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Dear Folks,
Welcome to the 2008 cycling season! So where are you headed this year? Sicily, Sonoma or Sonora? We can help with all three. But before you decide let's get to the point: don't let the dollar doldrums get you down!
If you haven't heard this before, let us pass this advice along: according to Michelle Higgins, writing in the April 20th NY Times Travel section, "One of the most common ways [to minimize the cost of your vacation in the face of a dollar drop] is to buy an all-inclusive vacation like a cruise or packaged tour."
If you've been with us you know that a bicycle tour with ExperiencePlus! is unlike any package tour you've ever taken. And it also covers all of your major costs including hotels, all breakfast, the cost of the bike, and about 70% of the dinners (with wine) on the tour. And, for 2008 we guarantee the price as published on the web. The only costs you need worry about are sandwiches at lunch and gelato two or three times per day (your choice!) And we'll help you find great pizza and bargain meals on those nights off. So give us a call today and let's talk about Puglia, Provence, Sicily, Sonora and Sonoma (and Romania, Germany, Turkey, ExpeditionPlus! and more!)
More and more these days, we've been seeing great photos from customers coming back from their tours. So this item from Adventure Cycling caught our eye - surely some of you shutterbugs have a shot or two you think is worth submitting? "Adventure Cycling is always on the lookout for great photographs of bicycles and bicycle travelers to post on our Photo of the Week page. Click here to view the current and past photos -- which include images from a wide range of places, such as Croatia, Ireland, Mallorca, and the Yukon. You'll also find instructions on how to submit your own favorite shots." (If you're not familiar with Adventure Cycling, you might want to take advantage of their offer and grab a free issue of their excellent magazine.)
Read on for my review of a great book on Mediterranean food, Paola's authentic baked fennel recipe, the latest about our upcoming ExpeditionPlus! tours and an exciting development in customized bicycle travel: our new BikeRentalsPlus! site allows you more bike tour choices than ever - adjust your European bike vacation to suit your budget and tastes.
I'm off to Coastal Tuscany, Corsica and the Greek Islands to lead the first tours of our European season. (You can follow my journeys this summer at my new blog, www.biketourleader.blogspot.com.) Happy cycling, wherever you're riding!
Rick Price
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 Our featured tours this month are big enough to be the crowning achievement of a lifetime of cycling: ExpeditionPlus! itineraries along the entirety of the Danube River, clear across South America from one ocean to the other, and a mysterious expedition being developed for the High Andes. They're an improbable kind of vacation that all started with Rick's desire to cross his own personal "terra incognita:"
To those of us with normal jobs, it might seem surprising that somebody who designs and sells bicycle tours for a living would have frustrated dreams about big trips. But that's just how our first ExpeditionPlus! got its start: Rick had always gazed longingly at the huge, unknown expanse of Eastern Europe between St. Petersburg (nèe Leningrad) and Istanbul (not Constantinople...). Finally, he decided to do it - and the tour, all 2500+ miles of it over six weeks, promptly sold out.
Read more about what makes these tours unique, or jump straight to the tour information for each one below.
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 This month's interview comes from Terre Lantzy, who's put together a group of friends for a custom itinerary in Croatia.
You've done a custom trip with ExperiencePlus! in the past, and have now gathered a group of friends to bicycle in Croatia this fall. What do you prefer about setting up your own trip? Well, we're all getting older, and the thought of changing hotels every night. even if ExperiencePlus! would transfer our bags, was our first reason for planning a custom trip. We wanted a day of relaxation between bike days - making the biking an option was important for some of our group. And since I'd done small custom trips that had varying degrees of success, I was happy to turn the planning over to ExperiencePlus! and trust them to come up with an itinerary that would meet our needs.
Read more from Terre here.
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 This month's recipe is a savory treatment of what, to Americans, at least, is a rather unusual vegetable:
I grew up eating fennel, raw in salads or cooked. My mother especially liked to serve it baked with béchamel sauce and Parmigiano cheese. Here is her recipe as I remember it.
Click here to read the rest of Paola's Baked Fennel recipe.
If you would like additional recipes, visit our online recipe archive. You'll find recipes for European and Latin American specialties like Panzanella: a Tuscan Salad, Tapenade, Gallo Pinto, and more.
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Happy Walking and Cycling until next month!
E-mail us at tours@ExperiencePlus.com with comments and questions. Or give us a call at 800-685-4565.
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