Everyday. Adventures.

Adventure riding takes many forms in New Zealand and around the world. For some it’s taking the long way home on trails while commuting, for others it’s riding the length of the Americas. Most of our adventure bikes are at home both on and off-road but you’ll have more fun riding single track on one of our mountain bikes, and more fun riding a road imperial century on our road touring bikes. You may also use your bike for varying terrains, from your week-day commute to a tour across Mongolia. Inevitably there may be trade-offs when choosing a bike for varied terrains. Our Surly bikes are fortunately very versatile and customisable to exactly your style of riding.

The amount you carry will likely vary on any given ride, but it’s important to consider the maximum amount you’re likely to carry. For some adventures provisions for a single day ride might be enough, but if you’re reading this you’re most likely going to be spending a little longer in the wilderness. A bike packing setup is great for multi-day mountain bike trips on the Timber Trail or Old Ghost Road, and can be easily fitted to almost any bike. This style of touring keeps your bike light and easy to manoeuvre, but limits your storage capacity, meaning you might have to forgo a few creature comforts. More traditional set ups use a front, and/or rear carrier fitted with panniers. This style of touring is great for longer tours, giving you storage for all the creature comforts you can fit on a bicycle. They work best when fitted to a dedicated touring bike but most of our bikes come with a carrier. The main draw back of the added weight is that it will make your bike harder to handle on rougher off-road trails. For more information about these bike bag set ups, click here.

Adventure bikes can come in many different frame styles with all kinds of different handlebars. Comfortable riding position and handlebars are one of the most import parts of any bike you plan to ride any distance on. An upright riding position and multiple handlebar positions are important for repeated long days of riding, choosing the correct handlebar for the terrain is also significant. Long distance tours on road are best served on drop bars or butterfly/trekking bars, for off-road use a multi-position mountain bike bar like the Jones Loop Bar might suit you best, for others a flat bar with comfortable grips and bar ends might be enough. Click here find out more about different handlebar options that you have.

Your new adventure bike will likely need some accoutrements. Your saddle, like your handlebars, are important to all day riding comfort. Alongside various modern gel comfort saddles we carry a full range of Brooks products including the venerable B17 touring saddle. Pedals are your final contact point, and many of our Adventure bikes come without pedals as this is such a personal choice. We have a wide selection of flat and clip-less pedals available to order, with our favourite reliable options available in store. We pride ourselves in building bikes for our customers that reflect their needs, but also their style. This might be as simple as adding a bell and matching your bar tape to your saddle, to a fully decked out build with your choice of awesome brands like Thomson and Velo Orange. For the purely practical minded adventurer we’ve got you covered, with everything from dynamo power to handlebar and helmet mirrors. If you're interested in having us build you your dream bike, click hereto learn more.

Adventure bicycles are arguably the most versatile bikes on the planet, while they come in a variety of forms they are all designed to be equally capable on a long on-road tour as on a day getting away from it all on dirt roads as on some light single track riding. They stemmed from cyclocross bikes which look like road bikes but are built for riding off pavement. Today there is a huge variety of adventure bikes on the market all catering to different ideal rides, but at the end of the day, versatility is the key for these machines. To learn more about the different types of adventure bike that we carry, click here.

It really can be tough to draw a through-line between every adventure bike on the market but for the majority of the models we carry will have rigid, steel frames for the utmost durability, and wheels with high volume tyres with some light tread, to make them comfortable off road. Nearly all of them will come with a variety of cargo rack connection points, like classic touring bikes, so they can be laden with gear for long tours or bikepacking. Beyond this, they can come with a massive variety of handlebar shapes, wheel sizes and drivetrain systems. 

For a great many people this category will hold your ideal bike, and especially those looking for a 'swiss army bike' that allows them to do all of their riding on one bike these are a great fit. However, they will not be as efficient on pavement as true road bikes (or even many urban/ hybrid bikes), and they won’t have the off-road capabilities of a dedicated mountain bike.

While many adventure bikes come with road bike standard 700c (28ish inch) wheels you will see options that run from small 26” wheels to large 29” wheels, they all have their own advantages and disadvantages. You may even see the same bike available with different wheel sizes (looking at you Surly Disc Trucker). Smaller wheels typically are sturdier and behave better under load, hence why many touring/ bikepacking oriented rides will have them. Some bikes such as the Midnight Special also opt for a smaller wheel size to allow for greater tyre clearance, whilst keeping the handling very nimble. Larger wheels on the other hand roll more efficiently both on and off-road, making them ride faster and smoother. For more information about the benefits and drawbacks of different wheelsizes, click here.