For long-distance ongoing cruising, the primary issue faced by any of these choices is gong to be the road conditions and resultant limited comfort and
safety provided to the user. It would be great to have almost any of these clever devices - or even a bike, like the one we carried through 37 countries - in a place like
Amsterdam. But most island nations offer rough roads, no paved shoulders, no sidewalks, and traffic that can be intense. Or consider the opposite: Most of First World
Europe with its narrow streets, bazillion
motor bikes buzzing by, and dense traffic. All of the gadgets I saw in the portions of this thread I read looked quite clever...but none of them would manage the road surfaces of most island nations nor even the cobbled pavement of many cities today with any degree of comfort.
When we arrived in Sines,
Portugal a local whizzed down to the
dock within 30 minutes on his Segway to welcome us to the port and point out where his flat with an open router
antenna was located - a generous thing to do and the Segway was ideal for that renovated, modern city with wide paved roads. But how would a
boat without a
generator charge such a device while out on the cruising trail...and for boats with generators, would you want to? And does everyone know that one of the accessories
sold to Segway owners are portable ramps so the unit can be put up/into the car's trunk or truck's
bed? These are not lightweight machines...tho' teasingly clever, to be sure.
I've been very thankful to have had a bike aboard - but not often. It made a dinghy
repair possible in Grand Cayman (very First World and with limited traffic), it made reaching the post offices easier when cruising along the USA's
east coast, and I placed my life in my hands when I used one to commute to chandlers and tool suppliers while wintering in London twice (talk about traffic!). But with an eye to heading back to the
Caribbean enroute the
Canal and into the Pacific, I took the bike off WHOOSH. Turns out - IMO anyway - 'auxiliary transport' is a tougher nut to crack than it first appears, at least for the wide-ranging cruising crew.
Jack