Bikerafting

I slept in on Sunday, one of the first times I've really done so for a while, and when I finally poked my head outside, it looked like a fine day. I decided to go ahead with a short trip I'd had in mind for some time, to experiment with multi-modal pedal and paddle trips. I've done similar trips in the past with a folding bike and an inflatable kayak or a packraft, but I'd heard it was possible to use the packraft with a full sized bike, and wanted to give it a try with the Pugsley. Add a packraft to the offroading capabilities of the Pugsley, and well, the sky is almost literally the limit. But there may even be ways to get around that limitation. Not sure how well that would work with a Pugsley though.

I loaded up a couple of Ortlieb Back Roller panniers (which are waterproof, with dry bag like roll top closures, so great for paddling as well) with camping gear, even though I wasn't planning to camp, and threw them on the rear rack of the Pugsley. I had another big Ortlieb duffel already packed and ready to go, containing my paddling gear: my new packraft, named Sundrop (for its diminutive size and cheerful yellow color, a mental antidote to the more common raindrops around here), PFD, inflation bag, paddle, drysuit, and sandles. That went on top of the rear rack. Then I pedaled off across Beacon Hill, setting off on a test run for some future trips I had in mind.

It was a nice, partly cloudy but warm day. I followed the road for a while then took a new paved bike trail, the Chief Sealth Trail, which follows the swath of power lines southwards from Beacon Hill. I'd actually stumbled upon it last year before I left, before it was complete or officially open, during on one of my longer bike rambles around town. It is a bit different from most other paved trails in the Seattle area, since it contains some pretty steep grades, and follows power lines instead of old rail beds. It does deviate from the power line corridor in a few spots to follow roads, but I just followed the slightly bumpy grassy slopes under the lines through some of these sections, since I hate confining the poor Pugs to the pavement when there are other options more suitable for what it was designed.

After the trail ended, I meandered through a tangle of streets, over the hills to Renton, navigating by the sun to avoid getting turned around as the streets curved this way and that. Eventually I arrived in an area I was familiar with, after passing such things such as a Polynesian Deli and a brightly painted Tibetan temple, as well of lots of residential neighborhoods that I'd never set tire nor foot in. I stopped for a quick lunch, then headed to the Cedar River Trail.

I followed the trail, scouting what I could of the river along the way, noting potential hazards and take outs. Past the golf course, I left the trail to take a bridge across the river, following Jones Road a while along the other bank until I found a bit of public land with river access. Turning my wheel onto the narrow, sandy path through the vegetation, I stopped at a small clearing with a recent fire ring, right on the shore of the river.

I pulled out and inflated the raft, then removed the wheels from the bike, and used a bit of velcro strap around the down tube and fork, in order to keep the handle bars fixed in a turned position. Then I strapped the bike to the tie downs on the front of the packraft, and stacked the wheels on top, strapping them to the frame with the shoulder straps from the panniers to make a secure package. I shoved the two panniers in the tapered bow of the boat, under the bike, one on top of the other. They are also tapered at the bottom, so it was a nice, snug fit.

Pulling on the drysuit and PFD, I tossed the duffel that had held the paddling gear and which now held my shoes and other small items into the bottom of the boat, and pushed off from shore, starting my drift down stream.

Given that the handle bars and rear rack were hanging off to either side, and my legs were bent much more than normal from the panniers in the bow, my paddle stroke had to be pretty funky, but with some practice I started to get used to it. I think next time I will remove the handlebars to strap them in a more out of the way location, which should improve things.

It felt good to be on moving water again, drifting under the sun dappled, fiery leafed trees above, and tired, battered, fiery red-orange salmon struggling up stream below.

The river was fairly tame, but there were a few bits of rougher water, and enough logs and other sweepers to keep me on my toes. The raft felt plenty stable, even with all the weight up front, but my funky paddle stroke made me quite a bit slower than usual, and packrafts aren't especially speedy in any case. That made for a few adrenaline filled seconds in some of the swifter sections, as I paddled hard to clear the current that was dragging me towards an over hanging tree or other potential hazard, paddling just as fast as I thought I could without thrashing about uselessly, mentally repeating the mantra "slow is smooth; smooth is fast."

That's something I first heard in my combatives and weapons training years ago, but the idea isn't limited to the martial arts, it also applies in many different physical endeavors where speed and efficiency of movement is key. Try to force yourself to go too fast, and all you get is useless, unecessary movement that not only slows you down, but also tires you out more rapidly.

So I forced myself to keep that in mind, as I hurtled toward the big, nasty log jutting out over the river, waiting to try to sweep me out of the raft. Finally it became apparent that I was going to clear it, and I relaxed a bit after a quick scan for other hazards.

At another point there was a tangle of fallen trees and logs blocking the entire river, and I pulled up on a bar to scout various options for getting around, finally deciding to portage over the bar, then push the raft under a tree in the shallows of a smaller channel, and then drag it over another log in an area of shallow water with little current.

For a change of pace, and to cool off a bit after the exertion of manhandling the raft, I pushed off from the tree and held onto the back of the raft, swimming behind it, propelling it forward with my kicking legs, my drysuit doing its job and warding off the cold water and potential hypothermia.

After a minute or so of that, I hauled myself back up into the raft, and discovered I could sit comfortably on the rear tube. From this position, I could paddle more comfortably, since I was farther back from the interference of the bike, and my knees weren't up where they caused even more interference. Not quite as stable as being down in the boat, but still plenty stable for flatwater.

As I started approaching town, I noticed that I had worked up an appetite, and started softly, but happily singing to myself: "Row, row, row, your bike, gently down the stream, merrily, merrily, merrily, merrily, I want some ice cream". Looking down at the poor, battered, nearly exhausted salmon, my only audience, I then changed my words for them, singing more sadly: "Roe, roe, roe you'll make somewhere up the stream, tiredly, tiredly, tiredly, tiredly, with fishes you will dream."

Drifting lazily down the river, trying to ignore the occasional pungent whiff of rotting fish, I waved to pedestrians looking down from bridges, and even had a few brief conversations with curious walkers on the riverside path as I floated past, finally gliding under the library building suspended over the river, I pulled out onto shore a short ways downstream.

Within half an hour, I had the bike ready to roll with the paddling gear packed, and set off to find that ice cream. And maybe a beer, too.

Waist deep in the muck

This past weekend I went down to my parents' place in Olympia to rummage through my storage unit and pickup some gear that I'm planning to use for some bike camping trips and such that I'm planning this fall and winter with the Pugsley.

I also took along my newly arrived lightweight tipi and woodstove, and had some fun testing them out in the rain in the backyard. They look like they should be just the thing for warming up and drying out after a wet day of paddling or cycling in the rain.

Late Sunday night, I realized there was some other stuff I should probably get out of the storage unit while I was down, so on Monday morning, instead of hopping on a bus back to Seattle, I hopped on my bike to collect the gear from the unit, planning to take another bus a bit later.

The weather had been pretty crappy all weekend, but now it was a bright, sunny, gorgeous, summery day, and I soon decided to take the day off and enjoy it outside. Looking forward to a dark, rainy Seattle winter, you have to take advantage of the nice days when they come along, and fortunately I get to pretty much set my own hours at work, so am often able to seize the day (or the fleeting hour in some cases) when the nice weather does occur.

Returning back to my parents' place on the now loaded bike after grabbing some lunch, I considered heading out for a longer ride. But then I realized I hadn't really fed my other addiction recently (bikes and boats, pedaling and paddling), and decided to head out onto the lake on my packraft, one of the pieces of gear I'd come down to Olympia to collect.

A packraft is a sweet little boatlet, a dinky inflatable raft paddled with a kayak paddle, which rolls down to the size of compact two person tent, and weighs less than 5 pounds. So it is great for hauling around in a backpack or on the back of bike, and is capable enough to handle serious whitewater, assuming you have the skill. But they are also quite fun on flatwater, and a truly take-anywhere boat.

I hadn't gotten around to repairing or replacing the broken shaft on my 4-piece paddle that I use with the packraft, and although I could have just borrowed one of my parents' paddles, I decided that I could probably pretty easily salvage most of my broken one to make a shorter paddle. So, I spent a few minutes scrounging up a hacksaw, a miter box, a drill, and a appropriately sized drill bit from the garage, and another few minutes cutting off the ragged end of the broken paddle shaft and drilling a new hole so the paddle blade could click into place. The new, shorter version of the paddle was only about 180cm long, as opposed to its original length of 210, but seemed like it might work out OK with the packraft.

I pumped up the packraft, pulled on my drysuit and PFD, grabbed my paddle and a bottle of water, and walked down to the lake. The plan was to explore the outlet, which is the source of river I had been considering paddling for a while. Currently the whole outlet area is a big marshy mess, but apparently in the past there was a more clearly defined stream until a big gas pipeline went in and caused big changes in the lake drainage area. So the plan was to scout and try to gauge the possibility of finding some sort of channel or bushwacking route through the marshy area so that I could possibly start a future paddle down the river from the dock at my parents' place on the lake.


The packraft isn't exactly the fastest boat around, maybe averaging about 2 mph on flatwater with no wind. But out on the lake there was a fair headwind, so I was traveling even slower. I also was having to modify my paddle stroke a bit beacuse of the shorter paddle, but after a couple of hundred strokes I got used to it, and it seemed to work fine. It was great to be out on the water, admiring the surrounding trees in their fiery fall colors, and I mostly had the lake to myself, other than a bunches of birds. I wasn't even minding the headwind that much.

After an hour and a half or so of paddling into the headwind, I finally reached the end of the lake and entered a calmer area in the lee of the trees. I ghosted along near shore, peering into the thick reeds and marshy vegetation, stopping now and then to listen for running water, trying to find the outlet. Eventually I detected some slowly flowing water and an overgrown channel of sorts, but too narrow and with too much vegetation to paddle. So I hopped out of the boat and started the difficult task of wading through the muck, pushing and pulling and sometimes carrying the packraft, trying to penetrate further into the marsh.

It was very slow going. The oozing, muddy bottom was quite soft, and at times I would sink up to my crotch in it, pulling myself free by placing my torso on the packraft and slowly wriggling free of the sucking mud. There was also a tangle of slippery, submerged trees and branches, and plenty of overhanging vegetation to further impede progress. After 15 minutes or so, I was covered in mud from the waist down, with several splotches higher up, was getting tired, had nearly lost my sandals to the muck several times, had nearly plunged headlong it the murky water on several other occasions, and had only managed to make it maybe 100 meters into the marsh. So I struggled back to the open water of the lake, swimming about a bit to wash the mud off my drysuit, and then scouted a bit more for any other channels without any luck.

Deciding it was time to start heading back, I turned the packraft homeward, now being pushed by a tailwind, making the return trip significantly faster, reflecting that although I hadn't been successful in finding passage through the marsh, I'd had a lot of fun messing about in a little boatlet and playing in the mud on a beautiful day.

Pugsley: Love at first ride

Over the past couple of weeks, I´ve been seriously considering a Surly Pugsley, a sort of "monster bike" with huge tires which allows you to ride on surfaces that wouldn´t normally be possible, such as deep sand or snow.

Although I was pretty sure I wanted to own for at least a while to test its capabilities, I was hesitant to take the plunge and drop a couple of thousand dollars on a bike I´d never even seen an example of in person. However, after talking to the friendly folks at Freerange Cycles in Fremont and getting a price quote from them, they decided they would order one in to have in the shop, which I´d be able to take a look at.

On Thursday afternoon, I got the call that the Pugsley had arrived, and within a few minutes I was out the door and on my bike to take a look. I took the bike for a spin after spending a couple of minutes admiring the humongous tires and all the weird stuff they had to do to the frame and fork shape get them to work with otherwise fairly standard bicycle components.

Given the size of the tires and overall weight, I was expecting it to be quite slow. Yes, it was a bit slow to accelerate, and yes, I sincerely doubt that you will ever see a Pugsley being raced in the Tour de France, but really it wasn´t all that different from a normal mountain bike, at least with the pressure in the tires at the maximum rated level. Unfortunately, there wasn't really any good terrain close by to test its true capabilities, but I got some idea of them by rolling over some curbs without even having to lift the front handlebars.

After fiddling with the saddle height and trying out a few different stems to get the handle bars positioned in a comfortable spot, I decided to buy it. I could probably have gone with one frame size bigger, but the fit seemed pretty good, and an extra 1.3 inches of standover clearance seemed attractive, given some of the terrain I'd be attempting. Forcibly bashing your crotch with your full body weight into a metal tube isn´t all that much fun after all.

That night, I took it out on a group ride, letting a bunch of people try it as we were waiting around to start. I didn´t have any problems keeping up on the ride, but then again it wasn't especially speedy. At one point we passed a section of road that had a bunch of apples on the pavement, fallen from the trees above, and those big tires just rolled right over them.

After quite a few stops for flats and mechanical issues with other peoples´ bikes, as well as a stop for food, drinks, and firewood at a grocery store, we headed down the dark, steep, forested trail to Carkeek. I think the Pugs was rejoicing that it FINALLY was getting off the pavement, even if it was a tame enough trail that road bikes and skinny tired fixed gears were riding it without too much trouble. On the final, paved stretch up to the fire pit, I joked with another rider that if I had known we were going offroading, that I would have put on the fat tires. "Those AREN'T the fat tires?" he asked incredulously, with a double take down at them, nearly twice the width of a standard mountain bike tire, then realized I was joking.

After a couple of hours around a campfire, complete with roasting marshmallows and wieners, not to mention plenty of beer, ginger vodka lemonade, and fiery drops of chipotle infused mescal to go around, I headed back home in the rain, happily listening to the hum of those freakin' huge tires, and not even minding the occasional chunk of mud they threw up into my face. It must be love.

The next morning on the way to work, I stopped at the Colonnade mountain bike park, letting out some of the air in the tires to run through the trails a few times, getting used to the handling on the tight switchbacks, narrow log bridges, and bike teeter-totters. There were also a few sections that approximated some of the big, chunky gravel common on some roads in Central America that had made biking difficult on my 2" tires, but the Pugs just rolled over it with no issues at all. I didn´t bother to pump up the tires when I left, and discovered with the lower pressure that indeed "it corners like a bus with a flat tire" at higher speeds. But at the max rating of 30 psi, it actually corners quite well on pavement. And those huge tires are great for fast descents on rougher pavement, since they just roll over anything and feel incredibly stable.

Later that afternoon, I headed out towards Golden Gardens, stopping to practice riding UP a couple of short flights of steps, with another quick stop at Freerange to pick up a Surly rear rack, since the Tubus rack I had wasn´t compatible with the tires.

When I reached Golden Gardens, it had started raining, and rather more heavily than the typical Seattle spit 'n' drizzle, but I didn´t really care, and rode out on to the beach, for once not sinking into the deep sand, but gliding over it! I played with tire pressure, probably going down to something like 5 psi (only a guess, since my gauge doesn´t register pressures that low), then had loads of fun riding all over the beach: riding in circles in the sand, chasing waves, riding over driftwood logs, riding over the deep, loose rocks on one section of the beach, feeling again like a little kid who is reveling in the joy of just having learned how to ride a bike.

I found you have to take care when cornering, since trying to turn too sharply on deep sand results in the front tire digging in. But otherwise, riding on the sand was surprisingly easy and fast. Not as fast or easy as riding on pavement of course, but much faster and more effortless than trying to walk through the same deep sand. I was having so much fun, I didn´t even realize that it had stopped raining until quite a while later.

Not so much fun was pumping the tires back up to pavement pressures afterwards. Those things hold a LOT of air!

So what adventures will Pugs and I get up to now? Stay tuned.

Cielita, a little piece of riding heaven

I´ve really been enjoying riding around on my new Bianchi San Jose, which I´ve come to refer to as Cielita, which means something like ¨little heaven¨ in Spanish.
The name comes both from her color, a ¨washed out blue¨ (cielo also means sky in Spanish), and the fact that I am having so much fun riding around on her. The nights have been almost perfect for riding the last week, and it is a nice change to be somewhere that I feel a bit more comfortable riding around after dark. In Central America (and Romania) I was always hesitant to do so, largely because of crazy road hazards like missing manhole covers and pit like potholes that are that much harder to see and avoid at night.

I also went for a longer ride on Sunday with one of the local bike clubs, which was a pretty decent ride. The weather was great, we got in some decent hills, and I got to chow down on ice cream in route, while the rest of the group fed their caffeine addiction at a Starbucks, and at he end of the ride we all had some very good beer at the Issaquah Rogue Brewhouse.

The downside is that by riding in a group, I found I had to pay more attention to the other riders than the scenery, to avoid bike pileups and such. One of the advantages
of riding solo. Still, I did get to admire some of the fall colors a bit.

In any case, I´m really liking the new bike so far, and haven't had to do a whole lot to get it set up comfortably. I swapped out the stock stem for something with more rise to bring the handle bars up to more comfortable level, thankfully at no additional cost, since the shop where I bought it did a straight trade for the stock stem.

After a few days of riding, I also swapped the stock saddle, with its center stripe of faux leopard fur, for a Terry Fly saddle I´ve had for a while. The stock saddle was actually fairly comfortable, but the furry stripe tended to hold a bit of water from the rain, and I don´t think leopard print is really my style. Maybe I will try to swap it with someone who wants to pimp out their ride a bit, or maybe add it to the Pugsley if I get one. Somewhow it seems like it might be a better match with the Pugsley, which already looks rather ridiculous due to the ginormous tires.

After some tweaking of saddle position and height, and a few days getting somewhat accustomed to riding on drop bars, the bike is quite comfortable, and pretty speedy, too. I am still not so sure about the stock tires, but so far they seem acceptable.

Since this is my main around town transport, and Seattle tends to be pretty wet and dark much of the time, I also added a set of fenders for rain and lights for darkness. To carry my stuff around without my back getting tweaked and sweaty from a bag or backpack, I added a quick release saddle mount for my Carradice bag, as well as small clip on rack to help support it without needing to lash the bag to the seat post, which both makes it quicker and easier to take on and off, and gives enough clearance so the back of my thighs don´t hit the bag while pedaling.

The gearing is a bit higher than I am used to running on a single speed, so my climbs home are a bit tough and slow, but I´m already starting to get used to it, and it is quite nice on descents, since I can go faster before I spin out. I´m still getting used to the brake position on the drop bars, still having a reflexive tendency to reach for where the brakes would be on a flat bar bike, so I may add a cross brake lever for the front brake. I don´t really need the rear brake, since I´ve only been running her as a fixed gear so far, although I do like the fact that there is a freewheel on the other side of the flip-flop rear hub, so I have that option if I decide to do longer rides or take her out on some trails.

But, for the rougher stuff, I have pretty much decided to get a Surly Pugsley, so the San Jose probably isn´t the newest addition to my bike stable for long.

Back to the "Real" World

I've been back in Seattle about a week and a half now, and back at work for a week. It has been busy: looking for a place to live, getting back into the swing of things at work, slowly trying to catch up with various friends in Seattle, and so on. But so far so good.

I've managed to find a room in Beacon Hill, nothing spectacular, but decent, and fairly inexpensive by Seattle standards. And it is a month-to-month rental, so I can always bail if it doesn't work out. The neighborhood looks interesting, even if I haven't had much of a chance to explore it yet. There is a decent sized grocery store, a few convenience stores, a couple of restaurants and a coffee place, a Tienda Mexicana or two, a donut shop and bakery, and a public library all within easy walking distance. Not that I've actually set foot in any of them yet. Well, other than the donut shop, which was too hard to resist, and had pretty decent donuts. Last night was the first night I spent at the new place, after moving some of my stuff up from storage in Olympia over the weekend.

From the house I can also get to Capitol Hill on my bike in 10 minutes, meaning loads of restaurants, pubs, coffee houses, movie theatres, etc. are easily accessible. To work is about 25 minutes or so by bike. It takes a bit longer going the other way because of having to climb the hills. But that is actually good, since it gives me a decent workout on the way home. And I actually wanted somewhere a bit away from work, so that I could get in a decent ride on my commute, and I've already been plotting out various routes to switch things up a bit.

Bus service also seems to be fairly frequent, although I have to change buses to get to or from work, going either via downtown or Capitol Hill. The downtown transit tunnel is finally open again, so at least that means getting through downtown by bus is significantly quicker than it has been for the last couple of years.

But back to bikes, it has been fun getting reacquainted with Seattle by zooming around on my fixie. My first real riding back in Seattle was the great Safety First alley cat put on by Ms. MaLora Ann, AKA Pirate Molly, AKA Bike Calendar Girl. I actually placed high enough to win a $50 gift certificate for a local bike shop, plus had an excellent time zipping up and down (OK, more like creeping up and zipping down) the hills of Seattle as I tried to remember the specifics of how Seattle streets link together after being away for a year. Many thanks to Molly Ann for putting it together!

And much of last week, I spent a lot of time on my own personal, multi-day Apartment Hunt alley cat, plotting my course between widely spread housing locations, taking me and my bike to several corners of the city I hadn't previously visited. Also great fun.

Plus I joined up with the slightly(?) crazy folks at .83 for a night ride, which first included a visit to Groce Out (pronounced "gross out", short for Grocery Outlet) to stock up on some brand of cheap beer no one had ever heard of, plus some kids' skeleton costumes which three of the riders somehow squeezed into, before I followed the long trail of red blinkies, ascending a quiet, forested road up Beacon Hill to a school yard, where we hung out drinking from a hollowed out pumpkin. Then onto Capitol Hill to the Elysian to sample the pumpkin ale, which of course they were out of, so we settled for porter and nachos, when we were told our table's second choice of stout wasn't available in pitchers for some legal reason having to do with alcohol content. The rolling party continued after a while, but I bailed at that point to ride back to West Seattle with a couple of others, back to my Sis's place where I was staying. Great fun to ride in a group again, although it took a while to adjust to the chaotic group riding style typical of these inebriated rides, and I tended to hang out towards the back. Overheard question of the night: "is it possible to get a BUI (biking under the influence)?." Apparently not in Washington, although it is in some other states.

Sadly, after enjoying these rides, my fixie, the bike I got for my 15th birthday and converted to a fixed gear commuter and around-town bike several months before leaving Seattle, the one I rode as a single-speed from Jasper to Glacier Park on the last segment of my trip, and the one I've been riding almost exclusively since returning, suffered a serious frame break the other day. It looks like it would be more expensive to repair than it is really worth, so I'll be retiring her.

Which means, of course, I need a new bike. Or two. After all, how could a single bike ever compete with one I've shared so many miles with over so many years? So, I just bought a new Bianchi San Jose, a single-speed/fixed gear bike, mostly for commuting and around town use. Not sure I'll actually keep it for long, but I wanted to try a bike with 700c wheels and drop bars, since I've never actually owned a bike with either. I've never really liked riding on bikes with drop bars, but then again, I've never ridden them for more than maybe half an hour, so have never gotten a chance to get used to them. So this bike is a test. And the San Jose can take fatter tires than many road bikes, meaning it should be a decent ride on hardpack trails and unpaved roads.

I'm actually thinking I'll have my "touring" bike (the Rodriguez) modified, replacing the vertical dropouts with horizontal ones, which will allow me to fairly easily switch it between gears and single-speed or fixed gear modes so that I have a flexible travel bike for quick trips out of town. Gears can be nice, if not strictly necessary, for longer trips, but nothing really beats the joy of flying on a fixed gear when in urban areas and in traffic. The Rodriguez already has S&S couplings and packs down pretty easily into an airline legal case to avoid oversize luggage charges on planes, trains, or buses, and I've been happy with the fit over the many miles I put on it over the last year. Once I do that, I probably won't need the Bianchi, but we'll see how it goes.

But I'm probably going to also be building up a Surly Pugsley (specs and more info here) for future adventures in the wilderness and the developing world which are currently percolating.

The Pugsley is definitely not your normal bike. It is the monster truck of bicycles, or maybe the Humvee of bicycles, with HUGE, cartoonish, tractor-like tires that look like they could roll over just about anything. It makes me smile when I look at. It is a post-apocalyptic bike-a-saurus. It makes me think of adding accesories you normally wouldn't associate with a bicycle. A machete would look quite at home, don't you think, and oh so useful on those muddy, overgrown jungle trails. Maybe a snow plow to help those poor bewildered, Seattlite car commuters make it back home when the white stuff occasionally falls? Maybe a rifle rack, just in case those polar bears are a bit too hungry when pedaling across the arctic tundra?

There is an old saying, "Don't take your bike to a car fight" (or something like that) but give me a Pugsley, and I might be willing to take on a car or two. Perhaps something like a Mini or Tdinky european cars anyway. I might not damage it much, but I could probably ride over it without hardly noticing the bump.

So, yeah, the question is: what exactly would I use it for, other than trying to crush cars? Well, all those third world "roads," tracks, and trails that I encountered during my travels which were too muddy or too sandy or too covered in thick, loose, chunky gravel for my measly 2" wide tires to deal with. Thinking back on it, many of the most enjoyable times on the trip were very much off the beaten path, and I'd like to get even further off it in the future. At least sometimes. Not to mention various wilderness areas in more developed nations. Say Alaska for instance. Just think of what could you do with a Pugsley and packraft. Of course the Pugs will be a pig on the pavement, and apperently it "corners like a bus with a flat tire", but that's OK. My style of travel definitely isn't about speed, and I've found being off the pavement is usually more enjoyable anyway.