ANY BIKE CAN TOUR

I go on organised tours within Europe two or three times a year and I use whatever is my current motorcycle, and my bikes are chosen with the heart rather than the head. The last few years have seen me taking my CBll00 to Spain, a Harley to the Ardennes, a KTM 690 to Austria, and this year I'll be visiting Italy and then Spain on my current bike, which is a BMWRnineTSport (read about it on pages 54-57 - ed.). I work on the basis that a 'touring bike' is any motorcycle with some luggage strapped to the back.

There are usually 15 or so bikes on each tour and the majority comprise a BMWGS, Triumph

Explorer and Kawasaki Versys, all dressed up with panniers and top boxes stuffed with far too much kit. On day one of each tour I am ridiculed, by day three I'm being asked questions, and at the end of the tour people are admitting that they are 'over-biked'. The thing is that quality touring in my book consists of 10-14 consecutive days of 200-mile per day on stunning roads. Each day is no more than a good Sunday thrash round the Yorkshire Dales and you don't need a 'Super Tourer' for that.

So will my touring friends convert to my way of thinking?

No, of course not, this year they will all be turning up on their new 1250 GSs with even bigger luggage crates!

Paul Bredael

Sounds like you have found a great way of enjoying your bikes. And I think that buying bikes with your heart rather than your head is the only way to do it, otherwise you're missing the point! If I wanted to tour in great comfort, with

loads of luggage space and low mpg, I would go in my Miera, but it's not quite the same, is it...

Mikko Nieminen