Bike with your Favorite WomanTours Guide

Many of the women who travel with us come to bicycle with their favorite guide. If you're having a hard time choosing your annual tour, then find your favorite leader below and join her!

If you'd like to see Laurie again, then you can find her this year on:
Louisiana Biking the Bayou
Natchez Trace of Mississippi
Maryland Eastern Shore
Cape Cod & Martha's Vineyard
Pennsylvania Dutch Country
Maine & Acadia National Park
Shenandoah National Park
Outer Banks of North Carolina

Michelle will be guiding the following tours:
Yellowstone & Grand Teton National Parks
Idaho Greenways
Glacier National Park
Sun Valley of Idaho
Moab of Utah
Santa Barbara & Santa Ynez Valley in October
Arizona in Autumn
Death Valley National Park in November

Linda B will be guiding and cooking:
Teton Valley
Idaho Greenways in July
Glacier National Park
Northwest Loop
Arizona in Autumn
Death Valley National Park in November

Patty will be guiding and cooking:
Santa Barbara & Santa Ynez Valley
Yellowstone & Grand Teton National Parks
Teton Valley
Utah: Grand Canyon, Bryce and Capitol Reef
Utah: Moab

Sid will be guiding:
Alaska: The Inside Passage
Cape Cod & Martha's Vineyard in September
Blue Ridge Rambler
Shenandoah National Park
Outer Banks of North Carolina

Linda G will be guiding:
Cape Cod & Martha's Vineyard in June
Sun Valley of Idaho
Idaho Greenways in September

Lynne will be guiding:
Louisiana Biking the Bayou
Natchez Trace of Mississippi
Maryland Eastern Shore

Kimberly will be guiding:
Blue Ridge Rambler
Maine & Acadia National Park

Denise will be guiding:
Northwest Loop
Utah: Grand Canyon, Bryce and Capitol Reef

Meanwhile, you can find me on:
Louisiana Biking the Bayou
Santa Barbara & Santa Ynez Valley in May
Finger Lakes of NY with my sister Jen
Sun Valley of Idaho
Adirondacks fall foliage

Crossing Texas on the Southern Tier Cross-Country

They entered Texas on March 20 and won't leave until April 9. Texas is a very looooong state and no one knows it better than the 23 women biking across it with our Southern Tier cross-country bike tour.


The women are experiencing the unseasonably cold air and wind that is making its way across the southern states right now. Lois writes, "How to keep warm on a bike in such weather? You put on every bit of clothing you have with you and pedal as fast as you possibly can."

Their ride yesterday took them, "to the tiny town of Marathon and the unexpectedly wonderful Gage Hotel - quintessentially Texan: stuffed dead animal heads on the walls, ornate saddles displayed as art, hammered copper ceilings, heavy wood furniture about 25% bigger than usual - quite wonderful. It's a very different world, this Texas is."

On her tweets, Marci just describes every day as, "the middle of nowhere...again."

Update on Cross-Country Southern Tier Bike Tour

This just in from Lois, on our Southern Tier cross-country bike ride:


Out of Silver City, we climbed through the Gila National Forest, which looks almost like Colorado.

After the stark flatness of the California/Arizona/New Mexico deserts, it was a rich visual feast. Then, the cragginess opened up into a big, wide valley - we're talking, stealing from the world of Broadway musicals, Brigadoon - total magical enchantment. I was not the only lady who admitted to riding along mildly teary & choked up at the truly breathtaking beauty and thinking, "What did I do to deserve this?"



This is the view from Emory Pass, the crest of the Black Range, elevation 8,828'. The climb, by the way, wasn't all that bad - long, but not impossibly steep and I didn't have as hard a time with the altitude as I'd thought I was going to. Note to Self: "Things are Never as Bad as Anticipated."


The end of our ride was the Black Range Lodge - dating from the 1880's, off the grid, owned and run by a couple who are into straw bale building, with two wonderful resident dogs, Pepper and Charlie.


The next morning we continued down into the valley. Now, when I think "New Mexico" I think "Taos, Santa Fe, Albuquerque." This wasn't that NM at all - vast farmlands of...

pecan orchards...









...pima cotton fields...














...and miles of red and green chili peppers.

Food in South America

I’ve always said that the best part about our tours is the fascinating women on them. Our Argentina and Chile tour was no exception.

Meet Maggie. When she’s not laughing at someone’s joke or bicycling across the Andes, she’s cooking and managing the kitchens at her Cesar restaurants in northern California. She's even published a cookbook.


All across South America, Maggie took photos of all of our meals. She reveled in learning how the food was prepared, the spices blended, the meat cooked. She taught me to salt and soak onions to soften their bite before adding them to salsa. She taught us that congria, loosely translated as whitefish, was really eel. She showed us that no matter how full we were, we could always eat dessert.

The next time you find yourself in the Bay Area, be sure to stop by Cesar and tell them WomanTours sent you. And be sure to look for the Argentina and Chile inspired dishes on the menu.

If you’re lucky, Maggie will be on your next tour. If so, beware. All the talk about food will make you eat more!

Argentina and Chile bike tour

I'm just back from a fabulous WomanTours trip across the Andes from Argentina to Chile. We learned that unlike in the USA, cyclists in Argentina have no rights to the road. That looks to be changing, as this sign in Buena Aires announcing a bike lane will show.

Our group of women kept busy. We all biked every mile over the pass through the Andes.


Some of us went rafting below towering Mount Osorno.


Others hiked the sand dunes along the Pacific Ocean.


While others - namely Jan, Sue, Kathy and JoAnn - decided it was their duty to find the best pisco sour in South America. We all had a wonderful time!

Southern Tier Cross-Country Takes off from San Diego

Our 23 women are off to a great start on their Southern Tier 2009 tour. Jim Grant from the Peninsula Beacon newspaper in San Diego was on hand to shoot these photos. Many thanks to him for sending them to us.




In just 10 days, the women are almost to New Mexico. Follow their itinerary here. Or see below for a list of their blogs.