>is there a map site that lets you create your own routes that would tell
>me how many miles a bike route would take up?
What type of cycling, what country and what approximate distances are
you talking about?
When I ride a bicycle tour, I'll ride 60-100 miles a day for a week or
more. When looking at routes for that type of ride, I do the
following:
1) Use a PC mapping program. I'll tweak my preferences to say "avoid
interstates" and adjust the miles/hour on the roads to favor medium
sized US highways. This gives me an approximate route I can use to
get a size for the trip and something I can then adjust.
2) If there are tricky spots such as bridges crossing the Mississippi,
I'll look things up on the web and if necessary ask in a newsgroup.
Some states have cycling maps and information online.
3) I'll use state highway maps to pick rough routes. Intuitive things
like "roads following rivers and railroads are sometimes flatter than
ones that don't" or "US highways that go parallel to Interstates can
be good choices" help me adjust routes. These can fail (e.g. when the
interstate is under construction and all the truck traffic is detoured
onto the parallel road...) but are a good starting point.
4) I'll ask people along the way. Many of them are motorists only, so
I tend to:
(a) Ask the same question to multiple people. If I say, "how far to
the next landmark" and get answers of 2, 4 and 11 miles (it happens
), then I'll assume it is somewhere in the middle.
(b) Ask relative questions. For example, "Is road X hillier than road
Y?" in cases I've just cycled X...will help me more than "Is road Y
hilly?" since I have no idea what they might consider hilly.
5) Make sure my route has enough alternatives so I can adjust
depending on weather, mechanical problems and road conditions. For
example, for a one-week motel trip, I will not have reservations
anywhere (unless in some peak season or there is only one motel in
town)...but instead look up in advance towns with motels and keep a
list of towns along the way. Web sites such as
http://www.motelguide.com list Mom-n-Pop motels and are otherwise
indicators of towns with motels.
Similarly, I tend to start bicycling early in the day and plan on
finishing approximately mid-afternoon. This is early enough motels
haven't filled up and if I need to ride an extra 45 miles I still have
enough daylight to do so...Same thing with camping, though in western
USA frequently have more alternatives there...
--mev, Mike Vermeulen