We have a problem.
Toys.
Lots of outdoors toys: skis, bikes and kayaks.
Wait, let me be more specific: downhill skis, touring skis, mountain bikes, road bikes, touring kayaks and whitewater kayaks. Hauling all of these toys around has been a bit of a challenge from time to time, especially considering we own two very different cars: a Toyota Prius and a Honda Element.
With summer here, now is the time to get our car setups dialed. It’s taken a few years, but here are the rack setups we use to get from A to B with all of our gear in tow.
1. Yakima HoldUp 2
When I was mostly riding by myself, I opted for roof racks on my Honda Element, which is essentially and SUV. It allows for easy access into the cargo area, but, due to the highly aerodynamic shape of my toaster, errr car, once I began riding with my fiance more and more, having two bikes on the roof was zapping our gas mileage way too much. Plus, she had trouble reaching the roof, so I was always loading and unloading both bikes. I don’t mind being chivalrous, but, there’s a more efficient method out there.
I had used some hitch racks before, but they were a bit flimsy, made by some off brand, plus the bottom always seemed to “bottom-out” going into dips between the road and driveways. Plus, they held the bike by the top-tube, which is a no-no for carbon frames.
After a ton of research, I decided upon the Yakima Hold Up. This rack holds two bikes – 29ers, roadies and everything in between – with cradles for each tire, and one retractable arm on the front tire to hold things in securely. The bikes barely move in this stable setup, and each tray has its own cable lock – a huge upgrade over using a 6 foot cable lock through each frame to the hitch itself I had MAcGyver’d the last time I used a hitch rack.
To solve the rack scraping, Yakima ingeniously curved the rack in an “S-like” shape up and away from the ground just past where the racks is locked into the hitch. I haven’t scraped once, and my Honda isn’t known for its high ground clearance.
2. Yakima Hold Up Plus Two
More and more our trips include both mountain biking, as well as some road biking. For instance, we recently did a mountain bike trip to Fruita over a three-day weekend. Rather than riding dirt bell-to-bell all three days, we opted to take it easy the middle day.
Saddling up onto road bikes we headed over to Palisade for some wine tasting on scenic country roads winding through Colorado’s western slope. With well over a dozen vineyards in the area, we could spend several hours pedaling and tasting via skinny tires, which is much easier than on heavy mountain bikes with knobby tires. Best of all, no spandex was required!
What does this have to do with rack, you might be thinking? Well, with two mountain bikes loaded on the Element’s HoldUp rack, all I had to do was add-on the Hold Up Plus 2, which quite literally, adds two more trays to carry a total of four bikes.
I barely noticed the extra load on the back and the ease of being able to load all four bikes from the ground was awesome – especially after tasting a few of those sweet wines! We spent the night at a B&B, by the way: I was only loading bikes onto the car for storage and not driving!
3. Yakima High Roller
The High Roller was my rack of choice for years. For a long time we would have one High Roller on the Element and one on our prius. It was so simple to swap racks from one car to the other when we needed two for a road trip, but in the meantime each had our own rack.
Once I upgraded the Element to the hitch rack, I was able to permanently keep two High Roller’s on the Prius. The low height of our golf-cart come automobile is ideal for my shorter riding companion to load bikes on, without having to use a step stool. Seriously, we used to have a step stool so she could load bikes onto the Element. I’m glad we retired that method before there was a slip and fall – especially if it was my bike that fell!
The High Roller is a great roof rack option. For one, you don’t have to take a wheel off, dirtying the interior of the car and adding additional steps to the loading and unloading process. Plus, with the advent of thru-axles and other mounting options, there is a lot of compatibility to worry about. Leaving the tire on solves this. You never know what a riding buddy’s bike requires, and the High Roller accommodates pretty much any combination possible. Additionally, the bikes is held in by the front wheel, so no part of the rack touches the frame and it’s delicate paint job.
Loading is simple: just open the front tire holder and place the bike in. The High Roller keeps the bike steady while clamping in the front wheel and strapping in the back tire. Simple and solid – great combo.
4. Yakima Hully Rollers & Mako Saddles
As mentioned above, we have two kayaks: one for touring lakes and the other for white water. The touring boat is about 13 feet long and quite heavy. However, it’s not impossible to load solo. Using the Hully Rollers, essentially a set of wheels shaped like the bottom hull of a boat, I have these mounted on the back cross bar of the Element. All I have to do is lift the bow of the boat onto these set of wheels while the rear of the boat it still on the ground. It’s not heavy or unwieldy, and once the hull is loaded, I can grab the back half of the boat and push it forward towards the front cross bar, which has the Mako Saddles. The Hully Roller takes all of the work and effort out of the process and 13 feet of plastic slides right into place. The Mako Saddles are a simple design, shaped in the same curved hull design, that secures the boat effortlessly. The hardest part is tying the boat down, which is fairly simple after the first time as well.
The whitewater boat is even easier to load, since it can be lifted right into place from the ground. I’ve had to load both boats only once at the same time. I put the touring boat in the rack and rested the whitewater boat, upside down, next to it. Using a few ratcheting tie downs they both stayed in place. I need to add one of the stacker racks for the second boat soon. I wouldn’t want to drive too far with the second boat not affixed to a proper rack.
Since the roof is clear of bikes now, we can easily load a boat or two and four bikes for a road trip to the desert or the mountains on the hitch. There might even be roof for a roof box if we needed more cargo space for an extended trip. We may look a bit like the Griswolds heading down the road, but we’ll have all the fun big kid toys for all of our summer trips!
Posted by Yakima Racks on Friday, March 27, 2015
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