Flat Pack Cardboard
Whenever a package arrives looking like this, we get panicked about damage. Especially when it’s a bike.
Do Not Like Facebook
Sorry, our future of the web is not owned by Facebook.
Escape from the Jet Age
Seth Stevenson argues in the NY Times that Icelandic Volcanoes are a good thing because they remind us of the pleases of traveling by land or sea. The travelers stuck in airports, I’m sure disagree, but Seth’s point relates to why we tour and ride. I fly to my destinations and ride from there and certainly see more of the world.
In this Getty photo, a German businessman bought a bicycle to make a journey on a cross channel ferry as space for foot passengers.
Photo: Getty via Daylife.
Hotels
Speaking of travel, the Mountain Bike Hotel and Bike Cop were popular this week. We’ve been working on the unWired Future of Bikes most of the week and the Maxwell Hotel Bike Program.
We wished a prototype bike left on a barstool in SoCal pub would get some buzz like a phone, and Pam started training with the iPad.
Cover Girl
While we finished this post, noticed that Liz Hatch was on the cover of Nina Magazine.
*Europe* by rail is awesome. The trips are shorter, and it was really adventure to deal with drunk racist jerks all the way from Utrecht to Dusseldorf, managing the chaos of platform changes in Frankfurt, getting off at the wrong station in Basel, and having a lengthy layover at some remote Alpine train station on the way to Florence. Mrs. Champs doesn’t do quite as well with uncertainty, but I had a blast.
It’s harder to romanticize those things in the US. With the standard 10-15 days for time off and the distances to cover, that’s two trips on the Empire Builder to visit Seattle or Portland and maybe a two or three night stay.