Flying to Colombia with Not a Bike Bag

Traveling to major cities, figuring out the taxi/train/bus to and from the airport, then bumbling about yet another globalized concrete jungle is usually not the experience we hope for when we dream of exploring the world.

To really get a feel for a city, you want to get on a bike. To really get a feel for a country, you want to get out of the city. I’ve promised myself I’d get a rental bike when I arrive, but half the time even when I’ve managed to find one they’ve been rubbish.

I tried that in Serbia. I had to get a friend to phone up a week ahead to get a proper road bike, then on the day they refused to let me have it. Another friend came to sort it out and eventually I got the bike, but I spent longer sneakily putting SPD-SLs on than I did riding the thing; the chain snapped at the first sign of an incline.

One way to avoid all of those problems is to take a bike with you.

If I was off for a cycling holiday in the Alps with some mates and planned on taking the carbon road bike, I’d pay through the nose for a hard-shell, give the airline whatever they asked, and dump that treasure chest in the rental car.

This trip was a little different: A solo trip to Medellin, Colombia! I’ve been lucky enough to go there a few times, but never had a chance to ride. The route between airport and city is amazing, with some serious mountains. The airport is at about 2000m, so after a 500m climb, you just bomb down 1500m of switchback dual carriage way, playing Mario Kart with zero-fuck giving taxis and scooters.

An amazing but hard 36km ride. My cross only has the one bottle cage so I was gasping half way into the 500m ride, and the 1500m descent was not as fun with the shoulder bag. I’d have loved to take my Surly Cross Check and shoved all my crap on the rack, but with a one-armed shoulder bag stuffed to the limits, I was getting pulled sideways and couldn’t see over my left shoulder to check for traffic.

I ended up riding the brakes a fair bit due to the messenger bag + missing spoke getting me down. A 32 spoke wheel shouldn’t give a damn about one spoke gone, but it was messing with my head anyway.

I’m also aware that I was lucky, and I’m not going to keep pushing that luck. Coming home was a real panic due to a two-stop Hurricane Irma dodge. I’m gonna write about building my Surly Cross Check into travel bike, to avoid panics in the future.

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