MTB Team building

After a few years in Rome our daughter came back from college with her bike.  It was a basic model, narrow tires, few speeds, but much better than anything I ever owned and I decided to give it a try in Umbria where we had just bought a house. I then discovered the pleasure of mountain biking and decided to adopt the sport.

I invited Derek, a very good friend from our Montreal days, to visit the area around Mt Ventoux in France on bike for a week.  We were inexperienced riders, the bikes were basic models (an advantage!), we did not have good maps nor proper equipment, but we did enjoy the area and saw it in a more meaningful way than we could have ever done by car. We repeated the experience in central Italy (Tuscanny to be precise) with some improvements in equipment if not in map reading.

Thereafter a succession of trips with different friends.
Bernie (a scott living in Rome at the time) joined me for a trip in the Cevennes.  Peter (an englisman living in Scotland) kept me company in France and in Scotland. Didier (a cousin) crossed the western Pyrénnées with me. Gernot joined me and others for crossing the Vosges.

A New Zealand colleague from FAO convinced me to get a decent mountain bike and we went for day rides around Rome and in Umbria.  I suggested we go on some "adventures" in Europe (mostly in France as a way to make him discover, and hopefully appreciate, my home country).  He accepted and we had some memorable trips (one of them in central Italy in November when we got soaked every day).

A few years later, he mentionned that one of his New Zealand friend was keen on joining those trips. Mike joined us.  Mike had a son who liked the idea of those trips: enters Thom.  Thom had a friend: enters Georg (from Austria). Mike's brother-in-law and his wife were curious about our adventures: enter Sue and Michael (from New Zealand). Thom had another friend: enters Lars (from Denmark) who joined us for our 2011 trip.

Hopefully we'll keep adding new friends to this group, the only requirements being that one is relatively fit, good company, eager to discover new places and people, and very tolerant about my map reading competences!

The philosophy, adopted by all who participed, has been to enjoy the trips: sleep in a bed, have a warm dinner, and not to turn them into physical excesses.  We average 3-4 participants on each adventures to keep it easy to find accomodations.

It has been great to have friends with different backgrounds, fitness levels, and ages but all keen on enjoying time together discovering a region.

France offers a great palyground because it has excellent maps with marked trails and numerous types of accommodations, Italy's maps leave somewhat to be desired, while Scotland offered stunning landscapes, aggressive "midges", and an addictive local "single" brew to dry you up after a day's ride under frequent showers.

This blog will narrate those trips and hopefully incites others to do the same while providing some logistics information.

Your comments/suggestions are always welcome.

Jacques
jaclah@gmail.com

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