Work at the Farm has been interesting lately, with an interesting variety of cleaning bikes, typing of hotel itinerary, creating tour scripts and gathering information for European cycling tours. In the office, various maps of roads, city layouts, national parks and highways have been at my fingertips. The information for a a single country is numerous with general travel information books that include history, art, food, language, hotel, attractions and tips. I work on putting binders together of information to give to our tour leaders of where a tour goes through. Soon new Van Nicholas bicycles will be delivered.
Our first tour left! A last minute SG tour in Italy left (self guided). A series of tours are about to be prepped and leaving. Tour leaders will soon be coming to the Farm to pick up vans, bicycles, first aid kits, tool boxes, office materials, ladders and tour binders for their specific tours. The office and garage is a frenzy of people and equipment moving through. Call it madness (mechanics and those in the office call it that), but the energy is enthusing and refreshing. Excitement is building as the first tour leaves on April 27 and Croatia May 1 and Coastal Tuscany May 8. The month of May has Dalmatia Islands, Ireland, Santiogo el Camino Spain and many Italian tours in the works.
If I am not finding and loading tours materials onto the van, I am cleaning bikes or working on documents for our European Operations with Monica. Tours scripts are written and formatted to include specific information such as hotel contacts, restaurants and meals, daily milages, routes, arrows for routes, city tips, activities along the way and what the day looks like overall. I imagine myself on tour with each script I write as I look up at the map of Europe above my desk and at books from the Farm library that is a few meters away at hand. One can learn a lot about a country, its history, geography, people and travel information simply by writing tour scripts or researching to write articles for the trip.
Dream destination of the moment (and has been a big focus in the office): St. Petersburg to Istanbul ride in June and August that goes over 46 days, covers over 2500 miles by cycling, passes through Russia, Slovenia, Hungary, Romania, Poland and Turkey, that includes spectacles of the Danube River, a number of mountain ranges, crossing boarders and a ferry into Turkey.
Another thing: “The happiest girls are the prettiest.” -Audrey Hepburn
-Courtney