I finished up my tour last Thursday clocking in just around 1110km bringing me to about 5975km in Australia since march. Because I broke my Shogun several months ago I ended up doing this ride on a Surly Long Haul Trucker let to me by a friend. I’ve noodle around on a couple of these bike before but never really like it. I found it to be too long causing me to be stretched out and not handling well. Big difference where that they where closer to my size (58cm) and 700c wheels. This one was too small (54cm) and had 26″ inch wheels. With a straight seat post and a longer stem (130mm) it was amazingly confortable and handled very nicely.
This tour I also was using Ortlieb Front-Roller Classics rather than double Back-Rollers like I used last time. These handled headwind much better and helped prevent my over packing…. which I still managed.
I think I will be building myself a Trucker pretty soon and using my current project (Hagen Wechsel) frame as a lightweight short distance tourer. This bike just worked out so well for me. Thanks Donny!
And another thing.. any thoughts on the more frequent shorter posts I did along the way? I found it to be a big easier compared to bulk updates every couple of days or week(s).
I was wondering why you were riding the Surly. That’s a shit ton of km, I need to go camping.
Loved it. You are amazing Morgan. Glad the tour went well. I liked the shorter posts they were easy to read.