Category: Bike Touring

A painful cross-country bike tour

A 25-year-old Sacramento man pedaled into Memphis recently, completing a remarkable 2,800-mile bike tour from La Jolla.

What makes Kyle Bryant's ride so amazing is that he suffers from a debilitating inherited disease — Friedreich's Ataxia — that damages his nervous system and causes loss of muscle control.

The ride was also noteworthy because he raised $47,000 and lots of awareness by doing the ride, and two major ataxia support organizations kicked in $30,000 each toward a $100,000 grant for ataxia research that will be awarded in his name ….

Continue reading

Permanent link to this article: https://www.bikingbis.com/2007/04/01/a-painful-cross-country-bike-tour/

Airlines gouging bicyclists flying abroad

Travellers preparing for bicycle tours of Europe are discovering that the airlines are jacking up the prices to carry bikes.

The International Bicycle Fund reports that, beginning in 2007, most airlines began charging for bicycles carried on trans-Atlantic flights to the tune of $80 to $160 each way. Before this year, ibike reported that airlines generally allowed bicycles to fly free, in lieu of a piece of baggage.

Why is this happening? Ibike suggests collusion among the airlines to pump up earnings. …

Continue reading

Permanent link to this article: https://www.bikingbis.com/2007/03/26/airlines-gouging-bicyclists-flying-abroad/

Lance Armstrong seeks team members for RAGBRAI

UPDATE: March 29, 2007 — Deadline to register extended to 5 p.m. CST Friday.


Lance Armstrong is taking a 100-member strong bicycling team with him to this year's Register's Annual Great Bicycle Ride Across Iowa (RAGBRAI) and he's looking for volunteers.

There are about 40 slots still open for cyclists who raise a minimum $1,000 for the Lance Armstrong Foundation and who register no later than midnight (Central Time) on Tuesday, March 27. Go to the LiveStrong RAGBRAI website for details.

The 7-time Tour de France winner showed up with a small cadre of cyclists to last year's bike ride across Iowa (photo) for a just a couple of days, and pledged to return this year for the entire week-long ride. …

Continue reading

Permanent link to this article: https://www.bikingbis.com/2007/03/25/lance-armstrong-seeks-team-members-for-ragbrai/

Ride your bike where they race the Tour de Georgia

What is it like to ride your bike to the finish line at the Tour de Georgia, or tackle one of the big category climbs? You can find out by signing up for a couple of recreational rides.

The first is the BriarRose Grand Peloton, a fund-raiser that lets participants bicycle the finishing 25 miles of the 6th stage route to Stone Mountain the morning of the actual race.

The other is the Brasstown Bald-Buster Century 2007, which is a 100-mile bike ride with 14,000 feet of elevation gain that takes place April 28, about a week after the peloton battles up the mountain during the Tour. …

Continue reading

Permanent link to this article: https://www.bikingbis.com/2007/03/18/ride-your-bike-where-they-race-the-tour-de-georgia/

Bike tourism's impact on local economies

Bicycle touring and its economic impact showed up on congressional radar screens this week during the 2007 National Bike Summit in Washington DC.

Slightly more than one-quarter (27%) of the US population participates in bicycling, contributing $132 billion to the US economy, according to a recent study by the Outdoor Industry Association (OIA).

BikePortland blogger Jonathan Maus, who provided excellent coverage of the 2007 National Bike Summit, reported that four representatives of bicycling and outdoor groups updated two members of the House Subcommittee on Highways and Transit on bicycle tourism and impacts on the economy …

Continue reading

Permanent link to this article: https://www.bikingbis.com/2007/03/16/bike-tourisms-impact-on-local-economies/

Couple sheds pounds on bicycle tour

An admittedly obese Pennsylvania woman and her husband are undergoing an extreme weight reduction program one pedalstroke at a time.

The couple are about 1,000 miles into their planned counterclockwise 16,000-mile bicycle tour around the United States. So far, they've lost a combined 130 pounds.

Morton and Priscilla Houliston are getting a lot of attention as they make their way up the East Coast from Key West. Their blog at LittleChanges.com reports numerous interviews with TV stations, which sometimes results in donations of food or a place to spend the night. They've inspired people to start exercising again …

Continue reading

Permanent link to this article: https://www.bikingbis.com/2007/03/14/couple-sheds-pounds-on-bicycle-tour/

Bicycle tours of a US president's ranch in Texas

Want to take a bike ride around the Texas ranch of a US president whose term got bogged down in an unpopular war?

Don't bother heading to Crawford to ride at W's ranch unless you're Lance Armstrong. I'm talking about the LBJ Ranch in Stonewall, about an hour's drive from Austin.

Luci Johnson, the youngest daughter of former president Lyndon Baines Johnson, led two bike tours of the ranch and surrounding areas last weekend that each drew about 75 people. The ride — about nine miles — started at the LBJ State Park and Historic Site and crossed over to the LBJ Ranch National Historic Park.

Continue reading

Permanent link to this article: https://www.bikingbis.com/2007/03/13/bicycle-tours-of-a-us-presidents-ranch-in-texas/

Underground Railroad bike route is complete

The 2,058-mile Underground Railroad Bicycle Route is finished and ready for action.

Actually, the route has been there since before the Civil War, when escaped slaves from the Deep South followed the Tombigbee to the Ohio River and beyond to freedom in Canada.

It's just now that the Adventure Cycling Association has completed more than three years of research and planning to chart that route along bike friendly, low-traffic roads from Mobile, Alabama, to Owen Sound, Ontario.

The recent completion of the last three sections of the five-section route has caused a minor buzz in the press, and at least one community along the route is preparing to welcome touring bicyclists with open arms (i.e. free camping in parks)….

Continue reading

Permanent link to this article: https://www.bikingbis.com/2007/03/10/underground-railroad-bike-route-is-complete/

One-man tour on two-person bicycle

Pan-American bicycle tourist Dominic Gill could put a classified ad in newspapers throughout the Americas:

Wanted: Tandem pilot seeks stoker. Full or part-time. Must be willing to travel.

Gill is an Englishman in the midst of a 20,000-mile journey from Alaska to the tip of South America on a tandem. Cycling the length of North and South America in search of company, Gill says, “What better way to get to know the locals than offering them a seat on your bike.” …

Continue reading

Permanent link to this article: https://www.bikingbis.com/2007/03/07/one-man-tour-on-two-person-bicycle/

Grand Canyon shortcut lands 3 cyclists in jail

Do not, repeat, do not ride your bicycle into the Grand Canyon. Three men on an Alaska to South American bicycle tour decided to cycle across the Grand Canyon last month and found themselves sentenced to 48 hours in jail.

The trio is on a pan-American off-road bicycle tour they call Riding the Spine. They started at Prudhoe Bay, Alaska, last year and plan to ride to the tip of South America.

The mountain bikers picked up the Arizona Trail — an 800-mile trail that spans Arizona from the Utah to Mexico borders — and decided to ride their bikes into the Grand Canyon and camp on the North Kaibab Trail. Bad idea…..

Continue reading

Permanent link to this article: https://www.bikingbis.com/2007/03/02/grand-canyon-shortcut-lands-3-cyclists-in-jail/