For most people nowadays, riding a bike is a top-notch exciting activity. Besides from exercising, the bike is also a quicker means of transportation in a busy city. If you’re lucky to escape the cities, it’s during your ride when you bond with nature.
But, when you want to go for a bike tour, proper planning is essential for a smooth ride. Remember, biking isn’t the same as driving a car where the routes are the obvious four-lane roads. You must identify your preferred route and stick to it.
Where exactly do you want to go?
The world is flooded with biking routes and let’s face it, you can’t conquer all of them at once. The first thing to do is choose your destination. Where exactly do you want to go to? 
Once you have identified the location, use any available hints, resources and recommendations to map out your exact route. Especially when going somewhere you have never been and alone.
When taking a town route
Whether you are familiar with the town or not, bike routes and car routes are different. Moreover, you don’t want to find yourself on a busy road when you can use other available side roads and detours.
Make Google Maps your best friend. The application shows all the possible routes that take you to a particular destination. However, don’t rely fully on it, because it will mostly show you common roads full of traffic. Google usually chooses the familiar bike lanes, but you can benefit from the street view option to get to know your surroundings.
In the bike-friendly countries, you can easily get a bike map from your local bike shop. If you’re into technology more than the old-fashioned way, then make use of the local GPS site and application (most municipalities will have one). The maps will show the exact route and landmarks that you will see on the way. They are quite helpful and easy to understand. What is more, you can create your own map or download available ones onto your bike computer.
Going from town to town
Race map routes are also quite useful when town-hoping or biking from a bigger city to another one. They are detailed for racers and include shortcuts and detours as well. Alternatively, go online and check the racers websites for a map of the route.
What if you are taking on a different country?
Do your research and understand the area, before reaching the border. Figure out if you need to exchange money to the local currency and what are the mobile service provider rates. Don’t forget to use the GPS and to download local guiding maps from the area of interest.
Luckily, you can access any helpful information within a single click or scroll on your mobile.
To be continued…
ABOUT THE AUTHOR: Sophie Elise is a passionate cyclist, author and blogger. Her favourite topics to write about include exciting women’s biking stories, health, fitness, adventures and more. You can often find her work on sportsly.net
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