Hotel or camping during a cycling tour?

Cycle-touring, Expeditions, Adventures, Major cycle routes NOT LeJoG (see other special board)

Hotel/B&B or Tent?

Poll ended at 5 Jul 2015, 5:20pm

Hotel/B&B
9
43%
Tent
11
52%
Other
1
5%
 
Total votes: 21

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Vantage
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Re: Hotel or camping during a cycling tour?

Post by Vantage »

Camping for me. I can't sleep in a bed that isn't 'mine'.
Bill


“Ride as much or as little, or as long or as short as you feel. But ride.” ~ Eddy Merckx
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cheesypeeps
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Hotel or camping during a cycling tour?

Post by cheesypeeps »

PaulB wrote:It depends how much stuff you want to haul with you. Travelling light (good title for a song!) without camping gear, means hotels or B & Bs but if you travel alone be prepared to be ripped off by the "Single Person Supplement"!


Can anyone explain this single person supplement to me. Surely if your willing to pay for the cost of a double room and it's £35pppn and ur happy to pay £70 that should be ok. I don't get charging £80 or the like. Ur using one less shower, one less towel to wash, eating one less breakfast.... I just don't get it!!
using hovercraft full of eels.
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foxyrider
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Re: Hotel or camping during a cycling tour?

Post by foxyrider »

cheesypeeps wrote:
PaulB wrote:It depends how much stuff you want to haul with you. Travelling light (good title for a song!) without camping gear, means hotels or B & Bs but if you travel alone be prepared to be ripped off by the "Single Person Supplement"!


Can anyone explain this single person supplement to me. Surely if your willing to pay for the cost of a double room and it's £35pppn and ur happy to pay £70 that should be ok. I don't get charging £80 or the like. Ur using one less shower, one less towel to wash, eating one less breakfast.... I just don't get it!!


It is a constant bugbear - the big groups often do it better as you pay per room not person. It annoys me no end when i pay a single 'supplement' then get put in a single room! i can understand a supplement if i'm in a multi occupancy room but otherwise it is a rip off. I have to say that i find it less of an issue generally when i'm abroad, its the anti single person attitude in the UK that really irks - there are lots of single travellers - we supplement couples/families. Then of course there are the 2 for 1 meal deals, free child places/food - someone has to pay and that someone is the single person.
Convention? what's that then?
Airnimal Chameleon touring, Orbit Pro hack, Orbit Photon audax, Focus Mares AX tour, Peugeot Carbon sportive, Owen Blower vintage race - all running Tulio's finest!
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bigjim
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Re: Hotel or camping during a cycling tour?

Post by bigjim »

I take an emergency tent and sleeping bag. I camp when there is no decent alternative. I like a roof. On one tour. no hotels available, we managed to snag a mobile home on a campsite instead of using our tents.
Image
I don't normally sleep well in tents. I find I interact with more people in B&Bs. I like coming down to a buffet breakfast and stocking up for the day. I can also cook in my room in a hotel, whereas I do not tend to cook evening meals on campsites. I eat out. It's expensive for a lone traveller in hotels but sometimes I just think "sod it, I'm on holiday".
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simonineaston
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Re: Hotel or camping during a cycling tour?

Post by simonineaston »

I go to northern France for most of my cycling where I think the local setup favours camping - the weather, for me anyway, is what you might call Goldilocks i.e. not too hot, not too cold for camping, and the place is littered with reasonably priced camp sites, the French gov. subsidising their town campsites. France too is predominantly rural, which is where I do most of my cycling, but I agree with others - why apply a hard-and-fast rule to stick to one regime or another? MixNmatch, do what feels right at the time... I nearly always find a cheap hotel if I'm in a town/city, and sometimes it's great to stay in a rural chamber d'ote and enjoy a bit of pampering. :-) But on the whole, your typical 2 or 3 star camping municipal has got everything I need/want so that's where I tend to head to...
S
(on the look out for Armageddon, on board a Brompton nano & ever-changing Moultons)
mcallaghan
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Re: Hotel or camping during a cycling tour?

Post by mcallaghan »

My longest tour, when I was fit and in shape and younger, and riding in a group of 12 or so, was all camping across europe. Of course, we had perfect weather every day and apart from the first day in the UK, we never (at least the guys in the group) didn't set up a tent again. Slept in our bags directly under the stars.

My Ireland tour...I would have been miserable camping and glad I went the B&B route. Strong winds and near constant rain would have been absolutely horrid while camping. It was nice to get somewhere warm and dry, dry the clothes etc, and have a very filling breakfast every morning.

My upcoming Wales tour will be done via B&B as well. I hear it gets slightly *less* rain than Ireland, so I think this is the smart decision!

I do love the full-english breakfast that B&Bs serve, and the general friendliness of the 'staff'/homeowners compared to a hotel. Get a lot more local insight and knowledge and interest from a B&B than a hotel owner.
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BeeKeeper
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Re: Hotel or camping during a cycling tour?

Post by BeeKeeper »

Done both, a trip in the Pyrenees was very hilly so we used hotels to keep luggage weight down and also because it was a bit early in the year for campsites to be open. Summer jaunts in Brittany or the Velodyssy which we did a couple of years ago were with tents.
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chris_suffolk
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Re: Hotel or camping during a cycling tour?

Post by chris_suffolk »

Doing Dover - Cape Wrath over the summer, using my road bike, so having kit transported and sleeping in B&B's will suit me fine. Can see the allure of camping, and doing as I please, but then the prospect of cycling all day in poor weather, setting up camp in the rain, and trying to cook etc before repeating the next day puts me off. At least with a B&B I can dry out and get warm each night if the day hasn't been briilliant. Of course touring outside the UK could reduce the chances somewhat.
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foxyrider
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Re: Hotel or camping during a cycling tour?

Post by foxyrider »

chris_suffolk wrote:Doing Dover - Cape Wrath over the summer, using my road bike, so having kit transported and sleeping in B&B's will suit me fine. Can see the allure of camping, and doing as I please, but then the prospect of cycling all day in poor weather, setting up camp in the rain, and trying to cook etc before repeating the next day puts me off. At least with a B&B I can dry out and get warm each night if the day hasn't been briilliant. Of course touring outside the UK could reduce the chances somewhat.


Don't bet on it! i generally reckon on having 3/4 wet days on each trip - sometimes its more, sometimes its less - worst up till now was a Zurich to Salzburg and return trip all under canvas, 8 wet days/nights out of 18, yes it was miserable at times but the dry 30 degree days just about made it all bearable! I was strapped for cash (due to a faulty cash card!) so i didn't have the option of hotel/b+b, was i glad that european campsites are better equipped than UK ones with campers lounges etc!
Convention? what's that then?
Airnimal Chameleon touring, Orbit Pro hack, Orbit Photon audax, Focus Mares AX tour, Peugeot Carbon sportive, Owen Blower vintage race - all running Tulio's finest!
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honesty
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Re: Hotel or camping during a cycling tour?

Post by honesty »

Depends. I like camping, but I also like B&Bing. Almost all of my cycling trips have been B&B ones though so I didn't have to carry the camping stuff and could get away with using my lighter audax bike. These were all solo trips though. I would think if I were to going with someone else and we could split the camping load that would be more likely the choice.
simonhill
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Re: Hotel or camping during a cycling tour?

Post by simonhill »

I think some people camp because they like camping. It is part of the trip. Others would never camp come what may. Inbetween there are innumeral variations.

I tour almost exclusively long haul for 5 or so months a year, mainly in Asia and almost all of my time is in hotels, guest houses and occasionally hostels (eg in Oz). There are probably 2 main reasons for this, firstly hotels are cheap and plentiful and secondly camping is often not an option (no sites, wild camping difficult, etc).

Personally I wouldn't want to camp as hotels are so much better: security of me; security of gear; personal hygiene (showers, washing clothes, etc); often WiFi; often in town so good for going out; meet people in hotels; experience local culture and food more in hotel than in tent; no need to carry camping gear; and finally a much better place to shelter from a typhoon!

I do occasionally camp in UK or N Europe, but it is as much a camping trip as a cycle tour. Although I enjoy these short trips they remind me how much harder it is and how much extra work is involved in camping. Not least a few extra hours of set up and packing up each day.
bretonbikes
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Re: Hotel or camping during a cycling tour?

Post by bretonbikes »

foxyrider wrote:
cheesypeeps wrote:
PaulB wrote:It depends how much stuff you want to haul with you. Travelling light (good title for a song!) without camping gear, means hotels or B & Bs but if you travel alone be prepared to be ripped off by the "Single Person Supplement"!


Can anyone explain this single person supplement to me. Surely if your willing to pay for the cost of a double room and it's £35pppn and ur happy to pay £70 that should be ok. I don't get charging £80 or the like. Ur using one less shower, one less towel to wash, eating one less breakfast.... I just don't get it!!


It is a constant bugbear - the big groups often do it better as you pay per room not person. It annoys me no end when i pay a single 'supplement' then get put in a single room! i can understand a supplement if i'm in a multi occupancy room but otherwise it is a rip off. I have to say that i find it less of an issue generally when i'm abroad, its the anti single person attitude in the UK that really irks - there are lots of single travellers - we supplement couples/families. Then of course there are the 2 for 1 meal deals, free child places/food - someone has to pay and that someone is the single person.


I've got to plead guilty to this in my own business. Our holiday tours all have a single-person supplement. Why? Because the hotels in France charge by the room - in fact the supplement doesn't cover all the extra so we actually subsidise singles. Wish it were otherwise and obviously our campers don't have to pay extra even though they get a tent, cooker etc to themselves rather than sharing...

But I vote for camping;-) Sometimes I fancy a hotel (when it's pouring for example) but once I'm snuggled into that sleeping bag I'd not want to be anywhere else;-)
38 years of cycletouring, 33 years of running cycling holidays, 8 years of running a campsite for cyclists - there's a pattern here...
robing
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Re: Hotel or camping during a cycling tour?

Post by robing »

One thing I've found with my tours. The longer the tour, the more I end up staying in hotels!
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