What tires we needs for our travel?
 

We are two Transalps that next June will leave from Italy to East Europe tour.
We will head to Hungary far east close to Ucraine border and then towards north in Slovenske Rep. and Poland.
We plan to visit the Bieszczadzki Park and then go to mountains across Slovenska rep and Poland border.

Our plan is to avoid as much as possible the main roads.

During our travel planning we looked at some photos and videos showing us (expecially in Bieszczadzki area) deep muddy road sections.

We are wondering therefore whether it is worth for us to have an off road extra tire (at least the rear) to replace the road tire when we arrive there.

Someone of you knows the Hungary areas close to Ucraine border and Bieszczadzki Park in Poland? Do we really need for off road tires?

Any suggestion will be appreciated

Thank you in advance
Cheers
Fabio

Some people swear by knobbly front and dual sport rear. I've not tried this set up (yet) so can't comment.

I'd go with some tourance type tyres. It depends how "hard core" off road you want to go.

You don't say how long you are going for but if you really need a knobbly set of tyres just go and buy some. Its Hungary not the moon :)

Conti tkc 80's
 

Hallo there fellow TA riders!

For off road with some on road the tyre you want is conti tkc 80's. This comes from way too much time spent on xrv.org.uk and aparently their awesome off road while being good on road also. tyre life seems to be around 4500-5000 miles so not amazing but it's a trade off I suppose.

(Sorry if this is a bit late)

Check out the site, its a must for anything Transalp related!

Good luck with the trip

Yahoo

I toured a bit in that area (Northern Hungary, Romania, Ukraine, Moldova, eastern Poland including Bieszczadzki through the Tatras and Slovenska, etc.) last fall. Roads were no worse than anywhere else, although some areas (Ukraine, Moldova) lacked paved alternates to the unpaved routes. If I'd wanted, I could've taken photos of horrifying mud and rough stone tracks....but realistically, unless you go looking for the tracks you'll do fine no matter what tires you've got. Nothing too terrible, and nothing I haven't seen elsewhere.

I was on a KLR, overloaded, with 90-10 tires (street-dirt). There were a few times I wished for TKC's, but I was glad not to be changing rear tires every 4000 miles, too. On a loaded Transalp you're not going to be getting too far into the backcountry, I'd suspect. Don't fret the tire choice unless you're either very fussy or very determined to look for mud and difficulty.

All the usual cautionary notes apply; mileages vary.

Mark