How To Choose A Location For Your Bike Tour

There are countless bicycle touring locations all around the world… and thousands of different ways you could go about determining which place YOU want to experience most.

You could choose to go to:

• The easiest location.
• The most difficult location.
• Some place a friend or family member of yours has been to before.
• A place that was recommended to you in a book, magazine or website.
• A place you learned about in a film or documentary.
• A place that no one else has been to before.
• A place that everyone seems to have been to.
• A location of historical significance.
• A location of personal significance.
• A place you are interested in learning more about.
• A place that very few people in the world seem to know anything about.
• A place that is safe.
• A place that is dangerous.
• A place where there are lots of people.
• A place where there are hardly any people at all.
• A place where bike shops, restaurants and other modern services are easy to find.
• A place where you will be entirely on your own.
• Or a place picked completely at random (by throwing a dart at a map of the world, perhaps?)

There are so many different ways you could go about selecting a location for your bicycle touring adventures. So, how should you go about choosing a location for your own bicycle tour?

To be honest, I’m not sure there is a good answer to this question. In my opinion though, you should choose a location not just because it is popular, well-known or heavily traveled.

Instead, I think you should go to a part of the world that is of most interest to YOU!

• If you want to go to China because you are interested in learning about Chinese teas, then China is where you should go.

• If you want to go to Australia because you’ve never seen a kangaroo before, then Australia is where you should go.

• And if you want to go bicycle touring in Peru so you can cycle your bike through the Nazca desert, then Peru is where you should go.

One of the many wonderful things about bicycle touring is that it allows you to go to the places in the world that are of most interest to YOU. And you can combine your bicycle tours with other things you personally enjoy.

I’ve talked about theme-based bicycle tours in the past, but that’s not what I’m talking about here. Instead, I’m trying to say that you shouldn’t let others influence (or totally decide for you) where you should go on your travels. YOU should be the one to make the ultimate decision about where your next bicycle tour will take you.

1. Figure out what your goals are for your next trip by bike.
2. Do some research on where in the world you could best satiate those goals.
3. And then start planning/preparing for that bicycle tour.

You could go bicycle touring along a pre-established bicycle touring route and have a great time. Or you could choose to travel with a group of friends or strangers on a guided or self-guided bicycle tour. But you’ll have an even better bicycle touring experience if you choose to travel in a part of the world that YOU are most interested in.

The only question left to ask now is, “Where do YOU want to go?”

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