just to say Hi from Malta.....

Oh and the trick here is to avoid rush hours....as elsewhere I suppose

I ride mostly early morning at dawn purely because it allows me to maximize my time available but an added benefit its that the roads are empty till 8am....on weekends you can go out early and ride till 10am without being bothered unduly by traffic, especially in gozo .....remember that we have the benefit of beautiful weather all year round with roads that are nearly always dry and salt and ice free....no fog or rain to speak of, so we do have our plus points....

Hi there Batchy...

I'll be honest....your reply was not exactly encouraging ;)...however I can report that cycling is very much alive and kicking here in all its various forms........

In reply to your questions.

1. I source my stuff from "the cyclist" in san Gwann. He has a decent range of bikes for rent ranging from road bikes to mountain bikes, and they are well maintained.
2. I ride 2 bikes currently....my mountain bike in gozo and my bottechia in malta....reason being as you probably know that it is so easy to find countryside trails in gozo....on the other hand roads have improved in malta and I do regular 40 to 50km rides on both islands.

If you want me to show you the routes I take it is not a problem. I track them on endomondo...is there any way to link my account to you so you can see te maps of my rides? Also on Facebook there is a group called randomly planned Maltese cycling rides who post up their routes on Facebook....maybe this can give you some pointers?

R.