WE ARE GOING TO MALLORCA, SPAIN ON SATURDAY

We are headed to Mallorca this coming Saturday (Feb 28, 2009). What you see are two of my favorite things over there, a cup of café con leche and some absolutely marvelous bike riding. The photo on the left is real, and it is not the only road like that, the Island is full of them. We is me and 8 friends of Sunnyside Sports. Some of the friends work at Sunnyside (Barb and Lew) the others are friends (other stores call them customers). Patsy, Gary, Linda, Paul, Mary and Leila. This will be my seventh time over there. I hope to go again next year even (if you are interested let me know (sunnyside@sunnysidesports.com will get me). This will be a trip when we get home we will be relaxed, in shape and full of memories of some of the best roads Europe has to offer. We will stay in one hotel the whole time. I have been asked many times "Don't you get bored riding the same roads all the time?" My answer is simple, No, I am not bored living in Bend yet after over 30 years. 

I missed going last year so this will be special, like a homecoming for me. You get to know some of local café owners, the people that work at the hotel, most of them are friendly faces. 

I am curious also how the economy is going to affect what we see. Will the number of riders be down? Will all the stores and cafés be open. I hope so.

Mallorca for most people means Euro tourist. Laying on the beach getting a british tan (sunburn). Well in  March the pools are not heated, the beaches cool and most of the tourist at home. What you have in March is up to 50,000 cyclists at a time enjoying the roads and the café. Not many Americans, mainly Germans, Swiss, Dutch and Brits. 

The bonus for me will be the Brits. Not really Brits though the Scots. You see the weather sucks in Scotland most of the time (this is a west coaster talking). For them Mallorca in March is the warmest they will see it all year. There are not that many Scots in the world. Around 5 million or so. They have some awesome cyclists though. Sir Chris Hoy won three golds medals in China this summer. David Millar, pro cyclist on the Garmin Chipotle team to name a couple. Then there are my Scots. These are some special friends I have. They live in Scotland and I live in Bend. I go to Scotland to see them, and they come to Bend to see me. We all go to Mallorca to ride bikes, almost every year. This year most of them will be there again. We make sure we are there at the same time, we stay in the same hotel or even apartment. We like to ride together, laugh at the English, Germans and yes the Americans too. We like to eat good food, drink good café, and of course even have a beer or two. I will even go home via Scotland to see the ones that couldn't make it this year. 

Next year why don't you come along.

Don

One more thing it really irritates me that my apple computer doesn't know how to spell Mallorca, it wants a j instead of ll. That is just fundamentally wrong.