Food And Wine Bike Tours Visit Italy’s Dolomite Mountain Range

by Chris Owen on

Food and wine may already be an embedded focus of vacation plans for many travelers. It’s not something to put on a to-do list, pencil in on an itinerary or even think all that much about when traveling. But maybe it should be. Travel companies feature and package food and wine bike tours in sizes that fit just about anyone and in 2013, there are plenty of them.

Discovering and experiencing unique cuisine around the world can make for rich, vivid travel memories. Tasting a wine in the region it was created can make us fans of a label for life.

ItaliaOutdoors Food and Wine is a private guide service that creates biking, skiing and hiking adventures with world-class culinary programs. Last year, in Bike Tour Cycles Through Culture, Food In Italy, Gadling shared information about ItaliaOutdoors‘ Summer Chefs On Bikes Tour. That seven-day, June 2012 event took cyclists on one of the former trade routes that distributed spices and goods from the East throughout Western Europe.

This year, ItaliaOutdoors has several bike tours through the Dolomite mountain range in northeast Italy, starting this spring. Each tour is a challenging climb and riding exploration that gets up close and personal with Italy’s rich culinary heritage.

Train Like a Local – May 26 to June 1, 2013
As close to a beginner/intro bike tour as one might get, this one focuses on climbs ranging between 900 and 1700 meters in the foothills of the Dolomites. Train Like a Local prepares cyclists for more challenging climbs in the upper Dolomites and the Alps. Along the way, group members sample regional cuisine and discover local wines unknown beyond the area.
The tour repeats September 1-7, 2013.The Agony and the Ecstasy tour – June 9 to 15, 2013
For more experienced cyclists, this tour brings one of the hardest climbs in northeast Italy. Designed for cyclists who have trained hard and are ready for difficult climbs, this tour features the regions of Veneto, Trentino-Alto Adige and Friuli Venezia, with stops to sample and savor local delicacies such as prosciutto, homemade gnocchi and grappa.

The Classic Climb tour – July 7 to 13, 2013
Adventure travelers will like that this tour traces a path through the heart of the Dolomites, combining little-known passes with the rigorous bike climbs that have made the region a sought-after destination for cyclists. Experiencing the blend of Italian and Austrian/Germanic cultures that define the region, expert cyclist and mountain guide Vernon McClure and cooking instructor and chef Kathy Bechtel, also an avid biker, will be along for the ride. The tour repeats September 8-4, 2013.

Limiting groups of 12 people or less, ItaliaOutdoors makes daily customization and refinement changes to itineraries, based on participants’ interests, pacing and real-time finds along the way.

ItaliaOutdoors also features private bike tours where a custom trip is planned and your tour is personally led by their owner/expert guides, as we see in this video:




Other sources for cycling tours include the Bike Tour Network, BackRoads and Bike Tours Direct.

[Photo Credit-Flickr user will_cyclist]

Video: Mountain Biking Greenland

by Kraig Becker on

Greenland’s official tourism website recently unveiled a new ad campaign that may have some travelers rethinking their next destination. Boasting a new tagline – “Rough. Real. Remote.” –these videos give us a glimpse of some of the amazing adventure travel opportunities that exist in the country, including sea kayaking along pristine shores or mountain biking past massive glaciers, which you’ll find in the video below.

I have to admit, Greenland wasn’t all that high on my list of places to visit, but after watching these clips, I’m definitely intrigued. Judging from this video, the country looks to be an outdoor enthusiast and active travelers dream.


Gunnison’s Wanderlust Hostel Offers $35 Crested Butte Lift Tickets

by Laurel Miller on

While I was enjoying a few days of Nordic (read: free) activities in Crested Butte last week, a local let me in on a secret. “You can get deals on lift tickets everywhere. You just need to know where to look.” And then she passed on some intel to me.

In that spirit, I’d like to present to you what is perhaps the most insane ski deal I’ve ever come across. Gunnison’s groovy Wanderlust Hostel is offering up $35 lift tickets with a one-night stay.

Located just 30 miles down-valley from Crested Butte, Gunnison is still very much the old-school ranching community it’s always been. Sure, they have a coffee house and some good restaurants now, but it’s still rural Colorado, albeit just outside one of the state’s most enchanting and authentic ski towns.

Wanderlust, which is owned by outdoor guide Amy Stevens and her cat Porkchop (don’t laugh; he’s kind of a badass, and even has his own blog), is the anti-hosteler’s hostel. It’s spotless, homey, peaceful, full of funky style, and caters to outdoorsy folks of all ages (for photos, click here). If the pursuit of powder (or, in summer, slab climbing, fly-fishing, trail-riding, or mountain biking) is more important to you than thread-count, you’ll appreciate Wanderlust.

There are private and shared rooms starting at just $23/night, and a family room that sleeps up to six. You can spend your time off the slopes curled up next to the fireplace, or cooking in the spacious hostel kitchen. No car? There’s a free shuttle to Crested Butte running eight times a day, just a half-block away.

[Photo credit: Tom Stillo]

Durango, Colorado Inspires Dreamers, Even When It’s Minus 9

by Dave Seminara on

It’s nine degrees below zero Fahrenheit and I’m the only soul out for a walk in downtown Durango on a Friday night. Everyone else in this idyllic town of about 16,000 in the southwest corner of Colorado is sensibly rushing into and out of businesses and some leave their cars running outside while they pop into shops or restaurants. It’s my first night in a town that I’ve imagined as a kind of adventure playground utopia and I have no intention of sitting in my warm hotel room watching TV.

Durango is a town that shows up on all kinds of best places lists. Outside magazine appears to crown Durango as the best something or other almost every year – in 2012 it was named one of their best new adventure hubs and one of America’s best river towns, and on at least two prior occasions, it was on their list of best towns. In recent years, my wife and I have been fantasizing about moving to a smaller, more laid back community and I’ve long been convinced that Durango would be a great place to live despite never having stepped foot in the place.


If you like to ski, snowboard, mountain bike and hike, you’re spoiled on choices within a short drive of Durango and a little further afield you have five national parks in Southern Utah plus the otherworldly Monument Valley and the Grand Staircase. There are a lot of places that people relocate to for jobs, but Durango is just the opposite – it’s mostly a refuge for outdoorsy people who are fleeing the big city rat race.

Before I landed in town, I met three people who loved the place so much that they found a way to live there, two in the airport and one on my flight in. Durango native Gregory Martin overheard me talking on the phone in the Denver airport about trying to find a medicine man on the Navajo Reservation and asked if I was “into sweat lodges” and things of that nature.

We got to talking and Martin told me he was a wilderness therapist at a place called Open Sky Wilderness, which helps heal troubled youths by bringing them out to live in a rustic, natural setting in the wilderness for two to three months. After talking to Gregory, I met a young man from Virginia who is studying music at Fort Lewis College in Durango. He visited the place and fell in love with it and his parents were sold when they found out that he could get free tuition because he’s ¼ Comanche Indian (the college provides free tuition to Native Americans).

“How did you prove you were Native American?” I asked, curious to know how a kid who looked very white could make the cut as a Native American.

“When I was born my dad got a card for me on the reservation, it’s kind of like a social security card – it proves I have Native American roots,” he explained.

And on the flight into Durango, a pilot who convinced NetJets, his employer, to allow him to base there about six years ago, sold me on the place.

“It would be a great place to grow up,” he said, and all I had to do was look over his shoulder at the dramatic, snow-capped mountains out the window to see what he meant.

Even after all the hype, I liked Durango immediately. The Animas River flows right behind Main Street, which is anchored at one end by a vintage train station where you can take the Durango-Silverton narrow gauge train, which has been in continuous operation for more than 130 years. I was bundled up and ready for the biting cold and the frigid night air felt oddly invigorating. Heat saps my energy and turns me into a sloth, but the cold puts a spring in my step, especially when there’s no wind.

On this bitter evening, the stars were out in force, the town was eerily quiet and the squeaky sounds of my shoes making impressions in the snow seemed oddly melodic.

I walked almost every block of Durango’s walkable, Wild West meets hip ski town center and felt like the place had pretty much everything I needed: two good bookstores, two brewpubs right downtown and two more nearby (four breweries in a city of 16,000!?), a nice collection of independent restaurants and shops, and a pleasant lost-in-time vibe.

I passed two old hotels, the Strater and the General Palmer, places advertising “Old West Photos” and Cowgirl apparel, a Tibetan Shop, a music store advertising “compact discs and tapes,” a Nepali, Indian and Tibetan restaurant and a shop selling a T-shirt, which read: OMG WTF is happening to the English language?

I had a glass of Colorado Kolsch at Steamworks Brewing and noticed that guys with ponytails shared baskets of peanuts with guys in cowboy hats and middle-aged ski bunnies in fluffy boots. When I asked a couple what the worst thing about Durango was they laughed.

“That’s a tough one,” the guy said. “We love it here.”

[Photo credit: Dave Seminara]

Biking In Afghanistan: The Power Of Two Wheels To Change Perspective

by Anna Brones on

“Nothing compares to the simple pleasure of riding a bike.” John F. Kennedy

Bikes have long been a simple mode of transportation, getting us from point A to point B. But riding a bike doesn’t just get you somewhere; the process is fun. There is joy in riding a bicycle.

When I travel I am always on the lookout for bikes and what the local bike culture is. In my hometown of Portland, Oregon, bikes are everywhere. It’s a city filled with commuters, cross racers and road riders. It’s a city with a strong bike culture and thanks to the work of bike advocates and groups like the Bicycle Transportation Alliance there are plenty of incentives to ride.

Coming from a place like Portland, it’s easy to take my easy bike commute for granted. Other cities are not always graced with the same ease of life on two wheels; but that doesn’t mean it doesn’t exist.

My first day in Kabul, we were in the midst of afternoon traffic hour. Cars, minivans and motorcycles were everywhere. There was even the occasional goat on the side of the street. In the midst of this chaotic hustle and bustle, men on bicycles wove in and out of traffic, dodging cars and doing the kind of cycling maneuvers that are normally equated with bike messengers.I was stressed, and it had nothing to do with being in a conflict zone. The thought of bikes in this mess of traffic was too much.

I thought back to my own close calls with cars – the near misses that keep you aware every time you get on your bike. I shuddered and wondered if I would have the mental capacity to deal with cycling in the midst of Kabul traffic on a daily basis. The phrase “this isn’t Portland …” kept popping into my head.

Making a U-turn in the middle of a busy road to avoid a traffic jam, we nearly hit a man with a kid sitting on his handlebars. Both the driver and cyclist insisted on their right of way, resulting in the bicycle tapping the front of our minivan and both our driver and the cyclist shouting at each other. I looked at my friend Shannon who has worked extensively in Afghanistan and knows the ins and outs of daily life. She just looked at me and shrugged. This was normal apparently.

What is not normal, however, is seeing a woman on a bicycle. As Shannon said in a recent interview about her own experience with biking in Afghanistan, “I had one man say to me, with this very shocked look on his face, how impressed he was, that it takes a lot of intelligence to ride a bike, alluding that that’s why women don’t ride bikes,” she said. “It became an interesting conversation starter.”

But that perspective is changing. There’s an Afghan women’s cycling team that competes internationally. One day we happened upon a girl riding to school just south of Kabul. In a country where conflict is a constant and women’s rights have a long way to go, it’s things like this that keep you inspired. Small change leads to big change.

In the rural village of Istalif, Shannon and I were even invited to take a cruise down the main street on a well-outfitted old bicycle, complete with a siren-sounding bell and streamers on the handlebars. The men laughed as we pedaled back and forth. A woman on a bicycle? How amusing!

It’s interesting to think about how much a simple thing like a bicycle can do to change perspective. As Susan B. Anthony once said, “Let me tell you what I think of bicycling. I think it has done more to emancipate women than anything else in the world. It gives women a feeling of freedom and self-reliance. I stand and rejoice every time I see a woman ride by on a wheel … the picture of free, untrammeled womanhood.”

The simple joys that come from riding a bicycle are undeniable; the smiles from a group of young Afghan kids on their way to school stopping to ride with Shannon when she was out on her mountain bike are a vivid memory. If there is a cultural bridge to cross, a bike may very well be the way to do it.

At the end of October 2012, Anna Brones spent two weeks in Afghanistan with nonprofit Mountain2Mountain working to produce several Streets of Afghanistan public photo exhibits. This series chronicles the work on that trip and what it’s like to travel in Afghanistan. Follow along here.

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