A Spectrum of Bicycle Touring Styles

Most books and magazine articles on bicycle touring split the various styles into three broad categories.

1. Fully supported tours.  Someone carries your luggage in a van or truck to a pre-determined destination where someone cooks your meals.  You do not have the ability to change the pre-planned itinerary.

2. Credit Card tours. You stay in B&B's or motels and and eat in restaurants.  It's called credit card touring because, you carry a credit card, some clothes and not much else.  You have limited ability to change your itinerary.

3. Self-Contained Touring.  You carry everything needed to camp out and cook your own meals.  You have complete freedom to change your itinerary. 

Within these broad categories, we have further differences in styles.   For example, some fully supported tours provide a van to sweep the route of riders who are too tired to continue.  Other supported tours provide rides only in an extreme emergency. 

Another example involves self-contained tourists.  Some self-contained tourists stay at established campgrounds.   Others pull off the road and discretely camp in the woods wherever they happen to be at the end of the day.  

Perhaps, we should think of the various styles as one continuo's spectrum.   At one end we have the fully pampered luxury tour where the touring cyclist's only responsibility is to show up.  At the other extreme, we have extremely self-reliant cyclists who always camps in the woods and never eats in restaurants. 

I illustrated this concept and rated my three tours to date on this scale.   This is not to say that either end or the middle is best.  Each tourist must find his or her own ideal balance between freedom and responsibility Vs costs and creature comforts. 

If you enjoyed this article, you may also enjoy:
A Review of the BOB Yak 16 Trailer
Vehicular Cycling
My Touring Bike
About Tom Swenson