*** MAIDEN VOYAGE! ***
I panicked for the first 30 seconds of riding, fearing I'd made a serious administartive error and invested a load of time and money in something that was too small for me. But it soon became apparent that it felt odd because it wasn't too big for me - this is new!
After checking out the newly re-opened Lune path, I engaged Adventure Mode on a succession of ruff stuffs.
It rides really nicely! Same chainset that I use on my tourer and commuter; I spent a remarkable amount of time in the big ring!
The handlebars are Ergotec Space Bugels, and the width and sweep of those suit me very well it seems.
Cables cut quite long for now whilst I figure out what to do about handlebar position and experiment with baggage on the bars.
The saddle is a Specialised Power Expert from Ebay. I've not used these before, but we did well considering our first encounter was 26 bumpy miles and I've barely done more than 2.6 miles in any saddle so far this year. Hard to tell what's due to the saddle and what's due to a better fitting bike at this stage...
The gear shifters are Deore spec, also from ebay. I'm used to Acera shifters on my Dawes and wasn't expecting to miss the plastic-y clacks as it indexes between gears. Cockpit set-up is always a compromise because things are never sized to accommodate smaller hands, so I have to move around on the bars quite a lot to change gears. The audio feedback that I've been able to stretch far enough to change to a larger sprocket turns out to be quite useful! These quieter ones are going to take a bit of getting used to...
I didn't do a huge amount on tarmac, but I didn't feel like I was fighting the Double Fighters when I did. They (1.9") were, unsurprisingly, noticeably more stable on the bumpy stuff than the 32mm Marathons on the Galaxy. I had the pressure up near max, so might reduce that a bit to benefit a bit more from the cushioning.
V-brakes also an improvement on the Galaxy cantilevers!
Trouble is, now I'm a bit reluctant to put mudguards and rack on it to enable Commuter Mode