And the question remains the same, which bike?

[Edward The Head]

Ok, I'm in the market for a new bike. Was thinking about a sports bike but thought against it and thought I should get some sort of dual sport. I currently own a Honda Shadow 600 and a Kawasaki Concours, neither of which is good for RTW type traveling, at least if you get off road much.

Anyway, I'm still caught in what type of bike I would like. I'm not even sure the exact type of riding I will be doing so I'm just gonna list some of the things that I plan on doing now plus a little background on me.

I live in the US, Maryland, I'm only 28, ridden all over the US and rode in the 01 Iron Butt Rally. My current plans are to see Canada, Alaska, Western Europe, probably Mexico and hopefully South America and Africa.

What I'd like out of a bike is something that will do a good amount of normal paved roads, but since I don't know where I'm going has to do off road as well. I also would like to be able to either get a bigger fuel tank or add some sort of fuel cell. I also want a bike that will last at least 10 years, while I don't think I would ride it as much as my Connie it will get a lot of use, probably 100K over that time. I really don't want to pay a lot so a new 1150gs is out. I'm hoping to cap for the bike around $8000 US.

The bikes I'm currently looking at are:

BMW 1150GS/1100GS
pros: good for the highway, powerful engine, good for possible 2-up

cons: can be heavy from what I've read on some off road places, expensive, proably too much for me.

F650GS
pros: light, good for off road

cons: gas tank under seat, is it easy to get a bigger one? might not be the best for 2-up, might not be best for lots of on road riding.

R80/100GS
pros: a mix between the 1150 and 650, other than that don't know a lot about this bike. can be found cheap

cons: old, parts might be hard to come by

KTM/KLR
I really don't know much about them, I'm guessing they will be closer to the F650. The biggest con I can see is how many dealers are there worldwide?

That's about all I can think of now, I'd like some more feedback. I did read through most of the other "what kind of bike" questions but they didn't seem to fit to me.

Oh one more thing, I'd probably be doing at least some of my own wrenching so the easier to work on the better as well.