In September, I’m going to go up to Halifax, Nova Scotia to preview the course for Ride The Lobster, an 800k unicycle relay race to be held in June 2008. The guy running the show said so far, he’s got teams signed up from 13 countries, and something near $10,000 in prize money.
So, in anticipation of this and perhaps future int’l coker rides… How am I supposed to get the beast on a plane? Even if I shipped it ahead of time, where do I go about getting a 36"X36" box to hold it? How have you handled this in the past?
I have relatives on the north coast of NS, they drive when they’ve come down here (and Connecticut is a lot further then Maine) and so did I when I visited them for a wedding. Also, there are ferrys you could take - Bar Harbour and Portland to Yarmouth. So, why go by plane?
I’d love to do this ride, but I think it’s a bit out of my league.
Dude - I fully plan on riding that race, and I fully plan on driving the 6 or 7 hours to Bar Harbor and taking the ferry to Yarmouth, where the race is to start. Why fly? Ferries are more fun anyway.
Well, maybe for you guys there are other options. But not all of the 13 countries are a drive and ferry ride away. It’ll be hard enough to get there from sunny ol’ England without flying, let alone the poor guys that are coming all the way from New Zealand!
Bike bags generally fit Cokers very well. I have travelled with mine many a time and the wheel fits in really nicely. You can often hire these bags if you need to from your local cycle store. Would suggest going for the soft padded version not the hard ones.
I tried to take a uni on a plane to an island off england, I emailed then but got I reply saying that I would not be able to take it on a plane due to sucrity reasons (just after london attack) so I had no uni
“Coker on a plane?” Isn’t that a movie? Wait, that was Snakes on a Plane.
I’ve never taken a Coker on a plane, but I have taken my prop table, uncicycle, juggling crap with me on a place. The bigest thing is the table and breaks down to basically just the tabletop, which ends up about the size of the coker with the seat taken off.
It should be just within range being small enough to be considered not oversized (something like 82" combined). So maybe if you have one checked luggage and the other is your coker they may take it. Some airlines have a set fee for anything like a bicycle, and they’d probably consider a unicycle for the same fee. Otherwise you get charged oversize/excess fee around $50-100. If you have a flight with no other airline connections this is am OK rate, otherwise for each connection you make the other airline will charge the fee to you again.
Other than that there are shipping companies, UPS FedEx or companies that handle excess baggage right there at the airport.
I’ve flown with cokers twice. 1st time I checked it in as is, with pedals removed. that was a single domestic flight and it was fine. 2nd time the wheel went in a bike bag (with roger’s coker) and the frame in my checked bag. hat was multi flight trip and probadly it was safer that way with bagage handlers in 3 airports in 3 countries.
I could ride there… I rode around New England earlier this year. (shameless plug- www.unicyclemax.com) But I’d be looking at about three weeks each way…
Great advice Roger…I now owe you big time. After reading your post, I happened to be up at my LBS buying a new cyclometer for my son for Christmas. They had a big Athalon bike bag hanging from the ceiling with a sign on it that said “Rent Me - $35 per week”. I asked the owner “How much would it be if it had a “Buy Me” tag instead of a “Rent Me” tag?”. She said “I’d sell it to you for $100.” Well, that seemed like a decent deal, but I’ve never priced one of these out and frankly couldn’t tell from where it was hanging if it would even fit a 36" wheel. I told her I’d be in the next day to see if my coker would fit.
When I started searching on Bike Bags, I found a lot of options…most of which seemed too small in dimension, and almost all of which were well over $100. I found the Athalon site also, but it appears they’re not making the bike bags anymore. So the net of it was it seemed to be a great deal, and I went back up today with my GB4 36 to see if it would fit. Not only does it fit without having to separate the wheel from the frame, but I think it will actually hold two 36-ers and frames if properly dis-assembled and packed. That will make for good traveling if I can convince my son to join me for the Lobster race. The bag is super spacious, has a center compartment for the bike, plus a big zipped compartment on each side for the wheels. All are well padded.
But the best news is this: when the owner rang up the sale, she only charged me $75. A screamin’ deal, making my day.
![2_1024[1].JPG](https://cdn.unicyclist.com/uploads/default/original/2X/f/ff4c0b6bad239bffeea7cbdc1e4a554cbaaadf26.jpeg)
