Sunday September 23, 1984 

ANDY CASSEL Herald Staff Writer

Good wine country tends also to be good bicycling country, and for many of the same reasons: long summers with warm, dry days; gentle slopes; a rural economy vigorous enough to keep the roads well paved without overcrowding them.

The area around the town of Bergerac, in the valley of the Dordogne river in France, is a fine example.

Near Monbazillac, some 55 miles east of Bordeaux, the wine is white and sweet, good with strawberries, and the roadsides are dotted with barns and farmhouses advertising degustation of the local produce. You can ride from tasting to tasting until you’re woozy.

I tasted my fill this summer, on a 10-day bicycle tour of that region organized by Country Cycling Tours, a New York company whose main business is introducing Manhattanites to fresh air. With 22 fellow Americans, I pedaled the French back roads on a rented 12-speed, packed with little more than a tire-patch kit, a water bottle and a Michelin Guide. Suitcases traveled ahead from hotel to hotel by van. We would catch up late in the afternoon, in time for a shower, a cocktail and a long French supper.

For 10 days in France, our group kept up a delightful rhythm. Up at 7 for breakfast and a “route rap” by the director, outlining the day’s ride, we were on the road by 9, stopping after a short warm-up ride to stretch and check maps. By mid- morning, we were either looking for picnic provisions or scouting for likely restaurants. How much wine and pate one could eat and still get back on a bicycle in the afternoon became a hot philosophical question.

Putting in from 15 to 35 miles a day, we rode through–or by–all that the Perigord region is famous for: vineyards, sunflower fields and fruit orchards; oak forests where truffles are hunted in winter, and medieval chateaux — real military fortress-castles, as opposed to the bourgeois pleasure-palaces of the Loire farther north. As we traveled up-river to the east, the Dordogne valley narrowed, with spectacular cliffs rising up on both sides. A thousand years ago the valley provided natural defenses for medieval monasteries and villages; today it offers thousands of urban Frenchmen a place for camping, canoeing and cycling.

Our routes kept us off the larger roads most of the time; even when we had to use them, the traffic was relatively light and surprisingly courteous. French drivers are vicious toward each other, but decent to cyclists, probably for the same sort of sentimental instincts that lead Texan drivers to respect people on horseback.

Organized bicycle touring has been around for decades, but its rapid growth as a business dates only to the early 1970s. Today there are dozens of companies who specialize in finding places with clean air, smooth asphalt and an agreeable absence of McDonalds’, and providing things that cyclists need there: maps, lodging, spare tires, first aid, and back-up transportation for bags and non-riders.

You need a little experience with bikes, a serviceable pair of quadriceps and a tolerant disposition. You get loads of exercise, wonderful scenery, pleasant places to stay and lots of food. Also a variety of companions, whom you may ignore if you wish.

I had discovered bike touring a year earlier, on a week- long trip with Vermont Bicycle Touring, at 14 years old the granddaddy of the commercial touring outfits. That group of 20 included a pair of Miami judges (she’s circuit, he’s appeals), a veteran foreign correspondent and his wife, and a Michigan teacher who learned to drink beer in the Navy. We traveled between postcard villages and country stores, where they sell T- shirts that say, simply and oh-so-truly: “Vermont Ain’t Flat.”

The country inns we stayed in have all been converted or renovated in the last five years, by innkeepers with enough sophistication to include well-stocked bars amid the four-poster beds and grandfather clocks. There are a lot of restored country inns in Vermont, in no small part because of bike tours like ours. The fastest, strongest riders would arrive around 4 p.m., and buy the first round. Dinner was hearty and family-style, and afterward we retired to the parlor for evenings that grew more organized as the week wore on. There was a charades tournament the third night, a beer drinking contest the fourth. The Michigan teacher won.

The beauty of these trips is in their flexibility. You can ride in a group, go off in pairs or travel alone from breakfast to dinner. You can push yourself or poke along, stopping at tourist sights, hilltops or watering holes as your whims and energy suggest. The group provides security and does a lot of the planning for you, but you’re on your own as well. Bicycling, I contend, also makes you feel good — assuming you’ve padded and toned up the appropriate parts of your anatomy in advance.

That’s the part that daunts beginners. The vision of breezy rides through verdant forests is frequently interrupted by prospects of chafed thighs, sore backs and tender bottoms. It needn’t be so; most adults of even moderate physical abilities can handle a multi-day bike tour.

There were plenty of beer bellies and droopy bottoms on both my tours, and their owners ranged well past child-bearing years. Some were confirmed weekend riders, others had been coaxed into coming by mates. But most had done at least a little preparation, and those who hadn’t quickly learned to pace themselves, taking slower, flatter routes when possible, riding in the van (called a “support vehicle” in the brochures, a “sag wagon” on the road) when necessary.

It’s easy enough to avoid most of the potential discomforts in advance. A little cycling around the neighborhood, if it’s regular, will build up the muscles and toughen up the tender spots. Then there is padding for the only places where your body meets the bike: Hands, feet and rear.

If those tight racing black shorts with the chamois crotches make you look and feel like a sausage, there are padded variations on walking shorts that are less extreme. Gloves with extra layers in the palms keep the road vibration from making your arms and shoulders tired as well. Helmets improve your security, and a bright-colored flag waving above the bike makes you more visible to motorists.

International trips are really the top of the line when it comes to bike tours; the number of weekend and three-day rides offered in the summer and fall months is large, and growing all the time. The Northeast leads the nation, but trips are sprouting in the West, Midwest and even parts of north and central Florida. Prices range from around $100 to nearly $2,000; my Vermont trip cost just over $400, and France was about $1,200, not counting airfare. Reservations should be made early; the best trips fill up faster every year.

Touring’s growth has helped, and been helped by, the bicycle industry, which has produced a staggering array of equipment to increase the comfort and efficiency of the rider. A lot of this stuff is merely expensive; some of it is quite useful.

Beside the standard carry-on water bottle, most bike- tourists carry a handlebar pack for wallets, locks, cameras and other essentials. These can be opened and closed while riding. Many carry an attached plastic map case on top. That, along with a tire pump and a couple of small tools, is really all you need.

You can, of course, carry enough luggage in side-saddles and such for a six-month trek across the continent. But if you do, don’t call me. I like my bike-touring civilized.

Here’s a short list of bicycle touring groups:

The League of American Wheelmen puts out a list of more than 100 bicycle-tour organizations in the U.S. and abroad; to obtain the list, write them at P.O. Box 988, Baltimore, Md. 21203.