Tom Hale left a career in environmental planning in 1979, then spent months cycling 5,000 solo miles through the American West while he worked out what he wanted his own company to look like. He landed in Berkeley, financed the first few months washing fondue pots at night, and led that very first tour himself: a bike trip through Death Valley with four guests, including his mother.
Backroads has grown a long way from that first tour since. It now runs active trips across more than 60 countries, still headquartered in Berkeley, still built around the same do-it-yourself spirit Hale started it with.
LIVE YOUR ADVENTURE. GO ACTIVE.
Traveling with Backroads feels like being handed a bike or a pair of hiking boots and pointed toward the day, with support close behind rather than out in front.
Every morning your Trip Leaders lay out a handful of route options at different distances and difficulty levels, so the real decision is how far and how hard you want to push it, not whether you'll be looked after.
Support vans trail the group, stocked with snacks and repair tools, and your luggage moves itself from hotel to hotel, freeing up a surprising amount of headspace for the scenery. How much of a day runs as a group versus how much is yours alone still depends on the specific trip and activity level.
What it’s like to travel with Backroads?
Backroads at a Glance:
- Group Size: Biking trips average about 15 travelers (max 26); Multi-Adventure trips average about 14 (max 26); Hiking & Walking trips average about 13 (max 20)
- Travel Style: Active, self-powered land trips — biking, hiking, walking, or a mix, with more than one route option built into every day
- Pace: Varies by itinerary and activity level
- Activity: Rated 1 (easygoing) to 5 (challenging) on Backroads' own scale
- Hotel: Luxury, Deluxe, or Casual hotels depending on the trip, plus lodge-to-lodge and single-hotel "Home Base" formats on select itineraries
- Free Time: Multiple daily route options built in, so how much you do together versus on your own is largely your call
- Service Level: Full-time Backroads Trip Leaders (not local contractors), support vans, and luggage handling on every trip
What Makes Backroads Different?
Backroads hires and trains its own leaders rather than contracting them locally each season, creating continuity that shows up in small things, like a leader who already knows your name by day two.
Full-Time Trip Leaders, Not Contractors
The same region can show up as a Biking trip, a Hiking & Walking trip, or a Multi-Adventure mix of both, so what changes from trip to trip is the activity, not just the destination.
However You Want to Move
Rather than just labeling one trip "easygoing," Backroads runs Dolce Tempo as its own separate collection of e-biking, walking, and multi-adventure trips built specifically around a slower pace, with a private van and local experts along the way, so a traveler who wants a gentler trip picks a different product line, not a scaled-back version of the standard one.
Dolce Tempo: A Dedicated Line for an Easier Pace
Biking trips specifically run with 3 to 4 professional Trip Leaders and two support vans working as a team, more staff per group than the single guide many active-travel companies assign.
Three to Four Sets of Hands, Not One
- Biking Tours — Guided cycling trips with multiple mileage options each day, your own maps and directions, and a GPS device on the bike preloaded with the day's route, plus e-bike and traditional ("Unplugged") choices.
- Hiking & Walking Tours — The walking equivalent, good for both weekend walkers and avid hikers, with multiple route options and van support each day.
- Multi-Adventure Tours — One trip that mixes biking and walking with other activities, like kayaking, rafting, or snorkeling, so you experience a region more than one way.
- Dolce Tempo — A dedicated collection of easygoing e-biking, walking, and multi-adventure trips built around a slower pace, with a private van and local experts along the way.
- Active Safaris — Wildlife-focused Multi-Adventure-style trips, combining game drives with walking and other active time.
- Active Culinary — Trips built around a region's food and wine, run at the same active, self-powered pace.
Ways to Travel With Backroads
- Snow Adventures — A winter version of the same format — think snowshoeing and winter walking in place of summer biking or hiking.
- Lodge-to-Lodge — Multi-day trips that move to a new lodge each night instead of returning to one base.
- Home Base — Trips built around a single hotel, with day trips out and back rather than packing up each morning.
- Family Trips — Itineraries spanning ages 2 to 25+, with kids' biking equipment available on Family biking trips; these make up close to 30% of Backroads' annual departures.
- Weekend Getaways — Shorter versions of the same active trip styles, built for a quick break rather than a full-length vacation.
- Women's Adventures — The same active trip styles, run as women-only departures.
- Private Trips — Any scheduled departure booked exclusively for your own group of friends or family.
- Backroads sits at a premium price point for active travel, so it's worth comparing what you're actually getting, not just the number on the invoice.
- Airfare, plus any days you add on before or after, aren't part of the trip price, and meal inclusions can vary from itinerary to itinerary, so it pays to check what's actually covered.
- This is an active trip by design, and the activity rating (1 through 5) matters just as much as the hotel tier: a Casual-hotel Biking trip rated a 2 and a Luxury-hotel Multi-Adventure trip rated a 4 can end up feeling like two completely different vacations, even in the same region.
Is Backroads One of the Options Worth Considering?
It's easy to picture Backroads as one thing: serious cyclists covering serious miles. That's true for plenty of its departures, but it's really just one end of a much wider range of Backroads tours that run under a single name.
Dolce Tempo covers the same regions at an easygoing pace, with a private van and local experts close by rather than a group of riders pushing toward a personal-best day. A Family trip built for a multigenerational group and a Women's Adventures departure both run on the same active-trip backbone, just reshaped for a different kind of traveler.
Beyond the brochure, that range is exactly why "Backroads" isn't itself the answer to which trip fits you; it's just the starting point. Nobody picks between those trip lines by accident; it usually comes down to whether the words "personal best" sound like a good day or a stressful one.
