Originally Posted by
Tourist in MSN
I would rather go solo than roll the dice with someone that I have not already known for a few years.
This.
If you're the right personality and don't mind letting someone else make all of the decisions, touring with a random person might work for you. I'm the sort that wants to share discussions and decide things together when they need deciding. You both have to compromise, or someone is going to have a crap time. A bike tour is a fairly rare, special thing for most of us, so it's not right for someone to have a crap time. At the end of the day, most people are kinda self-focused and kinda suck. If you don't want to deal with that, you have to go solo.
My touring partner is my best friend of ~24yrs. We've lived together as room mates and we both loved the experience. That said, there was one point on our first tour when I got so fed up with him over one particular reoccurring issue that I was certain I wasn't going to tour with him again. Overall it was a fantastic time and we both really loved it, but that one thing kept happening and wearing on me. I imagine a stranger would have something to bug me at least as much as a best friend of 24yrs.