I ride in Utah and the Western US. I’ve ridden my road bike with 23 slicks on MTB trails and use my CX bike to ride single track, and all of those things are possible, but I usually ride 3+ hours. Having been beaten up by a few too many centuries on rough gravel roads in races I am not winning, I’d rather go out and enjoy the journey on a big fluffy tires in the 40-50mm range.
Stats: Lady rider, 65-70kg depending on the time of year, currently I run 700x40c 30 psi and 650x47 sub 30 psi.
And here’s a nice picture of some terrain, sometimes worse, sometimes better.
