BikeTravellers News

The Adventure Cycling Association is looking for photos that “capture the beauty and wonder” of bike travel for its 1st Annual Bicycle Travel Photo Contest. The non-profit’s blog also says: “We are especially interested in images that showcase the wide range of bike touring experiences: road and dirt riding, rural and urban settings, scenery, people and their emotions.” The winning image will be printed in the March 2010 issue of Adventure Cycling magazine and be featured on the Adventure

With all the preamble finally out of the way, I left Ashland this morning at 7 and wow was it fucking cold.  I had an idea when my train got to Klamath Falls that I would have to amend the clothing I packed.  At a really cool bikeshop in Ashland (in a house) and an outdoor store (a crunchier city you have never encountered) I grabbed some tights and ear warmers and was staring at some full-fingered gloves when I got sick of buying stuff and blew that off.  Big fucking mistake.  The first two hours

The latest Ken Burns documentary, “The National Parks: America’s Best Idea,” began airing on PBS on Sunday. It got me thinking about how the parks are wonderful destinations for bike touring. The traffic at some of the most popular ones can be daunting; Yellowstone National Park warns about narrow roads and non-existent shoulders. But in spite of cars and campers, bicycling up to the rim of the Grand Canyon, left, is an experience I’ll never forget.

No other form of travel can quite beat the joys of cycling. A cyclist heads out early from Lewis and Clark Caverns State Park, Montana. Photograph: Wessel Kok In western Montana in August, crickets leap from heat-radiating roadways, bounding up from the pavement and brushing your legs. In Indonesia, boys will race you through their villages. Along the Blue Ridge Parkway in North Carolina in July, the scent of skunk hovers in the air. If you’re blasting downhill, the potent perfume lasts but a second.

Upcoming Changes at the Urbanophile I wanted to give everyone a heads up on some changes that will be coming. In a few weeks I will be completely updating the blog environment. This includes: Rolling out a new site design Migrating from blogspot to my own hosted domain www.urbanophile.com Changing technical platforms from Blogger to WordPress As you can see, this will be very technically invasive, but I will do everything I can to make it as painless as possible.

Syndicated from Bicycle Retailer & Industry News MISSOULA, MT (BRAIN)—There are only two weeks left to nominate your bicycle travel heroes for the Adventure Cycling Awards. Adventure Cycling will close award nominations on September 30, 2009. “Adventure Cycling’s national awards program recognizes the ‘above and beyond’ contributions made by individuals and organizations in America to improve conditions [...]read the entire article

The 2009 Oakland County Trail Summit: By Land, By Water is scheduled for October 8th at the Proud Lake State Recreation Area near Milford. The details and agenda are on the registration page . Note that this event is limited to 150 registrants. Later in the month (October 25th through the 28th) is the Mid-America Trails and Greenways Conference in Kalamazoo. There is less than two weeks left to get the early registration price.

8 days, 900 kms! The Tour of Nil­giris mean­ders through the famed Blue Moun­tains of South India immers­ing you in the stun­ning land­scape, bio-diversity, cul­ture and her­itage of Kar­nataka, Tamil Nadu and Kerala. This is the sec­ond edi­tion of the Tour of Nil­giris, fondly called TFN. As the name sug­gests, it is a tour and not a race.