Racking up the miles

The Tiger gets racked-up ready to go camping

THIS MONTH, CAMPING prep. Adding the panniers last month has increased the Tiger 1200’s carrying capacity — all good for touring but it’s also made it much more useful for day-to-day use (tool roll, puncture repair kit and waterproofs in one side, work bag in the other). But I’d like to do a bit of camping and that means lugging a big bag around.

I thought I had my camping system pretty well sussed, with a bulging rollbag ready to attach to the bike. But then we featured something in the Travel Gear pages that made me realise how wrong I was. The Moto Fizz Camping Seat Bag (£159, www.nippynormans.com) takes the task of carrying camping kit to another level… and I had to get one.

It is huge. Fully expanded, it takes my admittedly large tent, my seat, my 60cm long camping table, the cook set… plus

all the soft stuff (sleeping bags, air mattress, pillow, camping towel, etc). With space to spare. It’s robustly finished but isn’t waterproof: there’s a rain cover to add if the weather turns. But I’m a fair-weather campist so hopefully that won’t be needed any time soon.

The catch is, the bag’s too big for the Tiger’s compact rear rack. Triumph doesn’t offer a bigger rack, but Altrider makes one (£97.61, www.adventurebikeshop. co.uk) and it’s excellent — well-finished, easy to fit and big enough to take the bag, with plenty of slots for attaching straps to secure it. It’s possible to mount the bag without eating into the passenger space and a trial run shows that, using the supplied straps, the Moto Fizz stays securely in place.

One final piece of the puzzle is needed before heading off to a campsite: a bigger sidestand footprint, to stop the not inconsiderable weight of the fully loaded Tiger driving the sidestand inexorably into the earth. I liked the shape of the SW Motech one (£45.95, www.motohaus.com). It fits securely though it has a bit of a rattle, which I wasn’t expecting. But I can park the fully packed bike on the grass and it stays upright. Result. Now I’m ready to go camping… SIMON WEIR