The bike ride nap. What greater comfort is there?

When it comes to adventures, part of the attraction for most people is actually discomfort. As humans, we enjoy challenge, and experiences can be enhanced when they are hard to come by, or when they require some sort of physical hardship. Positive memories form when we rise up and overcome that difficulty. However, this fails to hold true when the adventure becomes a family affair — especially with toddlers involved. Young children like ours generally experience adventure at the whim of their parents, so for them, a high level of physical hardship is detrimental, and frankly, just plain unfair.

This is the challenge of adventuring families: how do you capture that thrill of adventure for your family and yourself without subjecting your kids to torture? As parents, we can push through long days of cycling in extreme situations and come out the other side with good memories and a great story — but at a major disservice to our kids. For this reason, one of our biggest concerns while out touring is the comfort and enjoyment of our children.

This goes beyond simple pacification with a hope that they can endure the each day. We desire to find ways for them to not only want to be riding with us, but to thrive while on the bikes. Most of the time this simply boils down to taking it easy, making the right toys and activities accessible, getting off the bikes when they need a break, and keeping them well hydrated and fed. When these needs are met, the kids can make it through almost any situation without issue. However, the entire subject needs to be re-approached when stretching family bike travel from a short vacation into a long-term way of life.

We’ve found that providing a variety of seating positions on the bikes really goes a long way towards long-term enjoyment for the kids, so we have set up our touring rigs to accommodate a couple of options.

• Riding on the back of Reuben’s Surly Big Dummy Xtracycle: there is plenty of room, great views, and freedom to play without being interrupted by a sibling. But things are quite exposed to the elements, and there are limited options for toys and activities (unless we want constantly be retrieving things strewn along the road as we cycle).

• In the trailer behind Heidi’s bike: toys and activities are plentiful (often the trailer ends up looking like a messy little play-room), everything is well protected from precipitation, but ventilation is poor and space is a bit cramped when sharing it with a sibling.

While both of these options have faults, having the kids ride together or separate can minimize fighting, facilitate playtime or quiet/alone time, or encourage a nap. The options also allow us to vary seating positions during inclement weather, and to properly distribute the 50+ pounds of human cargo between the two of us based on riding conditions and our energy levels.

In short, having more options for seating allows us to ride a little more, or a little further than we otherwise might, without subjecting our kids to additional hardship. But hey, a bicycle tour with kids is more about the time spent off the bike anyways, so spending extended hours in the saddle is not usually one of our goals in the first place!

We’re still refining and improving the details of our setup and have some exciting modifications planned that will make being a passenger on our bikes an even more comfortable adventure. Stay tuned.