This one goes out to all the financially strapped guys (and girls) who are sitting at home dreaming about touring but cant afford a "proper bike".
Alot of ppl think RTW touring and they go "yeah, i need my self a bmw or a super tenere or a africa twin" only problem is, bikes like that cost a fortune.
I have a japan-spec dualsport Honda Ax-1 250cc which cost me 975 us$ (which is quite a fortune to me). the way i see it theres really no need to get some 600+ trans-sahara thing. what a 600 can do, a 250 can do too if not even better.
a 250 is small and light, great when nipping through traffic, going off-road and when the worst happens ,like burning out a cdi box in the middle of nowhere (it happened 3 times to me!!!) it can be pushed for miles.
Lack of tank capacity is made up by economical fuel consumption. My Ax-1 gets 210-230km on a tankful, which is more than Triumph's Tiger and the ZZr600.
Now the powerplant is quite underpowered for high mileage highway cruising, but if auto-bahn storming is your thing then you'd be better of with a street-bike.i think thats a small price to pay for off-road capabilities. On ordinary roads it can hang in there with the biggest of them. I heard somebody mention luggage capacity...now, being a male im genuinely able to travel light but with a luggage-rack and and empty pillion i cant see anybody having trouble loading up gear for an extended tour.
If you already have a 250 and you wanna go touring dont let that stop you. Just fire it up and run it out. i can almost guarantee youll be pleasantly surprised.
even an old 250 would be a good choice as long as the engine is in mint condition. if you happen to break something thats impossible or too expensive to fix, you can leave the bike in a ditch and fly out.
Try that with your brandnew super trans-continental touring bike and youll have nightmares for years to come.