BICYCLE REVIEW : SOJOURN

I’ve been riding my 2009 Raleigh Sojourn for a couple of weeks now.

If you want the short version, read this paragraph: This is a great bike to do almost everything. It’s a purpose-built tourer, with comfortable, all-day geometry and braze-ons galore. It’s fast over long distances, is geared low enough to climb anything, and can carry a whole lot. Not a lightweight and not a small bike, the Sojourn feels out of place weaving in and out of dense city traffic, but will get you, and everything you need to bring with you, anywhere you need to go. Wide tires, big clearances, and full fenders mean it’s equally at home on gravel and tow paths as it is on the road.

TECH AND SPEC:The Sojourn’s simple, clean lines stand out compared with the flash graphics and loud style of most modern road bikes. Only the faux top tube protector, reading “Sojourn,” and the headbadge with the classic Raleigh heron logo interrupt the plain Khaki tan of the frame and matching fork. Most noticable at a glance are the handlebars. They’re WTB Mountain Drop Road bars, which have a shallow, wide drop that’s perfect for commuting and touring. It’s somewhere between a traditional drop and a moustache bar, and offers another hand position without taking one away. Nice. One other note is that WTB’s website for some reason lists these bars as being “not compatible with bar end shifters.” As the Sojourn has bar-ends and the MDRbars, it’s clearly not true! The angle of the drops does make the barends exit pointing slightly outside the line of the bike’s travel, which increases the overal width of the bike and makes them more vulnerable to damage in a crash.

(UPDATE - WTB says that the stock bars are, indeed, incompatible with barend shifters. The OEM equipment on the Raleigh Sojourn is slightly different than that which is available aftermarket. — ed )