Warm Showers: Couch Surfing for Bicyclists
by Christine Lepisto, Berlin on 11.18.07
If you own a bike, a spare bed or couch (with access to a warm shower) and you don't see a balloon on your hometown, you are in the perfect position to make a good thing better. Log in today to warm showers. It's easy: sign up, drop a few hints about yourself and a friendly invitation to bicyclists worldwide and you can be part of a growing community of people sharing their stories as they travel by human powered vehicle around the globe. Even if you'll have to borrow a bike, or you found more than one host already in your neck of the woods, join in to benefit from the "hospitality for touring cyclists".
Anyone who has pulled in from a hard ride knows that a warm shower is the most welcoming thought beckoning at the end of the road. Hosts benefit, of course, when their guests are re-invigorated and fresh-smelling as they join in for a meal or a drink. An inspired symbol for a web site which is extremely user friendly, for both hosts and travellers.
Hosts benefit from setting their own rules (such as how many days notice before you will accept a visitor) and being able to check themselves out as "not currently available" (for example, when out touring themselves).
Cyclist preparing a tour will find a network of accomodations to keep the costs of touring manageable. The forum includes topics for sharing information about countries and places visited and for planning tours, picking up riders and so forth.
Both parties can consult the experiences topic to learn whether other site members have behaved themselves, keeping a check on good behavior in the community.
Roger Gravel manages the Warm Showers site, having taken it over in 1996. If you finish a tour with a few bucks in your pocket, don't forget to support the site so Roger can keep a good thing going.
Via ::warm showers
thats really cool! I'll check it out for sure.
That is really useful application
This is a particularly suited taste for Treehugger. It helps build eco community (even if subversively since serious bikers don't necessarily ride to save the world, rather, because they like to ride) and gives you the slight push you need for a bike tour when the pocketbook is bit tight.