Cycling UK Forum

Although I listen to music or the radio at home or in the car I never feel the need to listen when out walking or cycling.

We have a stone built Victorian manse in the south of Scotland, so dealing with very warm weather isn't really a problem! However the cold is a different matter, we have put double glazed glass in the original windows, fully insulated the loft and roof etc. This doesn't turn the house into and equivalent of a modern insulated one - it takes quite a time to warm up and a fair amount of heat input to stay there!
We have installed a biomass (no mains gas) boiler and central heating which we supplement with a log burner using logs from the garden.
Thinking about an air source heat pump, but this would need the boiler as backup and solar water panels maybe to supplement water temperature.
The working internal shutters really help in severe cold though!

Dreich here.

We have a log burner as backup and handy for really cold nights to back up the heating. Had a 2 day powercut a couple of years ago in cold weather it was very handy then.
We only burn wood from our garden and local clearance of fallen trees, wouldn't be so keen if had to pay for firewood! I burn almost everything I cut down to stems about 15mm thick which are used for kindling and all types of wood.

Cycle more.....

Lots of well meaning words but very little about actually running hostels in that summary!

If you go to music festivals and local gigs there are plenty of musicians producing good music and doing it because they love ( and might have a chance to make it a bit bigger). It is the industry chart music that is the manufactured end of the music industry.

If horses can get through, what is to stop walkers and cyclists (apart from a sign)?

Most people I know would only use a hostel with dormitory style accommodation as a last resort, preferring not to share a sleeping area with other people. Also hostels are competing with other low cost accommodation in many areas.
We have stayed in a couple of hostels in the UK and NZ in the last few years, but ones with private rooms.
There are probably a range of issues causing the decline of hostels, from economic to peoples preferences.

Writing Christmas cards is the most writing I do in a year, apart from the occasional list, a nice fountain pen would merely be an ornament!

Ayseven wrote: ↑16 Dec 2023, 4:17pm So you are saying I have some influence with my provincial and federal governments? I don't think so! As I was saying, there are other forces which tend to have a lot of sway with the governments. They have it down to a science. That bit is supposed to be ironic.

Out of interest, what country are you in?

Berghaus seems to now be owned by the Pentland Group, which also own Endura, JD Sports and quite a few other brands

Definitely muck that needed to be raked!

Manc33 wrote: ↑16 Dec 2023, 10:35pm This will have been said already in the thread but a decent hub with gears like a Rohloff costs more than most people spend on a (half-decent) bike. You have to be quite serious about it (or you plan on long touring) to justify one. I'd love to have one but they were always out of my price range. There's others like Shimano but they don't have the range of the Rohloff.

OP you say a rear derailleur requires maintenance but why does it? The rear derailleur is one of the things I never touch once it's on and adjusted (H/L and B-tension).

I agree - where an IGH scored for me was all season commuting here in Scotland, the heavier duty chain etc required a lot less cleaning and resisted the road muck and salt much better than a derailleur system. . It was a Alfine 11sp and would have been even more maintenance free with a belt drive!
Also good for touring, but not really enjoyable for leisure riding.

Friends we have , who didn't really cycle much before, have got ebikes and take them to the bike shop for everything, they only maintenance they do is clean them.