I Want To Get A Bike For On And Off-road, Need Some Advice!



farmer333

New Member
Feb 22, 2015
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UK
Hi all!

This is my first post and partly the reason I have just joined the forum. I have recently moved to a new area, which incidentally is Somerset in the UK. I used to ride a great deal and want to get back into it. My surrounding here are fairly flat, with a mixture of roads, trails, woods and fields, with some steep climbs if I venture a bit further out (which I plan to for the amazing views!). With all this in mind I am trying to decide exactly what sort of bike I need.

I think ideally I want something with the handling and build quality of a mountain bike but with a slimmer tyre profile and maybe increased comfort for road use. I am also thinking a simple system of adding paniers would be be a plus but guess that is more of an after market consideration.

So what do you think? Should I be looking at some sort of hybrid, or would I be better off getting an mountain bike and then modifying it to suit my needs. Any advice is welcomed, I just need a good starting point, so personal experience would be great to hear.

Thanks in advance, and by the way, just to complicate things I am on a bit of a budget so probably looking at around the $500 (£300) mark. I am thinking this will probably lead me to second hand options but if anyone knows of any great entry level options I would love to hear about them. :)