My New Riding Companion – iPod Touch

iPod Touch

I don’t listen to music while rideing but I love to bring my iPod Touch along.

Here’s why:

1. I have always carried a book with me in my bike bag. With the iPod Touch I now carry as many books as I want in much less space. Plus if the light is dim .. no problem, the display is back lit. It is even easier for me to read a book in my sleeping bag on the iPod Touch than it is to read a paperback because the iPod Touch is easier to hold and I don’t have to hold a light in my teeth.

Hot Buy: Cycling in Quebec, 5th Edition

A new edition of Cycling in Quebec: Official Guide, 5th Edition in English is coming out very soon and can be ordered now. This is the best guide available for La Route Verde and cycling around Montreal and Quebec City. The English version is hard to get and usually sold out before summer. So if you are thinking of bicycling in Quebec order one now.

Click on the link above to order. The site is in French but easy to figure out. Just remember that Courriel is the official French word for email address. If you have any trouble with the French page, you will find an example of a completed form at the end of this post.

See: Official Opening of Longest Bike Path Network in North America for some of the reasons I like this guide.

Finding a Parking Place for your Car while Bicycle Touring in Vermont

Finding a parking place for your car while you are off on your bicycle tour is a major part of planning a bicycle tour. Each of my tours has had its own answer.

Crossing the Canadian Border on a Bicycle

The Route I have been laying out crosses the border from the US into Canada and returns. So what do I need to do to be prepared for that crossing?

Planning your own Bicycle Tour – Part 6 – First Route Map

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Note: Revised 2/23/08 – Start Point moved to North Hero State Park from Rouses Point, NY

We have a route concept and rough idea where we would like to spend the nights, Chambly and Saint Jean sur Richelieu. Using the Lake Champlain Bikeways Maps and Cycling in Quebec, I have laid out a preliminary one way route using Google Maps. This first cut at a route has some problems:

Planning your own Bicycle Tour – Part 5 – The Process

So we have our trip concept set, a week long ride from Vermont to Montreal and back. An evening in Chambly is desired and days should be around 40 miles to make the ride enjoyable for my wife.

Information has arrived, maps of the bicycle routes in Vermont and Quebec, a Vermont Camping Guide, “Cycling in Quebec” from Velo Magazine, and a Vermont Vacation Guide.

From this point on the process becomes recursive with each decision interacting and affecting previous decisions. However, we won’t let this process go on too long .

Planning your own Bicycle Tour – Part 4 – Information Found

So I have a trip concept ride the Richelieu River from Vermont to Montreal with an aside to Chambly possible. I did my web search for trip information and here is what I found:

Planning your own Bicycle Tour – Part 3 – Route Information Sources

Before I dig into how to gather information for your trip, a few tips on evaluating information on bicycling that you will find and receive from people you talk with.

Planning your own Bicycle Tour – Part 2 – Trip Concept

I am going to use my own planning for this summer as an example. Since I haven’t work out all the details yet, I am not quite sure where this will take me but I expect it to be fun and a clarifying process.

PLanning your own Bicycle Tour – Part 1 – First Thoughts and Tips

I am starting my planning for a bicycle tour with my wife in June or July and thought writing about the process might be interesting. I am going to aim this discussion at less experienced Bicycle Tourist, the experienced tourist have their own system already.