The Radavist

Over the years I’ve slowly tinkered with my touring setup to really nail down which pieces of kit work best for the type of riding I do and where I’m heading next.  I’m always looking for new products that are versatile in terms of the climate and terrain they can be used on, and most importantly I want them to last, as this stuff can be difficult to replace while on the road.  Most of the items on this list are things I’ve started to use over the last year or two, but there are also a couple of items that have been a staple of my setup for the last 7 years.

After finishing the route up from Bulgan, I arrived in the largest city I’d come across in the entire trip outside of Ulaanbaatar. Yet, with a shade under 30,000 inhabitants, it’s not exactly a metropolis. Still, after so many days out in the middle of nowhere, it was nice to have a hot shower and a couple of restaurants to choose from. A serious upgrade from settling for boiling instant noodles in a hotel’s electric kettle in some of the smaller villages.

I intended to come here to visit the military guard post, which is responsible for issuing permits to reach the Altai Tavan-Bogd region at the border with China. In the past, one was allowed to simply use their satellite tracker as a means to be allowed entry or higher a guide on a horse right at the park entrance to obtain a permit, but since Covid, they changed the rules up and tourists could no longer go to the region without a local jeep tour guide straight from the city of Ölgii.

Being tailed by a jeep for a week in the countryside isn’t exactly my idea of a great time, so I started looking for alternatives to fill that gap in my route. A quick glance over some satellite maps showed a small cluster of snowy peaks that were only about 50km away as the crow flies, and there was a little white-checkered line crossing them on the map, so this seemed like a nice plan B, no chaperon required.

I’ll be honest, the thought of a new bike is not something that really gets me terribly excited these days.  The places it can take me and the people I will meet along the way?  Definitely!  But when a post pops up on this site or any of the other bike-related sites I visit that starts getting into new-fangled hub spacings or microscopic geometry tweaks and angles, my brain tends to glaze over and forcibly pushes my hand toward clicking on the next article.  The things I look for when selecting a bike for my next big trip are based almost entirely on practicality and reliability.  I just want a bike that I don’t have to think about.

Remember that sick Black Sheep we shared last week? Well, the owner of that bike, Sam, has been tinkering in his garage and building some really unique bikes. Granted, he calls them “hunks of steel” and “kinda weird,” but as a cycling photographer I couldn’t pass up shooting his 135-millimeter-spaced Rohloff fat bike.

Instagram. It opens the door to people’s lives. Their existence, their motivations, their day-to-day routines, and their ambitious undertakings. With some, this transparency and subsequent stoked, is not only exciting to follow along, but highly motivating. Pepper is one of those people on Instagram. The ones you see on their bike, in beautiful places every post, and sharing a positive mental attitude all while promoting cycling. I had never met Pepper before yesterday, yet I’m sure the feeling is mutual when we acknowledged seeing each other’s lives unfold online. One of the bigger undertakings of her cycling life was an ambitious bikepacking route with the Tumbleweed Bikes team. The end product of their trip is a beautiful film by Jay Ritchey, which premiered here in Los Angeles last night, coinciding with an opportunity for me to meet Pepper and document the very bike that she pedaled, pushed, and crashed on the Peru Divide.

We’ve looked at Dan’s Tumbleweed before on the site, and while the frame details are the same, the build differs, particularly with Pepper’s use of a basket for touring – not pictured here, a Fabio’s Chest by Swift Industries and Ultra Romance has replaced it – for that, head to her Instagram to check it out, and be sure to catch the film El Silencio: Cycling the Peruvian Andres if it comes to your city!

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Follow Pepper on Instagram and Tumbleweed on Instagram.

Porcelain Rocket’s Moots Fatty with Hunter Fork
Words and photos by Morgan Taylor

Our recent trip through the Rockies to visit Porcelain Rocket’s shop was months in the making. The plan was to start with the shop visit in Calgary and then backtrack for a ride with Kevin Tweed in Banff the following day. I was excited to experience first hand the majestic Canadian Rockies, and to ride with Kevin on his home turf – but we were skunked.

In the days approaching our visit, massive wildfires burning south of the border combined with stagnant weather patterns to send a blanket of smoke over much of southern BC and Alberta. I had imagined shooting Scott’s Moots with a breathtaking Banff backdrop that I knew Kevin could lead us to, but that idea was out the window. Fortunately, Scott’s Moots holds its own. The haze lifted just enough to let an orange sun bring out the depth in the titanium, and we made some magic.