Tijmen's Bikes and Related Projects

How much rack taking off happened in those 25 minutes?
@Belagerent standard ICE size. It's quite good, but I don't often see them that empty.

Rear rack can stay on for a rinko situation IMO. Only adds vertical height especially if you keep the rear wheel on.

What it looked like inside of the bag. But because the rack is mounted to the rear axle there was still some rack-taking off action. I kept the upper bolts tightened and kept it pulled against the seatpost with a Voile strap. In hindsight it might have been better to keep it like that until reassembly and just carry both panniers separate from the bike to keep the weight on that minimalist-and-not-super-comfortable shoulder strap down. Also saves some wrenching time, but makes for a slightly less sturdy package.

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Ah interesting. Of course rear rack can stay in, it's not really overhanging. Front in the other hand.
Agree regarding bags, apart from weight on shoulder it's a pretty funny shaped thing, and not easy to get into the train without banging into everything.
One thing I did and thought was clever is strapping the wheels in a way so the thing stands on its own.

Can’t get over how great this bike is. The 10k asphalt slog in and out of town do make me wonder about a more aerodynamic position and faster tyres, but as soon as I’m off-road that’s immediately forgotten. I haven’t ridden drop bars in ages (shit gravel grinders say?) and maybe I’d see the fun in “underbiking” when I do again. But It’s so nice to have a bike that’s confident in the forest while still offering some challenge on technical stuff, yet rolls well enough to make getting in and out of town doable. Goldilocks magic , or at least it is for the rides I’ve been doing.

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That looks great!

And I recognize the feeling you're describing. Two bikes in working order, and both with 800 mm Kyote and 850 mm stridsland bars and having just done 100k in a day on the stridsland bar I can't come up with a reason for drops - for my riding at least.

Yesterday I didn't want to ride one of the three off-road loops that are available to me so I decided to take a train out of town and ride back home. I really shouldn't complain about the off-road riding available to me, but I guess the problem with riding more as that I'm becoming a bit bored with the options. Basically I can ride out of town in every major direction and within 10km I'm on nice unpaved tracks which I can loop together for however far I please to go. But the problem with that is that the first and last half hour of each ride is a bit of a slog, which also sets a minimum distance for a ride to be "worth" the slog.

So I guess I'm starting to realise the point in having a drop bar bike, by making the ride in and out of town part of the ride instead of a means to an end I a) can also go out for 1,5-2 hours and have a good ride b) become a bit more flexible in where I go. Although I do wonder if I'm just taking the fun part out to trick myself into thinking paved riding is fun, and I really hate being around cars. But I do feel some motivation to get the drop bar bike back into riding shape.

Anyway, yesterday's ride was great. There's a colony of bee eaters some 50k north of Leipzig which was my goal for the day. I spotted some, but from quite far away so I couldn't make out much more than a silhouette. Should have brought binoculars I guess. After that I rode home via the Dübener and Presseler Heide, which was full of the most luxurious gravel roads I've ever been on.

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Monoculars are half the weight of binoculars #ultralightbirding

But the problem with that is that the first and last half hour of each ride is a bit of a slog, which also sets a minimum distance for a ride to be "worth" the slog.

Can relate. When I was in SW London, all my pals would ride out of East which was 30km of London traffic for me to the start. So when they'd do a "just 70k on Saturday morning" I'd end up on about 130 by the time I got home. Effort.
Now that I'm in the countryside, the off-road riding is surprisingly worse. My county is super hilly and there's no gravel, just mud which is horrible when wet (most of the time) and bone rattling when dry

Isn't that everywhere in the UK except the new forest.

Yeah maybe. Surrey has nice trails also

sounds like you need an mtb

I just don't ride bikes anymore. Problem solved

same!

Got at link to some nice ones?
Wearing glasses and having one eye with worse sight than the other makes adjusting an using binos a really awfull experience.

edit: The only ones I kind find are either 10 gbp or >100 gbp - don't mind spending a bit more than 10.

I've got a Bresser Sprite 10x50 which I got for 43 pounds on the bay. It's relatively chunky though so most of the time touring I carry a "Carson blackwave 10x25" which I got for 16 (again on the bay)

Sometimes you go somewhere and there's nothing worth looking at, so the Bresser feels a bit OTT. The Carson is always fine. I'm no expert on these things but those are what I use.

Barr and Stroud and Celestron also have some decent stuff. I imagine there's not much difference in the market we're looking at, but it's probably worth going for a brand name of some description.

I'm no expert on these things but those are what I use

Which is excactly the kind of opinion I was hoping for - that 25mm aperture is adequate.
Because the ex-photographer in me thinks a larger aperture is always better, but none of the sites I've found are able to quantify/provide information about light sensitivity across a range of say 10x25, 10x32 or 10x45..

It's the kind of thing I looked up and learned about whilst I was buying them, but now that I've bought them I have basically forgotten. It's just "big monocular" or "small monocular"

I am glad I have them though, obviously you're not doing anything crazy but I have had great and memorable moments looking through them, like this kingfisher I saw once.

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The smaller ones should fit in a small cross body bag. Eventually might get a bigger one to watch the birds at the feeder in our garden.
Thank you for your insight and swift replies!

I had promised to post more bags here, you lot are getting the scoop on this one. I'm still very excited about the backpacks, this is number 8 and it feels like things really are coming together. An all black number with tons of texture, for me one the stand-out are the laser engraved hypalon labels.

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And a small one in a cheerier colourway. I adapted this one to be 5cm shorter to accommodate for a ±1.70m person. Historically, most things are designed by 1.80m+ men, and it's a fairly recent development that these men have started considering not the whole world looks like them. (Not pretending not to be guilty of this.)

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I can appreciate the black one, but love the colours on the second one. I can understand why you're excited about these.

Amazing stuff as usual! Where do you get the coloured Fidlock buckles?

Great stuff!

They're a recycled plastic version, http://stofftanten.de this place sells them at a rather unfriendly price.