The Bike That Seduced Me Into Bikepacking

Catalina and her partner Jose Pacheco are currently bikepacking through some beautiful and remote sections of the High Andes in Bolivia. They are capturing their experience on their blog monteadentro.cc. The bikepacking bug has got them constantly seeking new destinations and routes. Starting in Valdivia, Chile, they have travelled over 10,000 km since October 2023 over varied landscapes that are sometimes breathtaking in more ways than one. The blog is in Spanish, but their photography crosses any language barrier. Plus anyone can download the gpx files with key information in English. Their Instagram is also in Spanish, however they have begun including English translation on current posts.

Catalina rides one of our Soma Riff 27.5" wheel hardtail frames.
And we are very grateful she wanted to share the unusual way she came to own her bike.

This is my Soma Riff.  The only thing I love more is riding it.

Hello, I'm Catalina Melo from Colombia. Since I was a child, I have been passionate about sports; anything involving a ball, equipment, or simply being outdoors was my happy place. Soccer was my favorite sport for many years and I competed in local and national tournaments until I was 30. However, a number of injuries forced me to stop playing. 

But living without sports was impossible, so I started road cycling. I've enjoyed biking since I was young and used it as a means of transportation in a busy city like Bogotá, so the shift came naturally. Yet, I felt something was missing; the thrill wasn't the same.

A few years later, during a short mountain biking trip, my partner [Jose] experienced a life-threatening robbery. After this unfortunate incident, he made the decision to “take revenge“ by assembling his "ultimate mountain bike". That's how the SOMA Riff came into our home. However, he only used it a few times before embarking on his first extended bikepacking trip -- using another bike.

The SOMA remained in my room, and I was tasked with caring for it. Later, he admitted that he had also left it to lure me. Every night before bed, I would look at it and thought it was the most beautiful bike ever. Not only was it in my favorite color, but the color also had a connection to music history. And me having graduated from a music program, it was just a question of time and fate before this bike would become mine.

"Every night before bed, I would look at it and thought
it was the most beautiful bike ever."

One day, I decided to try riding it on a short trail, and I realized that mountain biking was what I had been missing: tackling technical descents, steep rocky climbs, singletracks, and remote and solitary routes feels like scoring a goal, making a perfect play, or winning a match. 

Desierto del Diablo (the Devil's Desert), an out of this world landscape
in Puna de Atacama, Argentina

This bike has witnessed my evolution as a cyclist and has motivated me to embark on adventurous bikepacking trips in Colombia and other parts of South America. I can without a doubt, confirm that the Riff frame offers everything I could wish for: 

1. Steel is Real

There's nowhere this bike can't go—rocks, sand, rivers. Nothing is as reliable as steel. This bike is perfect for bikepacking as it can carry loads without risking damage. Additionally, the  frame allows for easy rear rack attachment.

2. Tire Clearance

In Colombia, I regularly ride with 2.4-inch tires with a shock fork for short trips and day rides. However my bikepacking setup are 2.8" tires and a rigid fork; this is what I am using for exploring South America. Upon returning to Colombia, I plan to ride 29er skinny tires, for long distance journeys. 

3. The Head Tube

The bike's design is not fussy; its 44mm universal head tube fits both the 1-1/8" steerer of my rigid fork and tapered steerers of suspension forks.

4. Sliding Dropouts

Besides allowing wider tires, the sliding dropouts lets you adjust the rear wheel's position; you can convert the drivetrain to single-speed in case of derailleur failure. This could be a lifesaver until a proper repair is possible, especially while riding in remote areas.

5. Geometry

  

The SOMA Riff excels in downhill performance, while maintaining its capability on technical or steep climbs, embodying the essence of an authentic hardtail; its head tube angle is a happy medium between a relaxed and reactive feeling. Additionally, the frame triangle offers ample space for installing a frame bag, crucial for long bikepacking adventures.

last but not least…

6. The Perfect Color

Pelham Blue, the iconic color used by Cadillac and Gibson during the 1960’s. 

The Riff's versatility has enabled me to have several bikes with a single frame—from a mountain bike for enduring long days in Colombia's steep mountains to a bikepacking cruiser for adventures across South America's most remote routes.

Follow our cycling projects on Monteadentro's website and Instagram account. 

¡Buenas rodadas amigos!

Catalina Melo 

Riding in the dryest desert of the world: Atacama

Peinado Volcano in Ruta de los Seis Miles

Cycling through the Patagonia Beer Trail

Catalina and her partner Jose in the Bariloche Valley

[ The Riff in Pelham Blue Catalina adores is no longer available. Current colors are Aquamint and Pearl White. The Riff is now Boost compatible, too. ]

15 Years of Mixte Bikes

 

The mixte bicycle has a history that isn't too well documented. As far as we can gleen from our internet research, it first made its debut in the Peugeot bicycle line-up in the 1940's. And they had mixte-type frames built up as city or light touring bicycles for decades (along with Gitane and few other French brands). They were sold only in France for the most part. Mixte style bicycles didn't become a hit in the USA until the 1970's when a gas shortage created a bike boom. Peugeot stopped making their mixtes around 1986, but not before its popularity in the USA led a lot of other bike manufacturers to produce their own mixte style bikes.

In the mid 2000's, Bradley Woehl of American Cyclery in SF (and Soma brand co-founder) mentioned to us there was renewed interest among young urban cyclists for the unusual twin top tube design. People were scouring garage sales and joyfully pulling them out of dumpsters. Custom frame builders were experimenting with mixtes, too. The old design was striking a chord with a new generation. Was it something about those truss-like intersecting the seat tube and converging with the chainstays and seatstay at the rear axle or just its perception as something vintage? Who is to say? Sensing an opportunity, we got down to designing our own Buena Vista mixte updated for modern 130/135mm spaced hubs and  threadless forks. We released it in 2009. 

With our use of oversized chromoly alloy steel  tubes, the frame set has proven to be not only a great foundation for a breezy stylish ride to cruise around town on, but a capable machine for long distance touring. Hope you can have the joy of your own professionally built, custom accessorized Buena Vista mixte. 

To celebrate 15 years of producing our Buena Vista frame set, we want to share 15 memorable images – mostly from the owners who ride them or the bike shops who have built them.

1) Lifestyle shoot from February 2009.
This was the first build we did of a production frame,
a fixed gear with Velocity Deep V wood-look rims.

2) This is what we thought folks would be doing with this type of bike.
Putting baskets on it and visiting the Broadripple Farmer's Market to get
flowers and organic kale. Being just dudes, there was some concern whether 
cycling enthusiasts would take the time and extra money to custom build a bike
– not to race or to tour hundreds of miles – but to just commute or do errands.
Photo: @adventureswithdarby

3) We were wrong. People did enjoy building these up.
Vintage beauties with shiny fenders and leather saddles.
Fast, simple athletic bikes, too.
It brought out rider's desire to express themselves.
This gentleman even painted the straps on his saddle bag to match the mint green panel on the frame. Photo: Manoske Aramaki @masnoko123

4) Blue Lug, a group of bike shops in Japan has built many fun and classy
Soma frames over the years. This one has aero levers on our Soma Sparrow
handle and running 1x drivetrain with a bar end shifter. 
The balanced use of earth tone colors with the graphite frame
has a particular Japanese aesthetic. Photo: @bluelug 

4) Another Japanese bike shop build, this one with drop bars.
Above Bike Store. @abovebike
The Buena Vista geometry is very close to our Double Cross and
endurance road frames. If you want to bring out the sportiness
of the Buena Vista, consider a drop bar build.

5) This was memorable build by American Cyclery. To commemorate the
75th anniversary of the Golden Gate Bridge, a customer wanted
their Buena Vista custom painted "International Orange", the official paint color
of the beloved landmark. Porteur Rack and fenders were also painted.

6) Soma Bicycle Belles: Two sisters and their mom touring in the UK.
All three riding Soma mixtes. The low top tubes offers
an alternative way to mount/dismount so you don't have to 
swing a leg over a bag and rack.

7) So the Buena Vista can make a good light touring
frame, especially if you are older or have
limited hip mobility. So that's what folks will gather
about what looks like a "ladies" bike. A lot of people
tour with cheaper bikes - just ride what you got.
But Nicole B. who has toured up and down the West Coast more
than a couple of times, made it clear to us that the
Buena Vista is a practical touring bike period...no need to
qualify it with "ifs" or "caveats". 

8) @wayamaeba1 inspires us. She has captured
her experiences of a beginning bike traveller
to now showing others the best places to go in Japan and how to do it.
Her ride is a small 42cm BV with 26" wheels and swaps
it to studded tires when the weather gets snowy.


 

9) The view from the saddle. Jakarta, Indonesia
Photo: @hotrodqueen

fff 

10) "I was explaining to my daughter the beautiful symmetry of the split top tubes
and the seattube bisecting the rear brake center pull cable,
when my son taught me a new word - nerdgasm" - downtube42 on Bike Forums
Photo: Blue Lug Kamiuma

11) The time we got into Bicycling Magazine and didn't have to 
schmooze or pester any editor. Hazy on how it happened. I think Bicycling
asked Constance of the Lovely Bicycle blog to do a feature on equipment
for every day city cycling. She borrowed her friend, @bikeyface 's bicycle
for the photo spread. Photos: Bicycling Magazine

12) Forget about the bike. Can we just talk about her look? 
Photo: @sweet.spoken
 

13) In late 2017 we introduced the first production mixte that ran disc brakes
(first that we know of). This was not a just a modernization, but
opened up where you could ride because you were no longer limited to 700x32c tires.
You could go off the beaten path. Gravel grinding. Gravel touring. Bikepacking.
Photo: @naimbag_nga_aldaw Frame bag: Oveja Negra

14) Handsome build but super capable build by Gold Finch Cyclery
of our latest disc mixte. 38mm tires with fenders, no problem.
With the black components and our wide Dream Riser bars, it hardly 
looks vintage anymore. Photo: @goldfinchcyclery Bags: Swift Industries

15) A second image from Ade Putri Paramadita (@hotrodqueen) Even though her
talent as a culinary storyteller has won her notoriety in Indonesia, she is also 
part of the rich Jakarta bike community. More than one artist has been
inspired to draw her with her mixte... Built fixed gear.

Soma Rufus Mini Velo Bike Check

Just a quick dive into our first build up of a production Rufus frame set.
This is just one way to do it. You can build yours up anyway you want.


Bars: Nitto Higher Level 5" rise BMX'ish but aluminum
Stem: Soma Shotwell 90mm
Brake Levers: Dia-compe SS6 short pull
Brakes: Yokozuna Motoko Hybrid Hydraulic Cable Disc Brake, 160mm rotors. These are probably nicer brakes than you really need on this type of  bike. With the smaller wheels, you don't need big stopping power as larger wheels. Cheaper brakes and smaller rotors should work fine.
Grips: IRD Gordo
Pedals: Odyssey
Shifter: S-Ride M300 8-speed push-push trigger shifter
Rear Derailleur: S-Ride M300 short cage rear derailleur, no clutch
Tires: Vee Speedster 20 x 1.95" w/tubes
Wheels: Blacksnow 32h, w/cartridge bearing hubs
Cranket: New Albion XDS 44t, square taper
Cassette: S-Ride 8-speed, 11-32t
Saddle: Steve Potts Chinook, 150mm wide
Rear rack: Soma Rakku, aluminum

Pretty good heel clearance with bags when using the Soma 
Rakku rack. The Rakku fits perfect on the M5 rack eyelet.
The other eyelet is actually M6.

The frame is a size Small and Stan, who has been riding it around is about 5'6" and has the 350mm seatpost just about at the limit. A taller or more long legged person should opt for a 400mm post. Saddle and bar height match his 52cm Fog Cutter build.

So far, he has taken it so far on a grocery run, a ride down to Ocean Beach, and a visit to Japantown for the Nihonmachi street fair, which cut through Golden Gate Park and the panhandle and coming back he took a route took up past the Painted Ladies.

It fits in a Fit

Some of Stan's remarks:

- Feels punchier on short climbs than with bigger wheels. While the bike is not necessarily lighter than his Fog Cutter, it just feels easier to get the pedals to start turning. Probably because the smaller wheels take less torque to get going. This is a real world benefit if your routes has tons of stop signs or if you aren't a very fit rider.

- With the Soma Rakku Rack installed even the largest pannier he had resulted in no heel clip. This is with 165mm cranks and size 8 shoes. Easier to mount and dismount with dual panniers than on a road bike.

- Didn't feel twitchy, felt pretty normal riding through traffic, which was expected since the wheelbase is fairly close to the Fog Cutter. Pretty composed hitting speed bumps which are all over the city these days. He did get surprised by a hard-to-see mini-sink hole, but those can be scary on most wheel sizes. You definitely have to me more careful of road depressions with smaller wheels.

- Fits in the back of a Honda Fit with the Magic Seats folded up with out needing to twist the bars in a weird way. Just take off front wheel and roll it in.

Fender clearance and kickstand plate.

You might think that with the rack sitting this much lower, that bags would
be dragging the ground. Actually the bag height was more ideal for this 5'6" rider.
Easier to swing a leg over double grocery panniers when mounting. He could also mount and dismount by stepping over the top tube.

Your ride experience with Rufus may be different from Stan's.
Stan is over 50 and mostly does short rides. He describes himself as out of shape, but not as bad as a few years ago. He is still someone that hates any climbing. Besides the version 1 Fog Cutter, he also has a 1997 Breezer Storm. 

Introducing Rufus: Our New BMX Wheeled Mini Velo

We at Soma Fabrications made an attempt to introduce North America to the mini velo style of bicycle way back in 2010. Back then very few people here (except Mark V from Bike Hugger) were interested in mini velos or even knew what they were. 

Fast forward to 2024 and there is a mini velo Reddit group with 3500 members and Velo Orange as well as other designers have continued to push what mini velos look like and what they can be built up as. The Radavist just broke the story that Crust is working on a travel mini velo just this week. The wildly popular Tern GSD cargo bike has small wheels, but interestingly no one calls it a "mini velo".  It is just a nice e-cargo bike. And that should remind us that a bike should be defined by what it was designed for and how it can improve the owner's life, not by a wheel size. And we think our newest addition should be looked upon by how fun and functional it is, not as a "mini" version of something else.

But a more appropriate marketing term won't materialize in this post, so without further ado, we would like to present to you --- Rufus, a "mini velo" frameset designed around 20" BMX wheels. It intentionally doesn't have as many bells and whistles as similar designs out there, because we wanted to keep the price down in order to entice more enthusiasts to consider a small wheeler as their n+1. So the Rufus is not designed to take a dropper post, run internal geared hubs or even a front derailleur. Current price is $599.99 USD.

It does have a plethora of rack, pack, and fender mounts as well as longish chainstay length (endurance road bike length) to help it ride more steady with a load or without. The frame is compact with a low standover, but still offers lots of space for a half frame bag. The Rufus is a bike built with utility in mind first and foremost, but is just a breeze to ride around. 

You can call it a "mini velo", a "small wheeler", or just "a bike".

This is a size SM Rufus with 530mm effective top tube.
As set up here, its a comfortable sporty ride for someone 5'6"
It is running a 44t crankset and 11-32t 8-speed cassette.

Sold frame and fork together. Seat collar, too.
Smooth riding CrMo steel. Stiff hooded dropouts. BSA bottom bracket shell.
IS disc tabs. 27.2mm seatpost. Tried and true standards.

This is built with BMX vibes using a high rise bar, but you can build
this with city bars, low rise bar, or drop bars, too.

Specifications:

• 4130 double-butted chromoly steel frame and chromoly steel fork

• Rear rack & fender mounts, cargo cage/mini rack bosses on fork (with one set of thru-bosses)

• Three sets of water bottle bosses

• Cafe lock mount

• Kickstand plate

• International Standard disc brake tabs (140/160mm rotors suggested)

• Wheel size: 20" (ISO 406) BMX size. Easy to find quality street or knobby tread tires. Tire clearance for 20 x 2.3" (20 x 2.0" w/fenders) 

• Hub spacing: 135mm, rear; 100mm, fork

• Headset Fit: 1-1/8" threadless (EC34/28.6|EC34/30 headsets)

• Bottom Bracket Shell: 68mm English threaded

• Seatpost size: 27.2mm x 350/400mm

• Sizes: Small and Large (Depending what type of handlebars are used, the Small can fit 4' 11" to 5'7". The Large can fit 5'6" to 6'3")

• Paint: Purple

Our Riff Hardtail Frame Gets An Overdue Update

 If you've known Soma Fabrications for a while, you know we don't go by model years.
We don't want to refresh our frames every January just to say we have this new thing to plop in front of your eyeballs. We don't like being forced to adopt every trend or new standard either, some of which we feel is planned obsolescence. We think changing colors every year is basically making folks who just bought our frame a few months ago feel they have something old. We will make updates when we think they will serve our customers.

What is the Riff?
This is our hardtail frame designed for 27.5" wheels. It is a nice, steel frame for a variety of trail-riding and for bikepacking and is designed around a 120mm travel fork. It has sliding dropouts, which lets you fine-tune your chainstay length, but it is mainly for allowing single speed builds without needing a chain tensioner. You can also build it for derailleur gears and hub gears (like Rohloff or Alfine), too.

Main Update:
Boost 148mm rear hub spacing. After nine years in the market, Boost 148 has become THE MTB rear hub standard. If you are shopping for a new wheelset, almost all or your options will have Boost hubs, and some of you may already have an old Boost wheel in your spare parts collection. So the main reason for the change is to make it easier for riders who don't have the patience to shop around for their ideal 142mm or 135mm wheelset.

For those out of touch with bike standards, Boost hubs have a wider axle and wider flanges which allows the wheel build to have more dish, which reduces flexiness in the wheel. It also moves the chainline farther away from the tire, which is nice when running wide 2.8" tires.

Additions and Subtractions:
• We have shortened our seat tubes to help with dropper seatpost use and the lengths chosen attempt to match other brands, so it is easier to compare sizes when shopping.
• We changed the down tube bottle cage bosses to a three-pack mount.
• We added a set of bottle cage bosses under the downtube.
• But we removed the seat tube bosses on the smaller sizes so you can use a longer dropper post. The largest frame still has the seat tube bosses.
• We have discontinued the belt-drive option, because of policies our Taiwan factory adopted during the pandemic. (Yes, Covid is still affecting us.)

What About the "Geo"?
How slack is it? Is it shreddier? Is it as progressive as a San Francisco school board?
Sorry, nope. The biggest tweak is a 1.6° steeper seat tube to improve climbing efficiency.  The bottom bracket drops almost 10mm mainly because those riding 27.5 wheels are favoring 2.4 or wider tires. But Steve of Hardtail Party would definitely classify the Riff as "old school", which doesn't mean outdated.... just a rig more purposefully designed for rolling trails and bike packing than for bombing steeper technical downhills; and also doesn't require a "modern riding technique" to get the most out of it. The 67.6° head tube angle should make it a good climber without the wheel flop and wandering of slacker machines, but still able to descend with confidence (albeit less speed) than an enduro bike.

Because we are not optimizing for downhill speed and big drops and hits, we can use lighter tubes for a more nimble and fun ride even on smoother trails. And the frame won't beat you up on rockier terrain.

Yes, that is a cable stop for a old top pull front derailleur. We haven't abandoned 2x.
The Riff also has rear rack mounts, because hardtails are still pretty popular for
on-road loaded touring these days. They probably add less weight than
our brass headbadge

 

Soma Riff Aqua Mint Build. Size LG.