Motorcycle Touring Accommodation

Whether in a luxury hotel, hostel or on a roll-mat under the stars we all need to sleep. Especially if we want to be fresh and alert for the following days sight-seeing, trekking or motorbike riding. There are plenty of options available for where you rest your head for the night. However, unlike backpackers and many holiday-makers, motorcycle tourers have an additional consideration. And that is the bike you rode in on. If all goes to plan you'll want to be riding out on it too. Below are a few suggestions for keeping your bike safe and secure when staying overnight.

• Arrive in daylight (early/mid afternoon) so you can get a feel of the place before deciding on a location to stay.
• If possible, plan and call ahead so you know what the accommodation options are.
• If camping use a safe looking campsite or if camping wild make sure you camp out of sight of the road.
• Use hotels/motels with a courtyard or somewhere you can park you motorbike off the road.
• If you have to park you motorcycle on the road try to leave it in a well lit area in sight or close to your hotel/motel and remove your luggage.
• Put a motorbike cover over the bike. People are less likely to look and play with it if not readily available.
• Use a good quality security chain to lock the motorbike to something immoveable. Keep the chain from laying on the ground so that thieves can't use the ground as an anvil.
• If you can't lock the motorcycle to some other object then lock the rear wheel to the frame. You're basically trying to make it look uninviting to the passing thief.
• Use a brake disc lock (preferably with an inbuilt alarm)
• Use the inbuilt steering lock on the bike.

Camping

You don't have to camp but I like the idea of it. This love of sleeping outdoors generally lasts for about 2 nights before I need to find a hot shower and comfortable bed. Therefore, I will be alternate my accommodation between tent, hotel and house (see below). Everyone has their own way of camping so I'm not going into any details here. However, I have jotted down a few tips for motorcycle camping:

• Take a tent that is one person larger than the number of people sleeping in it. Gives you room to move and keep all your luggage inside.
• Use a self-standing dome tent that is as high in the centre as you can get. More room for movement inside. If it's raining you'll want to get dressing inside the tent!
• Self-standing tents also need few guy ropes to secure them.
• Buy as warm a sleeping bag as you can. You can always sleep with it open or just in your sleeping bag liner if the environment is warm. Go for a 'mummy' design with boxed feet, baffled head and shoulder sections.
• Buy a sleeping bag with synthetic filling. Synthetic filling still works when wet and is quicker to dry than down. Down filling is warm and compact but once wet it is a disaster as you're going to find it hard to dry it out.
• For added warmth and comfort buy a Therma-rest for your sleeping mat.
• Take a head-torch with you. You can also get small LED lamps to give a greater area of light round your campsite.
• Everyone raves about the Coleman Sportster II dual fuel stove (also know and the Coleman 533). Runs on white fuel and unleaded petrol.
• You can easily manage with a 1 litre stainless steel pot with lid, 1/2 litre mug, spoon, fork, camp knife or multi-tool. Leave the plate, bowel and candelabra at home.
• Store water in a hydration pack / water bladder. They take up minimal space when empty and can also be used in your back pack when trekking, etc.
• BW Technologies provide great in-line water filters for water bottles and hydration packs. Check them out here.
• Camp away from view of roads and other populated areas.
• If you are obviously camping on someone's land try to ask the owner if it's ok for you to do so. If you can't find the owner, set up camp inconspicuously and leave early in the morning (near dawn).
• Don't ask groups of people hanging around an area if you can camp there. It's unlikely they own the land and they may be up for a bit of mischief.

Couchsurfing - What a Great Idea!

I don't see much point in telling you about finding hotels. It's all pretty standard stuff. However, there is one form of accommodation I've come across recently that is worth a mention.

In January of 2004 Casey Fenton, Dan Hoffer, Sebastien Le Tuan, and Leonardo Silveira launched www.couchsurfing.com. The CouchSurfing Project is a free, Internet-based, international hospitality service, and it is currently the largest hospitality exchange network in the world. As of March 2009, it had more than 1 million members in 232 countries and territories.

Once you register on the site and create a profile you have access to a network of 1,000,000 other couchsurfers. You offer to host couchsurfers in your hometown and others offer to host you in their hometown. Hosting can be in the form of meeting for a coffee and showing someone round to offering them a couch to sleep on for a couple of nights. I reckon this is a great way of getting the real feel of the place, rather than just following the guide book. I'll let you know how it goes.