How/where to store bikes on a Princess35

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Growltiger Girl

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Hello everybody

We plan to take off 3-6 months next year to go to France, motor around the Channel Islands and then head into the French canals and up to Paris. We plan to spend up to a month in the Paris Arsenal marina so that we can fully enjoy the charms of Paris. We want to take our bikes with us for exploring the areas adjoining the canals and for shopping trips to the local food shops & supermarkets.

My questions is this – what is the best way/place to store the bikes on the boat?

They are ordinary, non folding bikes. We have wondered whether we could not have some sort of bracket/frame made that would go on the Weaver snap dinghy davits on the bathing platform. We have a transom door so would still need to have enough space to pass out of it onto the bathing platform and then step off the boat when taking mooring lines ashore. For this trip we won’t be using the dinghy davits for a tender as we will take our inflatable Avon which we will keep in the lazerette, we don’t expect to use it much anyway. Or would we be better storing them on the foredeck? If so how and then how do we get them ashore, it is much easier from the bathing platform.

I am very interested to hear people’s views and solutions to this requirement.
Thanks
Annabelle
 
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Hi,
welcome to the forum.
We took our full size bikes to Netherlands last year, and tried to mount them to bathing platform and all sorts of things. Eventually, we secured them with bungee straps to our guard wires on each side of the cockpit space. Relatively easy to get on and off.
 
Thanks for your speedy response. We are a motorboat and don't have guard wires around the cockpit, only alongside the side decks (too narrow to store bikes) and up on the foredeck. The foredeck is a possibility but I am not keen as it will impede the forward vision when helming from inside and then there is the difficulty of getting them off the boat from there. We can't wheel/carry them back to the bathing platform, which has easy access ashore, as the side decks are very narrow.

Oops -I meant this to go as a reply to FullCircle
 
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Wherever they'll fit, pulpit seems favourite. But you'll see boats with bikes stashed in every conceivable position on the boats on the French canals. Easy access isn't always best though, but does make it easier for the thieves.

Bikes are even stolen when the owners are aboard so always lock them to the boat with a solid barred lock to deter the bolt croppers. Seen plenty of bikeless and cropped 'security' chains/wires (and stolen bikes lying in the hedges along the canals). You have been warned.
 
Thanks Davegriff, your advice is noted regarding security. We will buy the best/heaviest duty locks we can find for attaching them to the boat. We don't have expensive bikes ( cost less than £300 each) but it would be annoying if they were stolen for want of a good lock.
 
Is it worth considering buying some folding bikes that will store more easily? I don't know how keen on cycling you are, but 2 x full sized bikes on a 35 foot boat is going to get in the way wherever you put them.

The bathing platform may work on the canals, but I wound imagine for a sea crossing the salt spray and general movement would be an issue.

You could get some canvas bike bags made ( maybe they sell them) that might make them easier to lash down without getting wet or depositing chain grease on the fabrics. They would also be marginally less attractive to thieves as they would not be able to assess if it was worth stealing.
 
They'll suffer terribly on the aft end of the boat from saltwater corrosion and also get plastered in diesel smuts. Horrid. Lashed on foredeck they'll be a liability - in the way and also likely to jiggle around and damage the gelcoat/stainless. You'll also look like Steptoe & Son. I'd buy a couple of cheapies when you get to Paris then leave them behind when you leave or you could rent. We did 6 months on board to La Rochelle and back from Plymouth in our Targa 39 and considered taking bikes but it wasn't practical; walking is good exercise and we became very familiar with public transport (which is very good) in France.
 
jrudge said:
Is it worth considering buying some folding bikes that will store more easily? I don't know how keen on cycling you are, but 2 x full sized bikes on a 35 foot boat is going to get in the way wherever you put them.

The bathing platform may work on the canals, but I wound imagine for a sea crossing the salt spray and general movement would be an issue.

You could get some canvas bike bags made ( maybe they sell them) that might make them easier to lash down without getting wet or depositing chain grease on the fabrics. They would also be marginally less attractive to thieves as they would not be able to assess if it was worth stealing.
Click to expand...

Princess 35 has a pretty decent lazarette, I think? If so, I'd buy a couple of cheapy folding bikes (not Bromptons - nice though they are) on ebay, get canvas bags made for them and store them in the laz.
 
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Couldn't you fabricate a simple hooked bar so you could effectively hang the bike frames from the davits?
 
Bikes stored outside in a salty environment are not going to be happy bikes, unless well wrapped from the sea spray. Folding in the lazerette would be my suggestion.
 
I think there's 3 stages to your trip, and you may want to keep them in a different place for each one

For cruising round the CI's, or anywhere at sea, you either want them inside the boat or undercover, otherwise the salt spray will kill them fairly quickly. Maybe even take the wheels off and store them in the lazarette if you don't want to use them until you reach the canals. Once on the canals, there's no issue with leaving them out, so the foredeck or transom would be fine. In Paris marina you probably wont want them on the boat at all, just secure them to the nearest suitable fitting on the pontoon, or on land at the head of the pontoon.
 
We are not expecting to spend much time in a sea environment, maybe a month around the CIs before heading to Paris via the canals. Thus the salt water issue is not a primary concern. I am concerned that having a pair of bikes hanging off the back of the transform may get damaged if we haver any problems going alongside when in the canals. Or for that matter other boats mooring behind us in a lock and then bumping into us when the water rushes in.

The idea of storing them on the back of the flybridge is attractive except we have the fender storage brackets there- not to say that we couldn't move these. I wonder how easy it would be to get the bikes down from up there? Has anybody done this. Also we may either take the flybridge down or hinge it if we decide to continue past Paris and into the smaller canals where headroom under bridges requires us to reduce our air-draught.

I have considered the idea of folding bikes but there is the cost for these and I can see it will be a hassle getting them out of the lazarette every time we want to use them. We will have to move the cockpit furniture around to lift up the lazarette door and then will need to assemble the bikes. I can't really see us dismantling every time we need to move the boat, after the first few uses I can see that we wouldn't bother with them due to the hassle factor.

Still, thanks for the answers everyone - you have given me (and the other half) some suggestions that we consider more closely.
 
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