly having to get a taxi for the final leg of the connection. Many operators will include pick up and drop off at a range of relatively nearby sites and this can be very helpful. In addition, if you find an operator/guide that you love to ride with, you may find that they will go out of their way to help you get to the start of your tour or to your next point of departure such as a rail station or an airport. If you are looking at options for getting around Europe and the UK before or after a bike tour, I would suggest comparing trains with planes and then look at hiring a car just so that you can appreciate the pros and cons of each. Flying in Europe and the UK can be a cheap alternative with airlines like EasyJet and Ryanair (no connection) but be aware that they often fly out of regional airports and can present a challenge in getting to and from the airports. Try the website flylc.com to identify either airlines that fly out of airports near where you are coming from or going to, or change the enquiry to look at specific airlines and see whether they offer flights at prices that might suit you. For rail options I would highly recommend looking at the webpage called the Man in Seat 61 - the train travel site at seat61.com . It is a fabulous site and was the catalyst for this website. Train travel is a fundamental element of each trip we take to Europe and the UK and I always start by checking seat61.com to find out what train options are available for the places we are travelling to, which class to travel, when to book, where to book, etc. Train travel options are myriad overseas and it can be daunting trying to work out whether, for example, to catch a TGV, an intercontinental train or a regional train in France. Renting a car can also be tricky. Again there are lots of comparison websites, but even so it can be really difficult to compare 'apples with apples' due to the different terminology that rental car firms use for the same event. Also, be aware that the three French car manufacturers (Citroen, Peugeot and Renault) offer car leasing schemes based on a minimum of a 21 day lease. If you need a car for more than 20 days it can be a much cheaper option and has a number of benefits including a better insurance option. If you lease the car is registered in your name and you get normal insurance rather than the tricky insurance with excesses for standard rental cars. Make sure you are fully aware of the terms and conditions (e.g. non serious accidents must be reported to the the leasing company within a specified time for the repair to be covered, but providing you do so there should be no excess payable. We have collected a Peugeot at the airport in Milan (for an additional small fee) so there is no problems with taking a leased car outside France, but I believe they must be returned in France. Further, if your leased vehicle breaks down, it must be repaired rather than being replaced and you will be provided with a hire car till the leased car is repaired. This can create two difficulties, first you have to return to the city where the car is being repaired once the repair is complete which can stuff up your itinerary, and secondly if the repair takes several days and your itinerary had you driving into another country in the interim, you may not be able to as when this happened to us in Italy we were told by the rental car company that we could not take their car outside Italy. Luggage Many overseas operators assume that their riders will be coming from countries relatively nearby or only for the duration of the tour. In addition, many riders come from countries with less generous holiday arrangements than Australians and the combination of these two factors often means that the riders will fly in, join the tour and then fly home. As a result, they can often get away with a backpack or small suitcase and easily meet maximum luggage size of the operator. It may therefore pay to contact the operator before your tour departs to find out how much luggage they will be willing to transfer each day. As Australia is so far away from almost everywhere we tend to arrange 6-10 week holidays with two or three bike tours over the period. This can mean leaving home with a large and small suitcase each and not all operators will transfer this quantum of luggage, particularly if the tour is fully booked out and luggage space in a van or bus needs to be optimised . This is where the itinerary for the whole trip can be important. For example, we have on occasion been able to devise a tour whereby a suitcase with clothing not needed during a ride week is stored in a locker at a railway station or in luggage storage in a hotel where a tour started and finished. Should I take my bike with me? Locally - roof v tow bar? The location of the ride will of course have a major bearing on your decision if you own a bike you would prefer to be riding. If you can drive to the start of the tour, you could take your bike with you. There are lots of racks that can be attached to your vehicle and used to carry your bike. In choosing a rack you need to think about whether you will attach to a towbar or use one of the racks that attach directly to the roof or boot lid. The other thing to think about is the compatibility of your bike(s) to the the rack system you choose. For example, if you have an all steel or an ebike, it will probably be heavy and better attached to a towbar based rack for ease of lifting. A full carbon bike will be light and roof rack options come into play, but you need to check whether the method of locking into the rack might cause long term cracking problems for the carbon. For carbon bikes, many bike mechanics I have spoken to suggest that it would be better to get a rack that attaches to the wheels rather than clamping to the frame. However, this advice has started to change over the last few years. Tow bar racks tend to come with two standard designs - an upright bent bar on which to hang your bike(s) using the cross bar or a full blown rack on which the bike(s) can rest and be attached. The latter are a better option for bikes you want to protect and some, such as the Yakima Click series come with optional ramps that can allow users to roll a bike up the ramp and on to the rack allowing most users to be able to load and unload even very heavy bikes. We changed to a Yakima Click 2 towbar rack when we purchased our Creo e road bikes even though they each only weigh 12 kgs. We have now used the rack for several trips including a tour in Tasmania with AllTrails which included taking the car with rack and bikes by ferry from Melbourne to Devonport and back. It did a brilliant job. Electric Vehicles and Bikes The recent uptake of electric vehicles (EVs) has introduced a new challenge for bike carriage. The addition of a bikes on a roof rack or the addition of tow bars and bike racks at the rear of an EV can impact of EV range through providing greater wind resistance. Theoretically hanging bikes behind rather than above an EV offers the least resistance, but even so a rack carrying two bikes and all up adding 50kgs towing weight can be expected to reduce an EVs range by 15-25% depending on the terrain being traversed. Bigger, SUV style EVs that allow you to carry bikes inside the car offers better range but all EV manufacturers are looking to improve battery range to facilitate all types of towing activities including bike racks. Overseas In my experience, if you are joining an organised cycle tour overseas, the operator will offer to rent you a bike and, if needed, a helmet. Taking your bike overseas with you can be done, but you might want to consider the pros and cons first. I've thought about doing so on a few occasions, but the cons won the day. However, a number of acquaintances have taken their bikes and have benefitted from having a bike that perfectly suits them, rather than renting. So here are my pros and cons: Pros You will probably be most comfortable on your bike. Saves you the cost of renting a bike when you arrive. Your preferred type of bike might not be available on the tour you are joining. If you are flying in to immediately start riding and will be flying home as soon as the ride finishes, many of the cons may be worth putting up with. If and when your ebike batteries can be hired from bike shops or the like at your destination, it might be worth the hassle of transporting your bike so that you both can take advantage of your bike's e features and also avoid the much steeper cost of hiring ebikes as opposed to manual bikes, whether they be road or hybrid. For our 2024 tour in Italy we ended up hiring two Giant e Road Bikes from the tour operator for a week. This cost us just shy of $AUD 1500 and while we enjoyed the ride the price was epic. Cons You will need to purchase a bike box of some description (although if you have the cardboard box that your bike was sent to your bike shop in, you may be able to use that box for your trip). Of course depending on the quality of your bike you may need to buy a relatively expensive metal bike box so that your bike is not damaged in transit. You will need to dismantle and rebuild your bike or pay mechanics at either end of your trip to do so. Depending on the distance between your arrival airport and the start of your riding tour, you will have a bike bag to lug around in addition to your luggage. This can be an issue if you are catching public transport to get around. See Brakes below - if you will be riding on the opposite side of the road to home, you might want to swap your brake levers over so that your bike is consistent with the set up of local bikes. If you are not joining a supported tour, you will probably need to find somewhere to store the bike box while you doing your riding. If you are joining a supported tour, they may not have room to store and/or cart your bike box. If you have an e bike of any type you will need to think about how you will transport your battery(ies) as you will probably be unable to leave them in or on the bike frame in the aeroplane's hold. Apparently batteries need to be carried as hand luggage, but many batteries will exceed the hand luggage weight limit of 1kg. If you are mixing your activities while overseas and won't be located in one spot when not riding, it could be a major hassle to transfer your bike when you are not cycling. If you have any mechanical problems while touring you may have to arrange your own repairs and depending in where you are you may be without a bike for a lengthy period. What are the alternatives to taking your own bike when travelling overseas? The basic alternatives are to purchase or rent a bike when you arrive. Some riders choose to purchase as they will need the bike for extended periods, don't need to worry about transporting their bikes and luggage between different locations and they can purchase a bike that they know suits them. Others want to try bike models that they can't trial at home or they can get a superior purchase price and intend returning home with the bike. However, the bike you want may not be available, the cost of purchase can be very expensive and what do you do if you can't sell the bike before you depart for home. If you opt to buy a relatively cheap bike then resale is much more feasible, but in return you may be opting for an uncomfortable riding experience. Hire Bikes However, in our experience, most overseas riders joining tours in Europe or the USA will opt to hire a bike from the company that is operating the tour. The type of bikes they offer (and most now seem to offer a choice between a manual bike and an ebike with the latter often being twice as expensive to hire) will vary from hybrids to flat bar road bikes to drop bar road bikes with the hire rate climbing as the choice improves. If you are bike and barging, you will often have a choice of a 7 or 21 gear hybrid bike with a rear rack and a vinyl pannier for carrying things like lunch, a bottle of water (usually distributed free of charge at the start of each day's ride), snacks and a rain jacket. Our European tours in 2023 and 2024 had us riding with people who had arranged to hire e flat bar hybrid bikes and e mountain bikes. The hire costs for these bikes were around 200 to 300 euros a week. Panniers and Bags As you improve the quality of the bike, you may be offered a vinyl bag that clips on to the handlebars. Having a capacity less than half of a pannier, you might need to ride with a back pack to carry those items that don't fit in the bag. Both panniers and handlebar bags can be clipped off and used to carry your valuables while you are away from your bike (while visiting a church or a museum, form example) but we found that in the heat carrying heavily laden panniers or bags was an inconvenience and we worked on carrying valuables in a lightweight back pack so that the bag or pannier could be left on the bike with non-valuable items that if stolen could be easily replaced. Brakes In Australia the primary direction signal is the right arm off the handlebar so the primary braking hand is the left hand for the rear brake. If you have your brake levers changed in Europe to match your home set up you will find yourself signalling the primary direction on the left and if, in an emergency, you use your right hand to slam on the brakes you will be putting on the front brake and may summersault over the handlebars. So stay with the European setting and spend the short amount of time required to get used to pulling on the right lever to put on the rear brakes. Bike Computers Whether of not your hire bike comes with a bike computer and its quality, depends on the operator and the cost of the tour. Many low end operators have cheap bike computers such as Catseyes which are good for keeping track of the distance ridden. As the quality of the bikes being hired improved you may find that your tour operator provides a pre-programmed device such as a Garmin 500 so that your route each day is pre-loaded and you can easily follow the route which is by a bold blue line. Trek Travel provided these devices on the two tours we did with them. Many serious riders already have their own bike computers which they always bring with them and attach to their bikes using the temporary attachment fittings provided with the device. If the operator has already fitted a bike computer to the handlebars, there may not be room on the handlebars for your computer too, but not to worry, just start it up at the beginning of the day and slip it in your back pocket and it will still keep track of your essential data. Over the last few years as we have moved up to higher quality bikes the operators are usually quite happy to program your bike computer so that it is the only device you have to attach to the handlebars and you can ride just like you would at home with the advantage of having the route available on your screen if you get lost. If you live in a country that drives on the left hand side of the road, in right hand side roads you will probably be offered the choice of having your bike brake levers set up in the way you are used to them at home - that is your rear brake lever on the left and your front brake lever on the right. I would strongly recommend that you say no!

An explanation of the types of e-road bikes covered by the Tour De Mature web site. E Road & Gravel Bikes When I started drafting this site during the early days of the COVID Pandemic the concept of ebikes was just taking off in Australia. The major bicycle manufacturers such as Trek and Specialized had released their e road bikes to join a market which largely consisted of short range e commuter bikes, e cargo bikes and e mountain bikes. In addition we were starting to see the emergence of short term rental e bikes and e scooters based on the Boris Bikes that had popped up in London as a means of tourists getting around the city. By 2022 e road bikes were being joined by e gravel bikes which looked similar but had bulkier tires and were more comfortable t0 ride long distances. What we didn't have until recently was the proliferation of so called ebikes which were actually e mopeds or e motor bikes. The other thing we didn't have in Australia was effective policing of the distribution, sale and use of these throttle operated e machines which could reach high speeds and were potentially dangerous. Then in 2025 we started to see various legislatures in the US, the UK and Australia reacting to media demands for greater controls to be applied to all e devices based on the actions of what were already illegal devices that had been ignored until the number of injuries and deaths started to rise. In late 2025 the Queensland Government tabled draft legislation that applied to all e devices whether or not they were compiled with the European Standard for e bikes as regulated in Australia. I deal with this issue elsewhere in this site, but suffice it to say that as you read the advice below please be aware that as I predicted 18 months ago regulators have failed to differentiate between legal e bikes and illegal e mopeds and e motor bikes. To help you understand the nuances of e-biking, I am pleased to include an article by Julia Widdup with my bracketed comments), from Canberra Pedal Power, called "All you need to know about e-bikes" that was published in Canberra Cyclist, # 278, Summer Edition 2021. "There are many myths associated with ebikes which deter 'real' bike riders from even trying an e-bike. Here are the seven biggest myths about e-bikes: • You don't have to pedal an E-Bike, just turn the throttle (this defines an emoped or emotor bike). • E-bikes are cheating (and the single gear bike riders say the same thing about multi geared bikes). • E-bikes aren't good exercise (you are still pedalling and get good exercise) • E-bikes are for people who can't ride conventional bikes (possibly true in some cases) • E-bikes are too expensive (as with all bikes the costs vary depending on what you wish to achieve). • E-bike batteries don't last long (I assume this is a referencer to range and again it depends on what you are willing to pay for. With recent improvements in battery technology range can vary from 60-70km to 200km depending on where and how you ride the bike in. question). • E-bikes can't go where mountain bikes go. (When this article was written e mountain bikes were just taking off. Nowadays most of the quality brand mountain bikes can go where regular mountain bikes will struggle to match). E-bikes are becoming the new normal and have many advantages for the everyday rider. The terms e-bike and electric bicycle today are often used as synonyms for pedelecs. A pedelec is a type of electric bicycle where the rider's pedalling is assisted by a small electric motor." Since I included Julia's article I have come to appreciate that there is an even bigger myth that is spread and reinforced by the cycling community. That is, that the term e-bike can be applied to all bikes with electric motors. As a result, the pros and cons of specific types of bikes with electrical motors can be used to support or denigrate all types of electrically propelled bikes. I have included a chapter in this blog called 'Not All E-Bikes Are The Same ' and you can click on the link to be taken to the article. As one gets older and joints get stiffer its great to know that you can still go for rides on your choice of e bike type and get assistance when you need it rather than having to either give up or join supported rides so that you leave the ride when mountains get to steep or headwinds make riding really uncomfortable. E-Road Bike Range - what’s possible A question I get asked often is ‘what range should I expect from my e-bike?’ I reply that there are lots of factors at play, with the first being the bike set up. So in order to answer this question I start with the suggestion of limiting the e-bike choices so as to try and compare ‘apples with apples’. I therefore start with limiting my e-bike option to e-road bikes which seem to be the most efficient of bikes using a motor to assist a rider. E-road bikes available in Australia have a total weight between 10 and 14 kgs without range extenders added. Those at the 10 kg end seem to have achieved the low weight by having smaller batteries that limit range to 60-80 kms, while those at the other end have ranges between 90 and 220kms depending on the technology utilised. As mentioned previously I ride a 2020 Specialized Turbo Creo Expert SL. This bike completely disengages the motor at 25kph which means that the more the rider can ride above 25kph the greater the battery range. A second factor is that the more the rider can rely on the Eco mode while riding below 25kph, the longer the battery will last. The following are the details of a 119.43km ride I did at the end of 2024. I hope that others with e-road bikes can aim to duplicate or match the ride to see what range results they can achieve and post to this Facebook page of to my updated and improved blog, TourDeMature.com? My ride was from Ainslie in Canberra through Hackett and North Watson and on to the Federal Highway out to the Olive Grove Cafe on the Highway a few km’s north of Collector and then back to Canberra riding along the Federal Highway and Northbourne Avenue till I turned left at Haig Park and rode back to Ainslie. I had charged my battery to 100% prior to the ride and according to my Specialised App I arrived home having consumed 52% of the available power. During my ride I had utilised the Eco mode for 67% of the power I consumed and Sports mode for 33%. During the ride I climbed 790m and rode with an average speed of 24.4kph. My max speed was 54.2 kph and I rode for 4hr 54m. My average cadence was 65 rpm with a max of 100 rpm. My average trip speed would have been closer 28 kph but for town riding in urban Canberra where traffic lights, pedestrians etc, slowed me down considerably. My followup ride added some interest comparison statistics. I joined my riding group for our weekly ride and I accidentally left the bike in Sports mode for 89% of the 53.7 km ride. As a result I used 22% of the remaining power in the battery, had a low average speed of 18.5kph and climbed 365m. So, notwithstanding I had left the bike in the wrong mode for much of the second trip I still achieved a significant ride of about 172 kms and 1,155m climbing from one fully charged battery. Accordingly I regularly achieve in excess of 200kms around town from a single battery charge during which Eco use is better than 95% and a lot of the riding is on flattish roads with speeds in excess of 25kph. Trips to mountainous regions like the East Coast of Tasmania does see me riding with more sports and even the occasional Turbo mode, but even then I still achieve ranges in excess of 110km. Finally, a word of caution. As bike companies boost the power outputs of their motors the downside is that they offer more power and this reduces the range. In mid 2024 my partner and I rented Creos in Italy to ride a hilly section between San Miniato and San Gimignano. The bike shop could only supply me with an original model Creo with a 1.0 motor, while my partner was provided with the almost new Creo with a 2.0 motor. Otherwise they were the same bike. The ride was substantially steeper on the way out to San Gimignano and my partner arrived at the half point worried that she would not have sufficient power to complete the ride. Fortunately with the ride back being mostly downhill, she arrived back at the bike shop with 20% still available on her battery. My battery still had over 40% power left notwithstanding I weigh 50% greater than my partner. Discussions with e-bike mechanics on our arrival back home suggested that the culprit was the extra motor power which would have made the climbing so much more easier. I hope that readers find this information useful and contribute their own experiences with their bikes. If you would like to make a contribution or there are other topics relevant to this blog that you would like dealt with please use the Contact Me page to send me an email with the details. Steve How my e-options saved my ride! Oct 2026 During a recent ride in central NSW I dropped my Creo when I lost concentration as I was applying sun lotion prior to resuming a 100km ride. I was standing on a concrete path and the bike landed on the derailleur and bent the mechanism onto the chain cassette. With no suitable tools to fix the problem I simply pulled the derailleur away from the cassette being careful not to snap the hanger which connects the derailleur to bike frame. This enabled me to resume riding, albeit only with access to gears 10 and 11. I was faced with a 36km ride into a strong headwind and lots of climbing! The initial challenge with only having access to gears 10 and 11 was that the process of starting or restarting a a ride would be slow and difficult. Further just how long could I last into the headwind? Then it dawned on me that the electric modes could compensate for the lost gears. I put the bike in sports mode and sure enough, getting started on the bike was straight forward and I was able to shift between sport and turbo as the conditions warranted extra support. Interestingly, either mode made it relatively easy to get up to the maximum e supported speed of 25 kph and I often found myself during the ride sitting on 26 or 27 kph and achieving a better average speed than if I had been riding primarily using gears. This was subsequently supported by my Strava AI review of my ride. I ended up doing another 34km ride the next morning with similar conditions and result before I was able to get the bike into Parkes NSW and to a bike repair business called Bickys Cycle Shed. Bicky has a fabulous bike repair business operating out of his backyard and he was able to fix my problem in a matter of minutes. Check out Bicky's Cycle Shed Facebook page or do a search on Google Maps if you are in the area and need assistance. But please be aware that you will need to make an appointment to ensure he will be home when you visit. e-options

Tourdemature.com provides information about cycle touring for older riders including answers to their questions about what is involved in getting on a bike and touring. Welcome I was asked why readers need this blog given there are a number of other cycling blogs already in existence including 'Crazy Guy on a Bike' and 'CycleBlaze'. I took time to ponder the question and came up with what I believe are the two fundamental things my blog covers that are different - first this site concentrates on comfortable cycling and, second, it provides reviews of cycle tours, bikes (especially e road bikes at present) and cycling accessories. I'm full of admiration for this cyclists that can load up their panniers on a regular endurance bike and hit the road without assistance of any kind, buts that's not me and, I believe, its not lots of you! I have endeavoured to keep the material brief, but in order to respond to questions I receive from time to time I have focused on the themes. The menu is topic based and will take readers directly to the topic(s) that you are interested in. Please use the Contact Me page to send me any suggestions for improvement or to identify additional topics that need to be covered? I hope you enjoy my blog which had its last major update at the start of 2025. While this site has an Australian focus, I encourage readers from other countries to submit local information to help fill any gaps where the Australian context may not apply. This website serves as a resource for anyone considering a bike holiday tour, providing relevant information on cycling options available at their travel destinations, as well as connections to providers offering bikes and touring services. Additionally, we offer advice on bikes and accessories, with a special focus on e-road bikes. Enjoying the scenery on Elba Island, Italy This site was initially developed during the 2020 Pandemic in response to frequent requests to help potential tour riders plan their cycling adventures. Six years on, and the site has been updated, but still serves the same purpose. Each menu tab provides extensive information on various topics. "Your Riding Experience " addresses key questions for cycle tourists—assessing your cycling background, determining if cycle touring suits you, and deciding between guided or-guided tours. "Which Bike " explores the types of bikes available for hire during cycle tours. "Tips 4 Touring " answers common inquiries about joining a cycle tour and what to expect"Reviews " features my evaluations of tours and cycling gear while allowing readers to share their reviews as well. The final two tabs, "About Us " and "Contact Me " provide information about the site's author and a means for you to reach out or submit your reviews. Shortcuts are available throughout the site, but our main goal to ensure potential cycle tourists can easily access the information they need informed touring decisions. If you identify any gaps or wish to provide updates or corrections, please visit the Contact to send me an email. Please note, the website includes reviews from tours conducted several years ago. Use them to get an idea of locations, facilities, ride difficulty, and highlights, rather than as definitive assessments of your potential experience. DISCLAIMER: This is not a professional website; its layout and format are still evolving. If you're viewing this site on a mobile device, some pages might be hard to read. For a better experience, please try accessing it on a computer. Anchor 2 Anchor 1

Reviews of bikes and accessories that older riders might find useful. BIKES AND ACCESSORIES While there are many reviews covering bikes and bike accessories on the web, they are often written by professionals who have many years experience either as riders and/or as journalists. I have found that often these reviews have a bias towards the 'top end' of the riding market and as such do not always cover the matters that really interest part time riders. For example, the fascination with getting various parts of the bike, such as brake rotors or the frame, to be as light as possible always seems to be overkill for most casual riders. Besides price and the overall weight, it seems to me that your older rider is more interested in comfort, ease in climbing hills, stability, etc. So this section of the Reviews tab is devoted to user reviews that might help readers make their decision about which bike or accessory to buy. Please use the Contact page to compile and submit your reviews. Please keep your review current and limit it to 400 words describing when and why you purchased the item and your assessment of how, in your estimation, the item has performed. To get the ball rolling I will start with reviews of my Specialized Creo, a Wahoo Element Roam bike computer and a Garmin Edge 530 bike computer. Specialized Turbo Vado SL 5.0 EQ -an initial reaction and review. July 2025 Mary and I have been impressed with our Specialized Turbo Creo e-road bikes, particularly after changing the road tyres to gravel tyres. They are brilliant bikes to ride, but @ over $Aus14,000 each and bike theft on the rise, they are not bikes that you want to ride to the supermarket and leave relatively insecure while you are inside. Equally, you don’t want to have to carry heavy chains, nor have to carry the chains and supermarket purchases home on your back. And, of course, they are road bikes that by their design require us to wear our cycling kit, including shoes with cleats. So we started looking at commuter e-bike options that would be price effective and provide us with bikes we can just jump on and ride short distances and carry additional items using baskets, panniers, carry bags, etc. As Specialized riders we decided to start out by looking at the Vado 5.0 series that were on sale at the time. I was looking for a commuter bike that wouldn’t require a major financial commitment, as well as a bike with flat pedals and one that was relatively lightweight. Mary was looking for a different style of commuter e-bike and her decision will, be the subject of a separate initial reaction and review. The 2021 Turbo Vado SL 5.0 EQ model met all my requirements while also having a number of issues I had to work through. It uses the same 1.0 motor and operating system as my Turbo Creo, but with a flat handle bar and clip less pedals plus an updated integrated Turbo Connect Display (TCD). It weighs in at around 16kgs (17 kgs with a heavy duty bike lock attached to the down bar) and built in items such as mudguards, a rear rack and front & rear lights that come on automatically when the bike is turned on. Once connected to the Specialized App* the bike has an inbuilt locking system that results in flashing lights and a low volume alarm buzzer that are triggered by moving the bike without turning the alarm off. Simply turning on the TCD or opening the app on my mobile phone is sufficient to turn off the lock and/or the alarm. I have been riding my Vados for a couple of weeks and so far, so good, and short rides are very enjoyable. What I have noticed so far is that: I need to try adding toe clips to my pedals as I miss the stability of being able to start pedalling without first manoeuvring the pedals into a good position to start riding given my long term problems with my right knee. My bike, having a Specialized 1.0 motor, does not, contrary to the material provided with the bike, have access to the Apple Find My Bike arrangement put in place between Apple and Specialized. It only works with the newer 2.0 motors and I will need to look at alternative means of connecting to Find My Bike. To get the best out of these bikes, we needed to add locks, carry bags and toe clips. While the built in lock and alarm is great, it won’t stop someone intent on ignoring the alarm and stealing the bike left at a bike rack. I’ve opted for a ABUS U-Grip Bordo 5700 Combo Lock which weighs about a kg and has a carrier system that attaches to the front down bar. It's expensive and by its design and length it is only useful to lock the bike to tubular steel bike racks. However, it does a good job and has facilitated leaving my bike out of my direct sight. My Vado has a bike rack and while the Specialized description says its Racktime compatible, I discovered that there are at least two Racktime models and most compatible carrier bags have the Racktime 2.0 Snap-it attachment system which does not work with my particular rack. So back it went to Amazon without any issues. The team at Specialised Support were unable to adviser what carrier to get for the the Turbo SL mounted rear rack. After much consideration I decided against getting g a second carrier bag. Instead I have ordered a MIK HD rack adaptor to fit on my rack so that Mary and I can share the carrier bag with panniers she purchased. And as for clip on pedals, I was convinced to purchase Shimano SPD pedals which provide a flat surface on one side and a clip in system on the reverse. I installed them over the weekend and took them out for a test run and was delighted with them. I can wear regular shoes or shoes with cleats and both will work well and the use of cleats certainly was much easier on my ankle and knee. And now to the asterisked item above - the Specialized App. Both the bikes we purchased are supposedly the most current 2023 models. The bikes arrived with 2020 hard copy editions of the respective User Manuals, notwithstanding that Specialized has a 2024 edition for each model. The main implication of this is that the older editions contain a chapter that tells you how to connect to and use the Specialized Mission Control App, notwithstanding that this app was replaced in 2023 with the Specialized App. I rang Specialized Australia’s customer relations team in Melbourne to ask about why there were references to the superseded Mission Control app and all they did in response was send me a link to a four year old You Tube video on downloading and using Mission Control. Fortunately, I discovered that if I went to the Specialized Australia website and looked up each Vado model the web page offered a section that listed manual downloads for each bike and that scrolling down I found the 2024 edition with a new chapter 9 that covered the new Specialized App. As the English version of the new manual was relatively short, I printed the new edition and disposed of the old manual. Summary so far - lovely to ride and far easier for me to get to the shops quickly. With knee and ankle problems walking has become difficult and has meant that my travels to local areas has been by bus or by car. The Vado certainly opens new possibilities and with the new Shimano pedals my most recent ride for coffee was a delight. The review of Mary's auto Vado will follow soon. Specialized Turbo Creo SL 1.0 e Road e-Bike 2020 ***** I purchased my Specialized Creo 1.0 e road bike in March 2020, right at the start of the COVID Pandemic. This meant that when it arrived, getting it fitted to suit my needs was impacted by being unable to enter the bike shop. Instead the fitting process was done at a distance and it certainly took longer to get the bike fully set up, especially in relation to seat positioning and getting a comfortable ride. One of the good things about Specialized is when you buy a new bike you can keep changing the seats till you find one that suits you, although there is an initial base price and the bike shop keeps adjusting up and down depending on your choice. Back in 2015 when I got my Roubaix I went through about six seats till I settled on a triathlon gel seat for comfort. By 2020 my backside had become used to riding a road bike and after starting with my Roubaix seat I switched to a Specialized Mimic (see separate review). As to the Creo, it has been superb. I have ridden over 7000 kms between March 2020 and January 2021 and only have praise for the bike. I have done some long rides with big climbs and the Creo has allowed me to ride with the young/fit guys. I regularly clean and oil the chain and replace it every 12-18 months as it stretches both due to my weight and because the e motor maintains an even pressure on the chain while in use and this causes the chain to stretch. Initially, the Creo linked to the Specialized Mission Control on my phone to keep track of my rides. In 2023 Specialized replaced Mission. Control with the Specialized App which provides the user with a fantastic level of detail including details of all e bikes covered by the app if you have multiple bikes; a simple to use ride recording system; details of all past rides; and a support centre. It is now very easy to keep track of both active battery charge levels and to compare trips undertaken to see how you are using the e modes, distances ridden and battery related battery consumption. As a result I was able to measure that I was achieving a battery range in excess of 200km per 100% charge with a usage mode of 92% in Eco mode and the balance in Sports mode. These are an expensive bike ranging in price in late 2024 from $8,200Aus for the aluminium framed Comp E5 to $14000Aus for the carbon framed Expert, but at each price point the bike is superb. In 2023 Specialized released the new 2.0 electric mot0rs across its full range of Creos and they are touted to be both quieter and faster than the 1.0 motor in my bike. As the price increases so does the quality of the bike and the quality of the add ons such as the Shimano fittings. The bike comes in at less than 13kg with battery range extender added and it rides like a dream. The Specialized developed titanium electric motor is fantastic and cuts out once you exceed 25kph. And it is so well balanced and set up that other than on big climbs or into stiff head winds, you find yourself easily riding at speeds in excess of 25kph which is why the batteries last so long! In summary, the Creo has done everything I have asked of it and my riding experience has been exceptional. This is a bike for road riders who love the experience of riding on roads and bike paths with climbs and variable winds and who from time to time need a little assistance to allow them to keep up with their riding companions who are younger, fitter or simply don't have the physical restrictions that you do! How do the Creo's perform over a six day tour? The answer every time has been 'brilliantly!' Just have a look at the reviews I have posted for rides we have done with AllTrails in Victoria, Tasmania and South Australia. Our Creos made our tours so enjoyable. Creo Future Shock 2.0 2021 On the top of the handlebar stem there is a dial (see photo) which enables the rider to stiffen or loosen the handlebar stiffness to suit conditions. By turning from one extreme to the other the rider can have handlebars that move up and down to counter bumpy rides or no movement at all to help stiffen the ride for steep and windy descents. The news Creo 2.0's come with Future Shock 3.0. It's designed to decrease the amount of road vibration felt by the riders hands and arms. Its claimed that riders arrive at destinations better refreshed than previously. Specialized Women's Power Comp with Mimic Saddle 2020 **** A saddle developed by Specialized for women riders, but which is now also being ridden by lots of men. By mid 2020, even with COVID constraints to outdoor riding, I was finding my new gel triathlon saddle was very uncomfortable and my rides were getting shorter. My bike mechanic suggested that the Mimic seats were finding favour with lots of riders, both women and men and I was able to take advantage of the Specialized saddle policy for new bikes and swap the Gel for a Comp Mimic. The Gel is the base model and I was required to make up the difference in price between the Gel and the Mimic, but the difference was marginal and the outcome was brilliant. The seats come in three sizes and I was fitted to get the right length for me. The improvement was noticeable immediately and I could ride short and long distances and the discomfort, if any, seemed to be limited to the first 10km or so of my ride and is associated with getting my sit bones comfortable. I've been riding about 2000 km a year and by early 2024 my Mimic needed to be replaced as it had started to lose its shape and was bending down from my downward weight when I ride. My new Mimic is just as comfortable as the first. Garmin Edge 530 Cycling Computer 2021 ***** When I purchased my new Creo in 2020, I was using a 5 year old Garmin Edge 1000 cycling computer which was on its last legs - the USB cable wouldn't connect properly and the on/off button had almost fully recessed into the unit making it hard to turn it on and off. I had really enjoyed using the then top of the range 1000 as it did everything I wanted and was easy to read as its screen was similar in size to my smart phone. In addition to the physical problems, the 1000 did not connect with the e features of my new bike. I had read that the Wahoo Element Roam would do everything that my 1000 was doing plus give me battery and e-mode readings and the screen size would be sufficient for my needs. However, from almost straight after purchasing the Wahoo I ran into problems with getting accurate trip distances and heart rate readings. Despite repeated emails to Wahoo to try and solve the problems they were ongoing and very frustrating. Finally I had had enough and after lots of research I opted to replace the Wahoo unit with the Garmin Edge 530. My options were the 530, the 830, the 1030 or the 1030 Plus with prices climbing astronomically as the number increased. All units other than the 530 were touch screen units and I opted for the non-touch screen 530 because it would be easier to use and read on the road. It was a little more difficult to set up using the buttons on the side rather than a bluetooth data transfer from my 1000, but once done the screen remained easy to read as it is free of fingerprints and grease from sweaty hands on hot days. I was also looking forward to being able to switch screens, start and finish rides and use the maps in winter by pushing buttons without having to take off my gloves. The verdict, the 530 initially looks small, but is actually easy to read using the 7 data sets screen in which the speed is centrally located and the other data sets radiate out from the speed. All monitored and/or collected data has proven to be accurate. By 2024 I am still using and enjoying the 530. One recent change though is to take advantage to the built in buttons on the top of the Creo handlebars which move the screens up and down. I have now opted for two four data set screens and a five data set. By doing so I have simple access to 13 data sets and can better manage my rides. FulGaz 2021 ***** I purchased an Elite Direto XR bike smart bike trainer and I was looking for an app that would provide me with a realistic indoor riding experience. There were several to choose from, with Zwift being the flavour of the moment. However, Zwift seemed to be aimed at competitive riders and I did not see myself in this category. So after asking around I decided to have a look at Fulgaz, an app that provides video rides on routes all around the world. From ride one, I have loved using it. So what did I get? I got access to video rides in a number of categories - long rides, short rides, easy rides, hard rides, group rides, etc. And how does it work? I select a ride that suits me in terms of length and difficulty and ride gradients - and a location that I would love to visit. Early on I did a 30km ride around Lake Constance in Germany, an area that I have always wanted to ride around. Someone else has done so and I get the benefit of riding in her/his shadow and seeing what they saw. Its fabulous. Having selected a ride, I download it to my laptop so that I avoid data buffering while the laptop is in action (buffering causes the video to freeze while data is being downloaded as is best avoided by downloading before you start the ride). I then turn the trainer power on so that the app connects to the trainer, don my heart rate monitor so that it too connects to the app and then select Ride, then Go, on the chosen route and start cycling. After that you see the ride as the cinematographer saw it. In addition, through the bike computer displayed on the laptop screen (or any other screen device such as Apple TV) I get to see my speed, my heart rate, my climbing data, my power rating, the time of day, how long I have been training, how far I've travelled, how far I have to go and heaps more. The app controls the trainer device which in turn controls the level of resistance of my rear wheel hub cassette. When the display says I'm climbing with a 15% gradient, the resistance is tough and I need to change gears to try and make it easier. FulGaz allows you to set your desired level of resistance and as I normally ride an e-road bike I've set resistance at just under 50% of the gradient. This works well for me and still provides a great work out. However, there are still rides that look reasonable, but which involve lots of steep climbs. I've done rides that on the screen look like, say, 12% or 13% steep, but have turned out to be 23% and real knee killers. As the saying goes, you have to be in it to win it, and the more I ride with my FullGaz app the more I appreciate how it is helping me to improve my fitness and at the same time introducing me to parts of the world that I have yet to actually ride through. In addition, the FullGaz people are always providing users with the opportunity to join in live rides, to experience rides in unique locations like South African Game Reserves or to fairly compete with other riders in all sorts of situations. A example was the opportunity over a couple of weeks to ride five Italian rides of varying difficulty to compete for a new trainer. You just needed to complete the five rides to be in the draw and it did not matter that I came 29th out of 29 riders aged 60-69 or took twice the total time of the rider who came 28th! It was a challenge I really enjoyed it and the I had an equal chance of the winning the prize which ws by random draw. My Trek Domane LT+ by John Thwaite 2021 ***** I live and ride in Canberra, Australia and this review covers the first three months and around 1000kms of riding since purchasing my first e bike in late 2021. I decided to replace my 6 years old Specialized Roubaix road bike with an e-bike as my ageing knees needed some assistance. I consulted Daniel the bike guru at "Bike Culture" our local bike shop. He recommended the Trek Domane LT+ and he was right, it suits me perfectly. The gentle assistance, especially on windy days or on steep climbs, is just great! The Domane LT+ is an e road bike with a carbon fibre frame. It weighs 14.7kg with the drive pack and 11.8kg without. There is an optional cover at additional cost if you don't want to use the drive pack. The total cost was $A9230 and there was only one colour option, Radioactive red/Trek black. The bike geometry is very good and it is really comfortable to ride. A feature I really like is rear "IsoSpeed" which "decouples" the seat tube from the frame allowing it to flex and absorb road vibration. It can be adjusted to suit the rider by moving a slider under the top tube. In all other respects it is a standard looking road bike with drop bars, hydraulic disc brakes, a Shimano Ultegra 11 speed cassette and double chainring at the front. The power comes from German Fazua Evation e-bike drive system comprising a gearbox in the bottom bracket with motor and battery housed in the down tube. In order to charge the battery a key is used to unlock the battery/motor and detach it from the bike. You take the battery to a power point and charge it. There is a two stage locking lever that helps to protect from accidental dropping. A small removable cover on the outside of the motor is the access point for updating the software. There is also a remote housed in the top bracket to switch the motor on and off. A series of LEDs indicate the state of charge and enables selection of four drive modes:- No support - white Breeze - minimal but active pedal support - green (I use this one most of the time), River - a little more assistance - blue, and Rocket - maximum support - pink. Two smart phone apps are integral to the operation of the bike. The Fazua app which enables the customisation of your riding profile. I am using the road bike factory profile which suits me. This app also provides details of all the firmware including the remote, motor and Bluetooth. Total distance travelled and number of charges is also shown. The Fazua Rider app shows the current charge and estimated distance achievable using each setting. In my case, based on height and weight, it shows 160kms (Breeze), 80kms (River) and 55Kms (Rocket). There is also a map feature. To date the only issue I have had is with my Garmin 830 GPS which I still use in addition to the apps. The Fazua dashboard is not working on my Garmin. Apparently, this has occurred since the last Garmin software update and efforts are being made to fix it. In summary this is a great e-bike and I really enjoy riding it. Pinarello Nytro 2022 *** We hired these e road bikes at the Lake Garda Bike Hotel (see review above) and preparing this review it became clear that our model which used Sram componetry has been superseded by models using the full range of Shimano componetry. Our bikes were set up for us using data we had supplied in advance and utilising our pedals and saddles we brought with us. These bikes had two chain rings in front and a regular cassette 50/34t at the rear. Without Di2 and the capacity to connect to our Garmin Edges, we found ourselves having to relearn to visually check front and rear gears as we rode. These bikes weigh in at around 14kgs and were very manoeuvrable. The disc brakes worked well and steep descents were a delight. The e system works through the control on the handlebar which provides basic ride data such as speed, time and distance ridden and a colour coded bar system to advise what mode you are in and how much charge you have left. Green was the Eco mode, while Blue was Sports and Pink was Turbo. These bikes don't have battery range extenders, but the battery can be removed and replaced with a fully charged unit. Initially we received fairly basic advice about how to ride these bikes from our guides at the Hotel and accordingly when we rode the bikes in a manner similar to our Specialized Creos as we started the 21km climb of Monte Baldo the battery's power charge started to diminish fairly quickly. At this point our guide for the ride saw we riding in the pink mode and advised that we would have flat batteries within an hour if we kept it up. Accordingly we rode in green from then on and used blue when the gradient got above 10%. My battery was almost flat by the time we stopped for refreshments at the 16km mark and was replaced, whereas Mary still had four bars and lasted till the coffee stop 5 kms later on when it too was replaced. Having learnt from this experience, a few days later I rode a 90 km course which included a 5km climb which started with a 500m climb at around 15%. It was a quick ride and I think I averaged around 30kmh with the climb and descent removed. I did the whole ride in Green and still had just under 50% battery charge at the end of the ride. Overall we were very impressed and it certainly our view that e road bikes allow us to be part of a ride in all conditions rather than either falling way behind or having to jump in the sag wagon. The Pinarello Nytros we rode were nice to ride, but well short of our Creos which we were delighted to get back on once we got home.

An AI search of e-road bikes available in Australia identified nine bike brands offering e-road bikes. This site endeavours to present readers with a page of data for each bike including price, weight and range. E-Bike Comparison Data

What do you need to do to successfully prepare for an upcoming cycle tour? Will you have the right gear, will you take your bike or hire one there, will all meals be provided or will you need to find some or all on your own. Just some of the many questions that you will need to consider. Are U Prepared? So you are about to join your first bike tour - are you prepared? Riding Readiness! Bike touring comes in many forms and as mentioned previously, this web site concentrates on guided bike tours. Over the last 15 years Mary and I have joined bike and barge/boat tours, bike and hotel tours and a variety of short tours based around a single site for accommodation. We started with bike and barge tours utilising hybrid bikes rented from the company organising the tours. These tours typically last from 5-7 days with out and back rides each day racing from, say, 40 to 50 kms. As we became confident with this style of cycling we moved on to tours with longer rides on road bikes and eventually started joining bike and hotel tours which often included rides anywhere between 70 and 100 kms a day. The preparation for these rides was very much dependent on the length of the daily rides. For a first tour you might like to consider whether the tour will include ride lengths and efforts that you already meet or exceed from your current riding program or do you need to start building up for the ride and get saddle ready? Nothing will dampen your enjoyment of cycling more than a sore bottom! You can be aerobically prepared but if you do not put in "saddle time" you might be sorry. In relation to distance, if you go on 50 km rides from home two or three days a week, you might be well prepared for the distance of your tour rides, but perhaps not the frequency. A cycle tour usually involves several days of riding in succession, although longer tours might also include one or two rest days. Doing a tour on an electric bike will find it much easier, but frequency might still be an issue. Accordingly, I suggest that you consider the 'plus 10 x 2 rule' - If the longest day on your tour is 25 km, then you should be able to ride 10 kms longer which is 35 km in this example. The x 2 component means that you should be able to do this distance AT LEAST twice in one week. You will benefit even more if you add at least one ride of a shorter distance for a few weeks before your tour. If you will be riding an electric bike and you do your training on a regular bike you shoulda be able to reduce the rule to a 'minus 10 x 2 rule, as the electric bike will certainly make it easier to complete the distances on the tour, but frequency might still be an issue. Even if you're accustomed to long distances, remember that you're going to be riding at a leisurely explorer's pace. This means you'll be on your bike longer than you expect, and certainly longer than your daily rides at home. Most home rides will last two, three or four hours, whereas touring usually sees you in the saddle from early morning till late afternoon with breaks for morning tea, lunch, afternoon tea and possibly visiting a tourist attraction or two. As the difficulty level increases, so should your pre-tour preparation and training. For those booking a difficult tour, the assumption of the organisers is that you are a regular year-round cyclist who understands training techniques. Hills require hill work and long distances require longer times in the saddle. Mary and I completed a ten day tour of Tasmania with two rest days on our electric road bikes. The daily rides ranged from 60 to 105 kms with many climbs every day. Over our eight riding days we completed in excess of 600km of riding with over 9,000 m of climbing. Our preparation included months of riding 2-3 times a week with distances equaling about 200 kms. On regular road bikes we would not have been prepared, but with our Specialized Creo electric road bikes we were able to match it with the younger, fitter riders and found ourselves enjoying the full eight days of riding. Cycling Attire! Wearing comfortable cycling attire, especially padded cycling pants or shorts, can be the difference between an enjoyable and a painful ride. If wearing 'lycra' is not for you, padded mountain bike shorts look like regular shorts with the benefit of good padding. You may also wish to bring along a padded/gel saddle cover for extra comfort, but perhaps test one out before you tour as not everyone finds them comfortable or effective. Check the weather forecasts for the tour route before you go and consider multiple layers of clothing. Multi layers tend to work best for all kinds of weather and if your bike has a paneer you can always take extra clothes off and store them till they are needed again. You might want to consider bringing a windbreaker and full rain gear and your own properly fitted helmet. If you will be riding in the Netherlands/Belgium, note that these countries are famous for their changeable weather - mornings can start cool and foggy, then slowly change to sunny, then clouds at the end of the day can make it chilly again. You never know what the day will be like, although we all hope that we have chosen a touring date that offers fabulous weather. Having a Rest One of the benefits of guided tours is the ability to have a rest if the need to rest arises. On a bike and barge tour, riders have the opportunity to decide at the start of the day that they will stay aboard the barge for the day rather than go for a ride. In most instances this means staying of the barge all day as it makes its way to the meeting point for the riders to return to in the afternoon. This can be a nice, slow, day and might help to get you ready for the next day's ride. As it will usually be the whole day, choose the day carefully so that you don't inadvertently miss the highlight of the tour. With bike and hotel tours, you would expect the tour to include a 'sag' wagon. This is the mini-bus that carries spares and may also carry the equipment to set up a trail lunch when no commercial alternative is available. The guides will tell you that the sag wagon is there as backup for riders who might decided that they can't ride any further, whether that's at the start of the day or some time during. You can also jump on board if the terrain gets too difficult and then resume riding once conditions improve. Mary and I have used the sag wagon under a variety of circumstances including when the climbing got too tough and we got out once the hard part was passed, on really hot days when the heat got to us for the last stage of the day's ride, and to mange a slight hamstring strain to make sure that we would be right to ride for the rest of the tour. Don't feel awkward about staying on board the barge or climbing aboard a sag wagon. Its your holiday and you should be enjoying everything, including the ride. So, in summary, the more you ride before your bicycle tour, the more you'll enjoy it! Nothing prepares you for a bike tour like "time in the saddle." If you have a bike, take it out as much as you can; to work, to go shopping or when visiting friends. Or go on a weekend bike excursion to that local forest, lake or nature area that you always wanted to explore. Practice makes perfect. And you'll be a lot fitter too. If you don't have a bike think about hiring one for the month or two before your tour. Likewise, if you will be hiring an electric bike for your tour, think about hiring one to practice on before your join the tour. Remember that an electric-bike still requires some cycling experience. It works like a normal bike - you do the pedalling - but it can go a lot faster. And don't forget to use the gears; cycling uphill or with a headwind calls for low gears. I would like to acknowledge that besides my own experience, I have utilised information published by AllTrails.com.au, BikeTours.com and Boat Bike Tours to prepare this page.

If you wondered what is the difference between a hybrid, a flat bar and a drop bar road bike, these pages provide the answers. Flat Bar Road Bike A Flat Bar Road bike is a road bike that has a flat handlebar rather than the drop bar handlebar, usually as the rider is looking for a more comfortable ride. They also often have 28 mm tyres as opposed to 23-26 mm on traditional road bikes, although this is now changing and 28 mm is becoming the norm across all road bikes. Bikes in this category can also have some carbon elements and possibly weigh less than 13 kg. By stepping up from a hybrid to a flat bar road bike you are initially getting the best of road biking but without the complication of going the 'full hog'! The prime difference between flat and drop bar road bikes is that you posture is more upright and you don't have to learn the art of using paddle gear levers (otherwise known as 'dual control levers'). Many riders prefer the thumb lever over paddles for changing gears, especially as the former usually are part of a barrel system which shows you which front cog you are using and the gear you are in. Canyon Roadlite Flat Bar Road Bike

Are you thinking about trying cycle touring and want to find out what is involved.? Do you need lots of cycling experience or can you just jump on a bike and go? Has the introduction of the various types of e-bikes made it easier for novices to join in? Is Cycle Touring for You? If you are new to cycle touring you might like to try it out locally before going to the expense of joining a lengthy organised tour. Many places have a variety of cycle touring companies that offer 2, 3 and 7 day cycle tours involving cycle paths or quiet country roads with quality accommodation and good meals included. Usually you have the choice of hiring bikes or bringing your own. The latter can bring the price down significantly. Once you have determined that cycle touring is for you, it's time to start thinking about where, when, how and what you can afford. (Riding Experience 1 or 2). How to get started: Read blogs like this one. Talk to others in your riding community who have already joined cycle tours and get their ideas and recommendations. Search the web and look at providers that are well established and offer a range of tours as they are more likely to be able to provide a guarantee that your chosen tour will occur. Review your cycling strengths and weaknesses: Many providers offer a difficulty scale to help you decide the type of cycle tour that will suit you. The scales are not universal, so you may need to do some additional research to help you decide whether a tour is for you. For example, when we were considering which road bike tour we would join with Road Bike Tours Italy for our first tour with them, we needed to get a better handle on just how difficult their 'Three Lakes Tour' would be. As this was a small, family run, business we were easily able to communicate with the owner Luca and provide him with details of a recent ride we had done with another company that we thought was comparable. Luca examined the ride and was able to assure us that it was comparable and within our scope and this turned out to be the case. (Riding Experience 5 or 6) . We also know our weaknesses and while we would love to be able to turn the clock back 20 or 30 years and ride like the younger riders, we know that this is not the case and we have to be careful to avoid tours that involve several days of riding 100 plus kms per day and/or doing lots of big climbs without appropriate support. It was this recognition that lead us to move to E Road Bikes in 2020 to enable us to join more interesting tours and match the younger, fitter, lighter riders. For us there is nothing worse than knowing that you will always be a long way behind the rest of the tour group due to steep climbs, really hot days and/or very strong head winds. And the good news is that since initially writing this section, e-road bikes cannot only be taken to other Australian locations by car or coach, but also they can be hired in Europe and similar circumstances should apply in whatever country you are based. Unfortunately, it is not possible to place a e bike in a passenger airplane cargo hold if it has a built in lithium battery. And while these batteries can be removed before a flight, they are too large to be carried as hold luggage and currently I have been unable to find any overseas bike shop that temporarily rents suitable batteries for my Specialized Creo. As far as I can tell this is the case for other e road bikes too. So bike rental remains the best option. Decide what you would like to do and where: There are lots of options for cycle touring and there is no hard and fast rule about what is the best one for anyone. Look at the options, possibly try out short versions of the ones that interest you and take it from there. We started with a 'bike and barge' tour in the Loire region in France and it was the perfect introduction. It was a great starting tour and provided us with the base line for our next tour. Our philosophy has been to make sure that our 'next' tour will be better both in terms of the set up and in terms of the quality of the ride. After more than 15 years we are pleased to report that we have mostly, but not always, been able to achieve this outcome. Communicate with the provider(s) to ensure that the tour is suitable for you: We decided many years ago that airlines and travel agents can be handy for arranging your principle flights, but we need to find and arrange our internal travel, accommodation and tours. Once we find a tour that looks good, we commence communicating with the operator if possible or else the company through whom you will need to make the booking. In this regard, be aware that many cycle tours are offered by multiple providers and delivered by single companies. It pays to compare as the costs can vary between providers. We have found that by communicating with operators or providers at an early stage you can not only decide on whether a tour is suitable for you, but also you can find out things like the probability that the tour will occur, the number of participants, where to stay before and after the tour, etc.

Trying to identify a cycle tour that's right for you but the tour brochures are vague in relation to matters of interest to you. This site aims to publish tour reviews from around the world that allow readers to better understand whether they will fit in. Steve's Ride Reviews You can read the reviews I have posted below, with the most recent review first and then descending in date order back till 2012. Once you open a review that interests you, you can in most cases click on the photo and you will be taken to the webpage for that tour from the company that that we booked with. In some instances you will find that a little searching will identify several companies offering the same tour. It can pay to check out the alternatives as this can lead to better prices or a bonus for booking or even access to a better room as companies each pre-book and some may still have first class rooms that others don't. Reviews are both subjective and relevant to the author who wrote them, as are the star ratings. Furthermore, these reviews present the author's opinion at a point in time and with the passage of time companies can change an itinerary, guides can change and conditions on the ground can vary. In relation to the latter, for example, the review from 2013 of the Po River Tour dealt with a tour that was impacted by massive rain and flooding across central Europe and northern Italy. A year earlier or later, riders would have had a vastly different experience. Therefore, please use these reviews as a starting point to gain an initial understanding of what is available and what you might experience. Not all the tours I have reviewed are offered every year, but where the tour or the experience is being offered in 2025 I have provided a link to the company's tour webpage. You can compare reviews in this website with other sites and after that you might want to contact tour facilitators and operators to ask questions and seek more detail about what is being offerer now. HOBOS Tour of Goulburn Oct 2025 (no rating as I organised the tour). My veterans cycling group arranges two riding trips per annum, usually within half a day from our home base in Canberra. I hadn't been on a HOBOS tour for a couple of years due to clashes with other important events, so Mike (my regular riding companion) and I proposed to the group that we would organise a three day tour in and around Goulburn. After months of planning and a visit to the region we found a suitable central motel for our two nights in Goulburn and identified four rides that we hoped would cater for the different riding aspirations of our group. The Goulburn tour we offered involved on day one a 15km morning ride around the heritage sites of Goulburn which is a historic city first settled in the 1830s. This was followed by lunch at a nice cafe before we set off on a 27 km loop from north Goulburn which saw our rider numbers diminish from 8 to 5 but which turned out to be a pleasant introduction to the magnificent bike paths in and around Goulburn. Day two saw us riding 87kms out to Windelema and Bungonia before some of us took the opportunity to ride an extra 14kms on the Goulburn bike paths beside the river. The length of this ride saw our numbers shrink to six, although some of our support group waited till they arrived back in Goulburn and also tried out the bike paths. Day three saw us checking out of the motel and driving across to Breadalbane for the start of a 50 km round trip to Gunning for lunch. The weather had continued to improve and for the first time over the three days got really warm and a bit sticky. All up an excellent three days and a variety of challenges including the short but very steep ascent to the Goulburn War Memorial Lookout with gradients around 15%, the 100 km ride which included about 1000m of climbing and avoiding snakes on the road into Gunning. Great company, good accommodation, excellent meals and access to a day and night cafe across the road from our motel and a place where I could go for an excellent flat white at all hours. Tuscany - Hills and Sea, Italy - Provided by Road Bike Tours Italy ***** June 2024 We’ve been back on the road again, this time in Italy. A little background first. As previously mentioned in my blogs, taking your ebike anywhere by plane is impossible unless you send through a courier company. I corresponded with the Specialized Australia team to see whether Specialized had plans to rent batteries in Europe so that you just take your bike without batteries and you rent what you need once you arrive. The answer was no. I’ll certainly keep pressing on this as I think the market will be huge given the number of touring e-bikes we’ve seen since we arrived in Italy. Anyway, Specialized put me in touch with Renato at the Taddei Bike Shop in San Miniato (about an hour's drive from Lucca where we were going to be staying) as they rent out Specialized e bikes including Creo’s. Renato was fabulous to deal with but he too had to contend with the Specialized suppliers in Milan. For five months we corresponded and arranged Creo bikes for Mary and I only to be informed by Renato the week we were departing that he had only received the large model for me and that he was advised that a medium or small for Mary wouldn’t arrive till 6 June at the earliest - useless as our tour started on 2 June. As an alternative, Renato went out of his way to bring an e hybrid bike to our house in Lucca for Mary to try, but it did not suit her. Ultimately Renato agreed to cancel my bike rental and we instead organised De Rosa e road bikes through Road Bike Tours Italy, our touring company. Not in the Creo’s class, but still much better than eMTBs or ehybrids. And to the tour. We have ridden with Luca and RBTours Italy twice before and we opted to join their Hills and Sea tour which took us from Siena to the island of Elba. Mary and I were joined by our Italian friends, Elena and Alessio, who both hired a e hybrid and eMTB respectively for the tour. They joined us in Lucca and RBTours collected their rental bikes from the shop in Lucca before picking the four of us up at our house and taking us to Sienna. Readers may recall that during the Bike and Barge Tour in 2022 our friend Elena who has no English had lots of quiet moments. This tour turned out to be the opposite with four Italian speakers plus Mary and I. By half way through the week I had to ask Luca to remember that my Italian is minimal and Mary's in nil and to ensure that they included us in conversations by mixing his choice of language. A small thing, but so important when you arrange a tour with multiple languages. To get the tour date that suited us, we had paid for a private self guided tour with vehicle support, with the option of a price reduction if another two persons wanted to join us for an open tour. We weren't joined by anyone else but Luca and his partner, Marilisa, arrived in a mini bus with the Alessio's and Elena' heavy bikes in the rear plus bikes on the roof for Mary, myself and Luca. At around 28kgs each, putting the two heavy bikes on theon the roof with our 12kg e de Rosa’s and Luca’s 7kg Giant road bikes wasn’t an option. Luca had had to remove the last row of seats to fit the two bikes plus luggage for 6. He also explained that he was in training for a difficult tour in the Dolomites and had decided to ride with us as our guide while Marilisa drove the van at no extra cost. The service from RBTours was, as usual, amazing. Having spent the morning driving from Lake Garda to collect us in Lucca, Luca and Marilisa started the trip to our tour starting point of Siena. Upon arrival at our hotel for the next two nights, Luca proceeded to set up the bikes to suit each rider. For Alessio and Elena it was mostly about adjusting seat heights and getting them familiar with riding unfamiliar bikes. Luca was worried about battery range with these bikes as initially we were riding 70 - 80 kms a day with big climbs. As it turned out he needn’t have worried as they both completed the rides every day except the big day where the bike’s batteries died with a few kms to go. For Mary’s and my bikes, Luca had a bit more work. On Mary’s bike he replaced the handle bar stem with the one we brought with us so that Mary could achieve the right riding posture. He also installed Mary’s seat and put her Garmin holder on the handle bar and installed her preferred cleat pedals. My bike was a little simpler. Just a seat and Garmin holder installed. Then for both of us it was ride, test, adjust until we both felt comfortable. Day 1 for riding involved riding a loop out to Rada in Chianti for coffee, then on to Castelina in Chianti where we had a photo with symbol of Chianti, a sculpture of the black rooster. Then off to Gaiole in Chianti for lunch before returning to Siena. 73kms and 1243m of climbing. A nice way to start and to get used to the very different operating system of the De Rosa. Two chain rings compared to one on the Creo. The motor in the rear hub rather than between the cranks. A small internal battery located between the cranks and a large, strangely shaped range extender battery in the rear water bottle holder. And a manual campagnolo gear charging system. By the end of the week I was still finding the push button to raise the gears or to go from large to small chain ring was not an automatic process. Many times I automatically lifted my hand looking for an alternative gear change system. It took a few days of communicating with Luca before it became clear that the five mode e gear system needed to be set before you first put your feet on the pedals, otherwise the support was minimal. Second, based on the Creo battery system I had assumed that the internal battery would have twice the power as the extender. Assumption wrong! The extender by its size is twice as powerful as the internal battery. It’s only a guess, but I think De Rosa achieved 12 kgs overall weight by using a small internal battery. There were a couple of days where my range extender died and I had to stop, disconnect the extender battery and then restart the bike so that it starting obtaining power from the internal battery - weird!! Day 2 involved an 84km ride from Siena to Volterra with 1587m of climbing. A very big day, particularly as the final climb to the town was over 300m with steep gradients most of the way. Day 3 took us from Volterra to Marina di Castogneto Carducci on the coast after a visit to Bolgheri, one of Italy’s premier wine towns and regions. Mostly a downhill day, but we did climb to Montecatini Val di Cecina which contributed most of the day’s 773m of climbing. After 68kms of riding we arrived mid afternoon to our beach hotel - a hotel with its own private beach among many with sun beds and umbrellas and across the whole beach plus a beach bar for drinks. We looked but none of used the hotels beach facilities. Day 4 saw us back in the bus for the drive to the ferry terminal at Piombino where we boarded the ferry and headed for Portoferraio, the Elba ferry port. We then drove out of the town to a carpark where we set up our bikes and started the day’s ride. Just 41kms for the day, but with the late start we still faced some challenging climbs. 766m of climbing over two climbs. The first up the Elba Mortirolo with a 3.8km climb and average gradients of 8/9% and I recorded a max of 17%. A real challenge, even on an e bike. We started our second big climb after lunch on the coast and this time it was about 7kms of climbing although gradients averaged about 5/6% and the steepest were around 10%. I had hoped to test the bike for speed on the descent, but half way down with a speed around 52kph I caught up with slow cars and motorbikes. The same happened on our last day of riding - so disappointing! Which brings us to Day 5. It’s about 90kms to circumnavigate Elba and day 5 took us to the other half of the island. Just on 50kms of riding and 774m of climbing with most of this occurring during the initial climb from our coastal hotel to the hill top town of Marciana. After that it was a rolling coastal ride before lunch in Marina di Campo and back across the middle of Elba to our hotel. So in summary, a week of challenging riding, fantastic views, very nice hotels including two night stays in Siena and Elba, excellent breakfasts, superb dinners, and to top it off Mary, Elena and Alessio and I bought some really good wines and enjoyed some diverse lunches. Drinks such as wine, coffee, beers and apperitivo’s plus lunches weren’t included in the package, but this wasn’t a problem and gave us the opportunity to discover drinks and foods that we might not otherwise have tried. South Australian Wine and Food Tour - Provided by AllTrails ***** March 2024 This tour organised by AllTrails from Melbourne had 17 riders, including two from the USA and we all got on famously. The week consisted of a mix or wine tastings, meals, snacks, excellent accommodation and, of course, rides. Day one started with a bus ride from Adelaide to our Clare accommodation via a Seven Hills Winery tour and a Seven Hills Pub lunch before we adjourned for an excellent roof top bar meal at a Clare Restaurant - no riding! All week the daily routine was a morning ride so that we could undertake the wine and food tastings without having to drink/ride. Day two was a 46km ride along the Riesling Rail Trail from Clare to Scholz Park and then into the buses for a visit to the Mintaro Maze for a fab lunch and a visit to the nearby Martingale Hall to witness SA's plush past. Then back to Clare for a delicious Italian meal in a popular local restaurant. Day three we rode from Clare to Nooriootpa where we had to finish the 46lm ride a few kms short as the strong head winds were really slowing everyone down and we had another fabulous wine tasting and lunch to get to at Saltrams - wow what an occasion and many of us ordered wines to be delivered after we returned home. After Saltram we visited Penfolds to try the Penfolds Experience - blending Shiraz, Grenache and Mataro to create an out of the box GSM. Then it was off to Tanunda for the night and dinner at the 1918 Restaurant, an experience highly recommended by friends and they were right. A delicious Chef's degustation meal with matching wines. WOW! Then, the next day, the longest ride of the week - 71km from Tanunda to Hahndorf. The ride included a visit to the Birdwood National Motor Museum (excellent) and a delicious lunch at the Fold Cafe across the road. Then it was off to the Nepenthe Winery to end our really enjoyable ride where we were supposed to experience a Nepenthe wine tasting witth accompanying anti pasto platters. However supposed did not convert to reality with the staff only starting to explain the wines after our guides complained that the staff were just pouring and departing. All up such a contrast to the Seven Hills and Saltram experiences. Then we were bused to Hahndorf. The motel called 'Lodge by Haus' was very ordinary but it was well located and we could put our bikes in our room, albeit the result was a crowded room. Dinner and breakfast were across the road at the Haus Restaurant and we were impressed with the staff and the food/drinks. Our second last day of riding (46kms) took us from Hahndorf to MacLaren Vale via Meadows for lunch in town at the Tin Shed Cafe and then back to the Serafino Winery where we were accommodated in lovely, large rooms. The heat which had been with us all week got to around 40 degrees and was exacerbated by a burst water main in the road out front of Serafino. Luckily they had huge water tanks and could switch over, but our restaurant for the night was not so lucky and had to cancel at the last minute. Jo did a fabulous job of finding an alternative that could fit us in on a Saturday night. Vaserelli's in the Main Street did so and their staff did an amazing job of looking after us, storms and all that came racing through mid meal. Sunday saw his riding to Glenelg for our last night together. 42kms with the toughest climbing of the week and another stinking hot day saw us ride up to the Grand Stamford Hotel on Glenelg Beach around noon after an early start to try and avoid the worst of the heat. We had the afternoon to ourselves and then joined everyone for one last excellent dinner. Mary's and my Specialized Creos with low pressure gravel wheels worked very well and we mostly rode in the Eco mode. The main exceptions were a few of the long, drawn out mountains on the way to Nepenthe and the climb beside the motor way into Adelaide which consisted of several climbs including three long steep climbs. I started to use the sports mode and Mary used a mix of sports and turbo. We only charged our batteries once during the week and that was before the 71km ride, but we had sufficient power available for days 4 - 6 and possibly could have gone another 45km ride. We were allowed to keep our bikes with us at all venues other than the Clare Country Club where they were stored in a conferenced room. This was a pleasant surprise and would have facilitated regular battery charging if needed. We had a number of e road and e hybrid bikes on the ride, more so than we had previously experienced on an AllTrails ride. Based on experience in Europe I would not be surprised to see a majority of e bike on our next AllTrails ride. The staff at AllTrails subsequently accepted my challenge to try and offer an even better ride in 2025! In summary, a hot but enjoyable ride, great company, superb food, mostly excellent accommodation and all but one amazing wine tasting experience and all topped off by the support offered by Jo, Andreas and Tim. A long review but I felt I had an obligation to my readers to let them understand such a wonderful tour in Australia! This tour was a once in a while tour and is being replaced in 2025 with the Victorian Food & Wine Cycling Tour which should be just as good. Alsace and the Vosges Tour, France - Provided by French Cycling Holidays ***** July 2023 We joined our third French Cycling Holidays tour once again lead by Susan and David with the addition of two support guys, Martin and Chris, due to the size of our tour group. Usually FCH would have groups of no more than 8 or 9 guests supported by two guides/drivers who would take it in turn to ride with the group or drive the support van. Special circumstances saw an extended family group of 13 joining the tour to celebrate a family connection to touring with FCH. As a result we had 17 in the tour group with two support vehicles driven by Chris and Martin, while Susan and David rode with the group. Mary and I made our way to Strasbourg where we were collected by David and driven to our hotel in Ottrott where we met the members of our touring group plus Martin and Chris. FCH supplied bicycles for the ride and our 17 bikes consisted of four Trek hybrid models, eleven Velo Ville e city bikes and two Specialized Turbo Creo SL E5 Comp e road bikes. The latter were supplied for Mary and I with an additional charge after FCH let us know that they were available. They were both models one below our own Creo Experts with aluminium frames and paddle gears and they were the best rental bikes we had ridden in Europe till then! It was a week long tour with bike fittings on the first day followed by a familiarisation ride to a nearby village for lunch before heading up to a convent at the top of a nearby mountain to get our legs working. We took pedals, seats and a stem adjuster for Mary. The latter was not fitted till later in the week when it became apparent that handlebar adjustments made by FCH were not enough for Mary's neck and back. Once fitted Mary's Creo was a delight to ride too. Over the week we rode to Ribeauville for one night, Colmar for two nights, Ensisheim for one night and Mulhouse for our last night, all in the French Alsace region. The daily rides varied between 50km and 100km with the ride from Ensisheim to Mulhouse via a 23km and 1200m climb of La Grand Ballon being a highlight. Of the 14 riders with e bikes, all but myself with two bars, were on their last bar of e support as we arrived at the hotel. Notwithstanding discussions elsewhere in this website of factors that can vary distances that can be achieved on e bikes, I finished with two bars of e support even though Mary and I rode the same route, used turbo and sport settings pretty much the same and i weigh about 40% more than Mary. The hotels we stayed in were excellent, the nightly meals and accompanying wines were often Michelin standard and lunches were picnics with fresh ingredients each day purchased by one of the crew in between delivering our luggage to our rooms on days when we changed hotels. On our last morning we were driven to the Mulhouse rail station for the next leg of our European holiday. Overall it was another brilliant FCH bike tour and as usual they set the bar very high for future tours. The challenge for next time will be sourcing our preferred bikes. Susan advised that at present FCH is limited to sourcing Creos for the Alsace tour as their supplier is the only one carrying them and only in this region. However, twelve months ago we were being told that we would be on Giant e road bikes as Specialized Creos were not available. Hopefully by 2024 availability will have changed elsewhere too? RACV Resorts Ride, Australia - provided by All Trails **** March/April 2023 All Trails offered a ten day ride through Victoria with a rest day between each tranche of five day's riding and they kindly offered us the opportunity to join the group for the first five days riding from Mulwala on the banks of the Murray River to Creswick near Ballarat. The ride commenced with a gathering of the 27 riders and three crew at the Southern Cross Railway station in Melbourne at 6:30am and was followed by a rail trip to Benalla before being bused to Mulwala where we had lunch and our ride to to our first Royal Automobile Club of Victoria resort at Cobram, 55 kms along the Murray. Over the next four nights we travelled to Shepparton, Mitchellstown vineyard, Kyneton and into the five star RACV Goldfields Resort outside Creswick. In total I rode 383kms, climbed in excess of 2500 metres, overcame two climbs at 13% and 14% which had even our best riders walking and dealt with initial gentle tail winds that became wet and strong head winds over the last two days. The accommodation ranged from a van and cabin park run by the RACV in Cobram, to motels in Shepparton and Kyneton, a luxury hotel in the vineyard and ending in the luxury RACV resort with golf course located outside Creswick. All breakfasts were provided, while lunches were mostly always provided, and dinners were provided in Mitchellstown and Creswick. We managed to find interesting dining options in Shepparton and Kyneton which was great considering that the nights we were there most restaurants were closed. We opted to ride our e road bikes with 38mm gravel tyres as we understood that heavy rains had impacted the roads and in some cases resulted in temporary blue gravel replacements. This slowed us down compared to the road bikes with thin tyres on the unaffected bitumen, but we certainly appreciated our tyres when we rode on blue gravel and dirt roads or bitumen roads with lots of pot holes. We Also appreciated our choice of riding modes as the ride became steeper and the head winds stronger. Half way through our second last day we opted to stay in the Sports Mode and as a result we found ourselves slowly but surely catching the riders we normally only saw at the start and finish of sections and we rode into our Kyneton Motel with only three riders in front of us. I was having problems with my battery and I arrived with only 10% of my battery capacity left. Mary on the other hand arrived with 65% of her capacity left. It got even better for me on the last day when I rode from Kyneton to Creswick over the two big climbs plus rolling climbs into strong headwinds mostly in sports mode and arrived at Creswick with almost 20% battery capacity left. Mary ,along with many other riders, chose to get in the sag wagon at Daylesford as the conditions got worse so her battery was still quite strong. The ride over, the All Trails crew transferred us to the Creswick railway station the next morning and by 10am we were back in Melbourne. Lake Garda Bike Hotel , Italy ***** Aug/September 2022 We arrived at the Garda Bike Hotel beside a major Italian lake called Lake Garda and my right knee was only just beginning to settle down after strain put on it by the weight and configuration of my bike and barge e bike. We had signed up for four days of joining guided rides using Pinarello Nytro e road bikes. We brought our pedals and seats with us and it took the mechanics about 20 minutes to set us up. Mary's bike had a Garmin out front bracket which was great but I was glad I brought my Garmin temporary bracket which worked really well. The Bike Hotel usually offers three rides each day, a classic (40-70 kms), an Enthusiastic (about 90 kms) and an Epic (around 125kms). The actual rides change every day but if you stay long enough you will see the same rides offered, but perhaps with a different guide. When I say guide, it's not like you would expect on a cycle tour. The Bike Hotel Guides seem to approach each ride with the desire of completing it as soon as possible, especially the last 20-30 kms! Average speeds I experienced for the last parts of my rides were around 28-32 kms and pauses were rare and usually for photos. During our six days at Lake Garda I completed four very different rides, three of them with Mary. The first day was a 68 km ride up the eastern side of Lake Garda and into the hills before returning to the Hotel. Day 2 saw us transported to the base of Monte Baldo where we joined several other guests from the hotel in riding from the back of the mountain to the top and then down the other side towards Lake Garda and back to the hotel. All up just on 80 km of riding with a climb of 1,728m and a real good test of our Pinarello Nytros range. Day 3 we opted for a shorter ride with minimal climbing. So we rode south than east and then back to the hotel, just on 65 km and only 539m of climbing. Mary sat out the last day's ride and so I joined a hotel riding group including Brandan and Veronica Sweeney from Ireland who were also holidaying at the hotel. The Day 4 ride involved a rapid ride averaging in the low 30's from the hotel to the ferry port on the eastern shore of Lake Garda in a town called Torri del Benaco. After a ferry ride to Toscolano Maderno on the western shore, we climbed up into the mountains behind the town before descending to Garden Riviera and then riding long the lake foreshore to the lovely holiday town of Salo where we stopped for cold drinks as a beach side bar. After that, it was back on the bikes to ride to San Felice del Benaco before returning to the hotel via Desenzanodel Garda. All up, 90km of riding and an elevation gain of 807m. Our Pinarello Nytros were very good bikes, although Mary and I agreed that our Specialized Creos are better. Possibly due to the cost of purchasing Nytros and wanting to keep them affordable to rent, the Hotel had provided Nytros with Shram gearing, but no electronic gears like Shimano Di2. They also have big and small front chain rings and it was sometimes difficult to work out what gear we were in. This in turn caused each of us to drop a chain once. Easy to fix, but annoying. Nytros don't have range extenders and the main batteries had to be carefully used to ensue we had sufficient power to complete our rides. This was particularly the case with Monte Baldo with a climb of 21 kms and where spare batteries were retrieved from the supporting van to ensure we could get to the top and then back to the hotel. Besides range, we also noticed that the three modes - green (eco), blue (sport) and pink (turbo) operate differently to our Creo system. Provided I stayed in green it provided excellent support - for example at the end of my last ride of just on 90 kms with a steady 5km climb in the middle, I had only used the green mode and I had used only about 60% of my battery power. Using blue for steeper climbs and then reverting to green, it was like hitting a barrier we switched back. It was as if I had turned the power off for a few seconds and then the lesser support kicked in. This was even more noticeable going from pink to blue and while pink certainly made it easier to deal with gradients over 10%, we didn't experience the initial surge in power that we had found with our Creos in similar circumstances while climbing in Tasmania earlier this year. It is possible, however, that the differences in performance were the result of how the bikes were set up. The Creo's Mission Control App allows you to dictate how much support you get from each mode and after watching some You Tube stories on optimising each mode, we had changed the factory settings so that we removed the mode cross over set up and made sure that as you change up, you get the boost you are expecting. As a result, eith the Creo, if and when you go up or down a mode you notice the difference, but at the same time it's a smooth change. Communications with the Hotel's mechanics and guides (and it seemed most guides were also mechanics) was one of the weak points of our time at the Hotel. From bike setup, to bike use and through to our rides we felt that the communication levels were pretty ordinary. Of course everyone was Italian and English was their second language. This may explains why when they did communicate it sometimes took an effort on everyone's part to get messages across. But we were offered only rudimentary advice about the ins and outs of riding the Nytros - essentially just an explanation of the modes. This came to a head for us while climbing the first 16kms of Monte Baldo with gradients ranging from 5% to 12%. Working on the premise that we should ride the same way we would on our Creos we were moving between blue and pink as gradients changed. Then our guide appeared, saw we we in pink and chastised us for being so. At that point he advised that if we continued doing do our batteries would be empty after an hour of riding. We knew we each had a spare battery in the support van, but if he was right we would have used both by the first major stop at 16kms. So we changed to climbing using green till gradients got too steep and then we switched to blue. This way I arrived at the 16km mark with two bars left, while Mary had four. They swapped my battery then, while Mary's was changed after the second, shorter but steeper climb. So steep that we used pink for about 500m. As I weigh about 33% more than Mary we assumed that the power consumption differences were probably weight related. This has been a bit long winded, but an aim of this site is to hopefully fill in gaps never covered in bike or tour reviews. We had a great week of cycling, the Nytros were certainly great to ride, especially as we learned more about how to best operate them, the hotel services are fabulous including providing late lunches if you ride and washing your cycling gear overnight which makes it so easy to ride. The hotel staff were great and the guides were very good, but gave us the impression that our decision to ride e road bikes labeled us as non-serious riders. As a result we felt that notwithstanding how we rode each day, we didn't receive the accolades or feedback that the other riders we rode with received. Paranoid perhaps, but when Scott arrived, unpacked his road bike and immediately was approached by one of the owner/guides who had spent the whole week smiling at us but did not engage with us. Hopefully, the hotel will attract more riders like us and the guides will come to understand that us mature riders by using ebikes are able to join in the rides and do the climbs without falling way behind and yet still make a big effort! Bike and Barge tour from Amsterdam to Brugge Provided by Tripsite ***** August 2022 In late August 2022 we joined the Magnifique IV Bike and Barge Tour from Amsterdam to Brugge. This was a seven day, six nht tour that allowed the Magnifique to work its way along canals and rivers in the Netherlands and Belgium while we either watched on as passengers or participated in daily rides. We were joined by two Italian friends who were being initiated into the wonderful world of bike and barging. They both have city e bikes at home, so all four of us opted to rent the barge's city e bikes (see photo) to help with the daily rides which ranged from about 32 to 57 kms. The week was fabulous - we were aboard a self proclaimed Luxury River Cruiser and it showed. Our above deck suite was spacious and very well appointed. Two single beds pushed together in the main cabin with a coffee table and two soft chairs plus wardrobe with a safe in it. The bathroom was big for a barge and the shower was the equal of any experienced in top notch hotels. We had 33 passengers, five crew and two guides on board and everyone had a great week. Our Italian friends enjoyed the experience although one doesn't speak English. It was disappointing that we only had one other Italian speaker on board resulting in lots of quiet moments for our friend. We have discussed this and the four of us agreed that for a week long adventure it's important to know the likely makeup of the touring group so that you don't find yourself feeling isolated. We had experienced this on a tour several years ago when we were two of just four English speakers on a German speaking barge and it made for a difficult week. The rides each day, after day one when it rained and Mary dropped the heavy ebike on the side of the road and cut her leg below her knee, were delightful. A bonus on our last day of riding was that the four of us were set up by the guides to use Ride with GPS on my iPhone to ride the last day on our own for the 33 kms into Brugge. This worked really well. Usually each riding day started with us being divided into two groups to keep the rides manageable. Still, riding with a group of about 15 can be very tiring at times with daily average speeds around 16 kph. As at least half the participants had ebikes, it was surprising that average speeds weren't higher until you considered that some of the riders had opted for regular bikes rather than ebikes notwithstanding they were hopeless riders. The promotion material urges people to opt for ebikes if they can't maintain a daily average speed of 15+ kph, which is still slow, but at least feels a good pace. I twice acted as group sweep, once to a group containing some very slow riders. My job was to stay behind the group and let the guide know that everyone was still behind. With the slow riders we got down to an average of 11kph, the gap between us and the rest of the group blew out to about a km and yes we got to a major multi direction junction and had no clue which way the group had gone. To make matters worse the walkie talkie I was given to communicate with the group leader didn't work. She had accidentally changed the station and when I pressed the required buttons there was nobody there. So a final day on our own averaging about 22 kph was delightful and threw into question whether unguided touring might be a better option provided you have the right support such as Ride with GPS? It's a wonderful visual and audio guide, but it eats phone batteries. My phone started at 100% and was almost dead by the 25 km mark. Luckily we had our charging block with us and were able to recharge the phone as we rode. And what were our learnings from the week? First and foremost, bike and barging is a wonderful way of combining my two passions, exploring new places and riding bikes. Second and most importantly, really check out the implications of the equipment you will be riding if you are hiring your bike. In years past bike and barging in various forms has introduced us to riding with cleats, showed us the wonderful benefits of the Di2 electronic gear system and made it clear that to keep up with younger, fitter riders we would need e road bikes. This time round we opted for the offered e city bikes so that we could ride the same equipment as our friends. Perhaps if the route had involved more climbing they would have been great, but the four of agreed that manual bikes would have been more challenging and removed the down side of these bikes. The bikes we received weighed in at around 30 kgs each and were very difficult to manoeuvre whether on and off the bike. I have a weak right knee and it took three days of taking anti inflammatory tablets once the ride was over before my knee pain disappeared. Not being allowed to fit my clip on pedals (understandable given how stiff and heavy the bikes were and the likeliness of novice riders around you just stopping without warning) meant that each time we restarted the heavy bike really applied pressure to my right knee. On top of this, their weight meant that turning, manoeuvring, coasting and stopping were all major exercises that at times made riding on crowded bike paths or through heavily populated city centres very difficult. Tour of the East Coast of Tasmania, Australia, Provided by AllTrails ***** February 2022 Mary and I took the post pandemic plunge and headed to Tasmania to join the AllTrails tour from Launceston to Hobart! A ten day tour with eight days of riding and two rest days at Freycinet and Port Arthur. By driving to Melbourne and catching the Spirit of Tasmania we were able to take our Specialized Turbo Creo SL E road bikes and they made the tour so very enjoyable. Over the eight days of riding I rode in excess of 670 kms and climbed more than 8,000m. Mary's figures were slightly less as she had a hammie strain half way through a day's riding and later I joined one really long ride with a steep climb just to see how I would go. The tour was superb, with the tour crew - Rick and Lou - providing great support, with the 12 riders soon establishing a great level of camaraderie and support. In addition breakfasts were generally excellent and occasionally superb, while the provided meals (most lunches and dinners) were also of a very high standard, culminating in great meals in Port Arthur and Hobart. Accommodation was as advertised, 3 or 4 star hotels or equivalent with our accommodation in Richmond being a little quirky, but still pretty good. Our bikes each weigh 12 kgs without the 1kg battery range extenders and we looked at our pre-tour stats and decided that we wouldn't take the extenders as our main batteries should be capable of providing adequate support for even the longest days. We had our bikes in our room on all but one night and were able to recharge them from the room power points without any issue. At our Richmond accommodation all bikes had to stay outside and so our bikes chargers were attached to a power board which was in turn attached to mains power in the establishment via an extension cord. We don't know how it happened (but could guess) but the charging stopped with just 1% power added to each of our bikes. The bike were locked down with a tarpaulin and a locked cable and we only discovered the failure to charge as the bikes were uncovered prior to our ride the next morning. We had finished the day before with 60% and 58% charge left on our bikes respectively after a 60km ride and we were facing another 80 kms + ride with lots of climbing. It was a great test for the bikes, particularly as we faced over 1100m of steep climbing. I'm pleased to report that even though we used the sports and turbo modes as needed (to beat the 'fast' riders up climbs or to counter strong head winds) we arrived in Port Arthur without any issues. However we had tested the batteries with my bike in the 'red' literally with less than 10% charge left, while lightweight Mary still had just over 10% left. One of our riders, Derek, rode a rented Zoomo Sport e-bike which essentially is an Australian developed urban e-bike which weighs about 28kgs and has a battery life of about 6 hours which apparently will allow the rider to get about 80kms riding up to 25kph depending on the terrain. At the end of the tour I asked Derek, who seemed to ride consistently between 10 and 25 kph, at what point each day did he replace his battery with his spare. His answer was that he had not had to use his spare, but he rode at slow speeds and often turned the emode off and relied on his legs alone. This process kept him within sight of his partner who was on a regular Trek road bike, usually at the rear of the ride, and left him with lots of e-power for the big climbs. So, did we enjoy the riding experience and would we do it again? The answer is a hearty yes! We really worked the sport and turbo functions hard and they came up trumps. On the day that I rode 119 kms with one big climb and about the last 40 kms into a strong headwind, I only used less than 40% of my charge. Possibly because the bike is so well balanced that riding on the flat or rolling roads, even with a headwind saw me averaging 28kph over the first 40kms and close to 25kph over the whole ride. It's a fabulous bike and I look forward to trying it soon in other difficult conditions. Australia - Slow Ocean Road Tour, Victoria Provided by AllTrails ***** March 2021 Our first local cycle tour since COVID began was a six day tour organised by AllTrails along the Great Ocean Road which follows the Victorian coast between South Australia and Port Phillip Bay. We were collected in Melbourne early on a Tuesday morning (luggage and our bikes) and bused to a location about 40km west of Port Campbell. Six days later we finished the riding element in Morningside before being bused back into Melbourne to end the tour. in between we had been provided with six lunches, five breakfasts and five dinners, all of which were excellent. We were to fend for ourselves for dinner in Apollo Bay but we all ended up eating in the same pub, such was the camaraderie we developed. Richard, our tour leader, strongly supported by Lou our bus driver and general fantastic all round helper, looked after us fabulously. The tour was a mix of rides which averaged about 40kms a day and involved bus transfers when the distances got too long or we were mixing our activities. Besides riding the Great Ocean Road, we had a great time riding e fattyre MTBs around Cape Otway. We also stopped and admired many view points along the coast, visited an animal reserve, visited the Cape Otway Lighthouse, visited Timboon for lunch on our way to the start of the ride and travelled by ferry from Queenscliffe to Sorrento. Dinners were excellent and ranged from a bbq dinner cooked for us by Richard and Lou at our Otway caravan park (we had a delightful solar power eco-hut which was spacious and well appointed) to an amazing dinner at the 360Q Restauant in Queenscliffe to celebrate the end of the tour. Accommodation ranged from motels to cabins to bnb’s and all were excellent. Loire Valley - Cycling in the land of Châteaux, France provided by French Cycling Holidays ***** June 2019 Another French tour booked through Tour de Vines, operated by French Cycling Holidays and lead by the wonderful guides, Susan and David. We were collected from our Hotel in Tours and taken along with several other riders to our first nights' hotel in Azay-le-Rideau where we were joined by the rest of the riders. A lovely hotel which set the scene for the rest of the week, as did the excellent meals and amazing wines. After arrival we were fitted to our Trek 23 speed hybrid bikes including changing pedals and seats as required. Our group of 10 riders was mainly from Australia and ranged from novices to experienced riders. The route for the week was essentially flat and daily rides tended to range from 40 - 60kms, making it easy for the novices to keep up. The highlights of the week included visiting the Chateau de Villandry which has amazing gardens and the Chambord Chateau which is an impressive castle built for a king. Our hotel was right beside the Chateau and provided us with amazing views. Southern Dalmatia Plus, Croatia,Bike and Yacht Holiday Provided by Saddle Skedaddle **** June 2019 Our first sea based bike and barge tour was a delight. We booked through Saddle Skedaddle, an English company and it was operated by a company called Island Hopping. We joined our boat called the Melody in the Croatian port of Trogir and were quickly settled into our twin cabin on the upper deck. The Melody was a good sized boat and accommodated our large group of 25 riders without a problem. About two thirds of our group, including Mary, opted for the Cube hybrid ebikes, while the rest of us opted for the cube manual hybrid bikes. Over the following week we visited different ports each day, mostly on the islands that are prevalent in Southern Dalmatia, but also two on the mainland. The rides from the ports other than in Split, required us to climb from the port up into the surrounding hills/mountains and by the Thursday I was delighted to have the opportunity to ride one of the ebikes for the biggest daily climb of the week. After having struggled at times on the manual bikes throughout the week, it was a delight to try the ebike and enjoy the big climbs, further reinforcing my desire to try a full E Road bike tour. The accommodation was excellent, the food was nicely prepared and varied, the bar has excellent drink choices and we really enjoyed the experience. Our guides were efficient and effective, but not as personable as some on other rides. Tuscany - A Fantastic Journey, Italy, Provided by Road Bike Tours , Italy **** September 2018 An adventure from Sienna to Assisi in Italy. Due to trains from Rome not directly linking with Sienna on weekends, we departed from our train in Florence and were collected by Luca and his cousin Richi who had taken over from Michalia as driver and mechanic. We met the other five riders who were joining us for this tour and our first get to know you activity was a bus trip to a nearby venue for dinner. Unfortunately one of the five did not want to join in with the group and this was to be the pattern for the week. We were provided with Giant TSR road bikes and over the corse of the week we were faced with long rides, some with steep climbs, lots very ordinary roads with multiple pot holes and some amazing sights. The climbs were on very hot days and twice my partner and I decided to finish the climbs in the bus. With temperatures over 30 degrees and 6-15% climbs we again were thinking about what it would take for us to complete rides with the group. This highlight of the week was the visit to hilltop town of Civita di Bagnoregio, with amazing sights, a wonderful dinner and a welcome break from cycling. All up a week of highs and lows, but a tour with lots of potential for the very fit or with e bike assistance. Good hotels, nice meals and wines made for a mostly enjoyable week. Dordogne Castles and Caves, France Provided by French Cycling Holidays ***** August 2018 This was our first tour with French Cycling Holidays. Our guides/mechanics/drivers were Susan and David and they did a fabulous job. We were collected from our hotel in Brive on the Sunday morning and a week later we were back at the same hotel to collect half our luggage which we had put in storage to reduce our impact on the transportation of luggage in the minibus as we did not know that there would only be four riders joining this tour. We were transferred to our Chateau for the night and did a short exploratory tour to the Caves of Le Saux get used to our Trek flat bar road bikes. The rest of the week was taken up with lengthy rides along the Dordogne River visiting very interesting places including the Troglodyte Caves and some interesting castles and we spent a day canoeing down part of the Dordogne. The accommodation was first class, the food and wine was usually Michelin quality and the bikes were perfect for the ride although the climb to the top of the mountain behind Rocamadour was too much for the two of us and we each spent parts of the climb in the bus. Northern Italy - 3 Lakes and More, Italy & Switzerland Provided by Road Bike Tours Italy **** September 2017 This was our first tour with Luca and Road Bike Tours Italy which was then a relatively new bike touring company. The company has a range of road bike tours across Northern and Central Italy and we opted for the tour that seemed to best suit our riding abilities as it was relatively flat most of the time and daily distances were manageable. Because of the newness of the company there were only the two of us participating and we had a fabulous time with the couple that were running the tours. Luca is the guide and for this tour his then partner, Michalia, was the bus driver. Accommodation was mostly 3 or 4 star, the food was excellent, the riding ranged from very good to very challenging and the Bianchi road bikes were a pleasure to ride, albeit they had manual gears and calliper brake which required getting used to. The three lakes, Maggiore, Como and Iseo, were a pleasure to ride around and the ride into and out of Switzerland from Lake Maggiore introduced both a tough climb and a very different perspective to Italy.