The Surly Long Haul Trucker

An excellent touring bicycle, the Surly Long Haul Trucker's number one design feature that sets it apart from the other touring bikes is it's larger diameter, and thicker Chromoly Surly 4130 tubing.  The thicker and larger diameter tubing provides extra strength for load carrying, increased road vibration damping, and provides a stiffer, but still resiliant ride.  The frame is TIG welded without using frame lugs except in the fork crown.

Surly Long Haul Trucker

A note on the Surly website warns owners from installing kickstands, as they can crush the bottom stay tubing by being either over tightened or if left too loose.  Details on this and other Surly bicycle "Spews" are located here.
Depending on the size frame you need you will have to accept either 26" wheels (in 42 - 62 cm sizes) or 700c wheels (in 56-64 cm sizes).   As a 50 - 52 cm rider, that leaves me with 26" wheels, not the 700 c wheels I prefer for road touring.  For the taller riders however, Surly offers a 64 cm frame size in a production model, which is awesome!
As a company, Surly came to the market later than most other bicycle touring manufacturers, allowing them to take advantage of some newer frame design ideas, materials and production processes.  The Surly LHT has every rack and fender braze-on you could expect, can accept wide tires and its component package is nice, but it is not overly spec'd price-wise.  
The Surly Long Haul Trucker is an excellent touring bicycle, designed for someone who plans to tour a long, long time.