A couple weeks ago I did a week-long bike tour in northwest Michigan (Traverse City-Petoskey-Harbor Springs) with Carolina Tailwinds and had a great time with great weather, covering about 240 miles in 6 days. Those roads can be quite hilly and the last time I was on some of them was 10 years ago on the popular Shoreline West tour. This time I had a much more suitable bike -- lighter weight and lower gearing -- and expected to ace some of the hills that I knew we'd encounter. Well, it didn't quite go that way, as I did make it up all of them, but only with some real effort. At first I put some of this down to the fact that I don't have any hills in the area where I normally ride, the worst hills were on the first two days when I was just getting acclimated, and those were also the only really hot days. Plus, most of the miles were in the afternoon when I'm never at my best. But later I realized that I really was 10 years younger back then and, at 72 now, I can't deny the effects of aging that I also see in the way my running performances have steadily declined.
OK then. On the rest of the tour, I opted to skip some sections, i.e. get shuttled, rather than do the max available mileage, and that turned out to be a good decision. After those first days of 45 and 55 tough miles, the next day I skipped a 22-mile segment and turned a 58-mile ride into a pleasant 36 miles and felt fresh and recovered at the end. There were a few others on the tour in my age bracket and we all took some miles off during the week. After all, this was supposed to be fun -- not a challenge, although there were some in the group that were all about maxing out distance and speed. To each their own...
I'd also highly recommend Carolina Tailwinds if you're into high-end catered touring. They are much smaller than the better-known outfits like VBT and Backroads, but offer a comparable service from what I could tell. They also have more of a personal touch since the owners also act as the guides on many of the trips.