E Bike Tours
Our Hinterland & Secret Beaches tour and Mynion Falls tour are available to 15+ age (160cm height minimum) making them a great family rides! Otherwise the rest of our tours are 18+.
For some of our routes we offer a self guided tours, you follow the route on an app on your smartphone.
The app is called ridewithgps and is helpful if you can download prior to the journey. You do not need to sign up, there is a shortcode you will be given to access my private area of the App.
You need to have a moderate level of fitness and some experience of cycling a normal bike, as you must pedal for the duration of the tour, of course you can use turbo mode when ever we are approaching a hill (or all the time if you want to feel like a superhero!). For the Hells Hole and Unicorn Falls tours we require that you feel confident on a bike as there are some steeper sections on gravel roads. If you are not so confident we recommend the Hinterland & Beach tour or Nightcap Forest Immersion Tour.
As these are bike tours we are unable to offer access to people with limited physical, visual or intellectual abilities. We maybe can accommodate hearing difficulties, please contact us via email to discuss what is possible.
You must have closed shoes and some form of eye protection (sunglasses are fine or we can provide tinted safety glasses). Please also bring Sunscreen and a water-bottle (either your own bike bottle or any water bottle that you can carry in a backpack)
If you fancy a dip in the ocean or waterfalls, please bring swimmers and a SMALL towel.
We provide you with a high quality FOCUS Electric Mountain Bike made in Germany. We offer Hardtail (only front suspension) Jarifa 6.7 Nine's and Full Suspension (suspension front and back) Thron 6.8's Bikes.
We also sell the bikes, as once you ride one, you will want to own one!
We operate tours in all weathers except very heavy rain so please bring appropriate clothing if some rain is forecast. If over 10mm of rain is forecast with over 50% probability for the time of the tour there will be the option of a credit to rebook for another time.
Up to 7 days prior to the tour date, full refund (minus booking fees).
Up to 24 hours prior to tour start time, you may change date/time or exchange for gift voucher (though this booking cannot be refunded in future).
Within 24 hours of tour start time, no refund. If weather is bad there may be option for credit or date change.
If tour cancelled by operator for any reason, then a full refund will be issued.
We provide a premium German made E-bike (FOCUS or KALKHOFF) with lights, locks, pannier (bike bag) or backpack, gel seat and an approved Giro bike helmet. You are free to bring your own helmet if you prefer.
We are also unique in fitting all our bikes with puncture proof tyres to make your trip as stress free as possible.
E-Bikes
An Electric Bike is like a normal bike except it has a motor to provide you assistance. It has no throttle, you still have to pedal to get anywhere but its a lot easier and you can cycle up any hill on a road as though its flat! (which never gets boring)
See our range of FOCUS E Mountain Bikes here which we use for tours and also sell. All accessories used on the tour are also available for sale. Let us help you with a complete package of bike and accessories.
E-bikes can help you achieve a reduction in your carbon footprint and it is a form of transportation that does not release dangerous chemicals into the air like a car or bus. The batteries are easily recycled and their health benefits place even less burden on the health-care system.
Cars Versus E-Bikes
When you look at the facts, there is no denying that when you compare e-bikes to cars and other vehicles, e-bikes win by a landslide. Indeed, when comparing any type of bicycle to cars and busses, the bike always wins in terms of energy and environmental impact.
For example, to travel just one kilometer, a standard bike uses 5-15 watt-hours (w-h) of energy, as compared to 15-20 w-h by foot, 30-40 by train, and a whopping 400 w-h in an average-sized car with one person.
Source: The Energy Cost of Human and Electric Powered bicycles, Justin Lemire-Elmore
Three components have to be considered in looking at the total Carbon Footprint of a bike, its manufacture, the food required to replace calories burned in riding and (for an E Bike) the electricity used to recharge the battery, according to a study by the European Cyclists Federation (ECF)
Manufacture
For a normal bike 96kg of CO2 is produced during manufacture and 134kg for an E Bike. The average lifespan of a bike is 19,200km giving a per km figure of 5g for a normal bike and 7g for an e bike.
Extra Food consumed
Riding a normal bike consumes an average of 11 calories per km, but for an E Bike this is more than halved to 4.4 calories per km due to the assistance of the motor. ECF estimates that 1.44g of carbon are required to generate each calorie (this assumes average diet so will be less if you are vegan!). This translates to 16g of CO2 per km for a normal bike and 6.3g for an E-Bike
Electricity Usage
At Beyond Byron E Bikes all of the electricity used to recharge the batteries is from renewable sources. Monitoring of the usage of our bikes has shown an average of 8.1Wh per km being consumed on our tours (this ranges from 5.9Wh for the Beach tour to 9Wh per km for the Mount Jerusalem tours as they are more hilly)
According to the World Energy Council the CO2 generated by renewable energy is a maximum of 50g of CO2 per KWh. This translates to a figure of 0.4g of CO2 per km travelled.
Totals
This translates to a total of 21g of CO2 per km for a normal bike and 13.8g of CO2 per km for an E Bike, a saving of 35%.
As a comparison, for similar length journeys that could be replaced by bikes, a car uses 271g of CO2/km and a bus 101g co2/km.
Sources:
"Quantifying CO2 savings for cycling" by the European Cyclists Federation
"Comparison of Energy Systems using Lifecycle Assessment 2004", World Energy Council
Carbon emissions in cities could be reduced by 12 percent if just 15 percent of urban transportation miles travelled were instead made by e-bike.
When comparing an e-bike with a regular bike, most would think that riding with muscle power alone would be the greener way by far. There’s no battery, less weight and you don’t need to charge up from a power grid that generates power from any number of sources (green or otherwise).
However, surprisingly, riding an electric bike can actually use less energy and have less impact on the environment than riding a regular bike.
How?
One of the factors taken into consideration when comparing how good e-bikes are for the environment versus traditional bikes is food consumption.
The average human-powered bike rider with a daily commute of 30 miles will likely consume an additional 800 calories each day, this alone is going to increase the amount of carbon dioxide emitted into the air every day through the energy needed to produce, package, transport and prepare these extra calories of food each day.
Propelling a bike, whether an electric bike or human-powered will take about the same 5-15 wh per km. Just comparing the efficiency and the source of the energy required to provide that power is what can be deceiving between electric bikes and human-powered bikes.
This white paper compared e-bikes and human-powered bikes and the energy inputs and outputs required for each system. The paper found that “on average each unit of mechanical energy that a cyclist delivers to the pedals comes at the expense of 28 units of primary energy (i.e. Fossil fuels).”, or a ratio of 1:28.
This compares to the energy ratio for an ebike with a lithium-ion battery to be around 1:5.8. This scenario compares typical food production energy ratios and average power grid efficiency and energy ratios.
Source: The Energy Cost of Human and Electric Powered bicycles, Justin Lemire-Elmore
We are based inside Sourdough Innovation Hub in Mullumbimby which is completely powered by renewable electricity, thereby you can be assured your e-bike tour has the lowest carbon footprint possible.
Beyond Byron E Bikes and ECO Tourism
Ecotourism is ecologically sustainable tourism with a primary focus on experiencing natural areas that fosters environmental and cultural understanding, appreciation and conservation
Source: ecotourism.org
We adhere to the seven Leave No Trace Principles as defined by Leave no Trace Australia
Plan Ahead and Prepare
Travel and Camp on Durable Surfaces
Dispose of Waste Properly
Leave What You Find
Minimise the Impact of Fires
Respect Wildlife
Be Considerate of Your Hosts and Other Visitors
We also abide by the Green Mountain Biking Guide and the Green guide to bushwalking
Sources:
Biodiversity is the very fabric of the Earth. It is diversity in plants and animals that enables ecosystems to function. Yet, one eighth of the world’s species – more than a million – are threatened with extinction.
In Australia, we are renowned for our unique wildlife with more than 70% of our species (69% of mammals, 94% of amphibians, 46% of birds and 93% of reptiles) found nowhere else on earth. But, we also have the highest rate of vertebrate mammal extinction in the world.
The greatest threats facing our plants and animals are changes in land and sea use; direct exploitation of organisms; climate change; pollution; and invasion of alien species.
Resources
According to the Archives of Environmental Contamination and Toxicology, the main ingredients causing all this damage are called oxybenzone and octinoxate. When exposed to these nasty chemicals, coral larvae becomes deformed and unable to spread through ocean currents. They also reduce coral’s defence against bleaching - which is a primary killer of reefs worldwide.
In 2015, it was estimated that around 14,000 tons of sunscreen are ending up in the world’s coral reefs per year and causing irreparable damage. Coral bleaching had affected more than 60 percent of the Great Barrier Reef, while a staggering 90 percent of the reefs in the Caribbean are estimated to have disappeared since 1980.
In 2018, Hawaii became the first US State to ban sunscreens that contain oxybenzone and octinoxate from being worn or sold and Palau has become the first country to ban sunscreens containing any one of 10 potentially harmful ingredients.
Sources:
Why Is Hawaii Banning Sunscreen? Scientific American, Everyday Einstein Sabrina Stierwalt, June 2018
Where possible Beyond Byron E bikes assesses suppliers via the SLAPPED criteria:
Sustainable, Locally Sourced, Australian made, Palm oil free, Plastic free, Environmentally friendly, Delicious.
All food provided is sourced locally and we employ local guides.
We are working with ReForestNow.org to plant local rainforest trees to offset our carbon. We plant one tree for every tour we run which more than covers our carbon footprint.