by Larry Lagarde

If you're visiting New Orleans soon for French Quarter Fest, JazzFest or simply to enjoy our awesome Springtime weather, here's a thought:

Take the money it would cost to rent a bicycle or car for your visit and buy a bike instead from RideTHISbike.com. When you're done with the bike, we'll make it a snap to donate your bike to a worthy local non-profit that's looking to make New Orleans greener and more environmentally sustainable.

Most major New Orleans tourism destinations are clustered within easy bicycling range of one another. As a result, if you're in the French Quarter, Downtown, Warehouse District, Marigny, etc., chances are you'll get around faster on a bicycle than you could driving a car or taking a taxi.

By donating your bike at the end of your visit, you can help a variety of charitable, non-profit organizations that are working hard to improve life in New Orleans. In fact, here's how one non-profit plans to use bikes to fulfill a core mission.

Green Light New Orleans
Green Light installs modern compact fluorescent lighting (CFL's) in homes free of charge. To date, they've removed over 150,000 incandescent lights, eliminating @ 60 million kilowatt hours of electric consumption at a savings of $7 million.

To make their CFL light bulb program even greener, Green Light wants volunteers to ride adult folding trikes to install CFL's. Our folding tricycles are ideal because they have a low center of gravity, making them very stable even when the rear basket is loaded with CFL's. Since the trikes fold compactly, they take up less room in Green Light's cramped warehouse too.

Several other non-profits have expressed interest in accepting JazzFest bikes as donations. Look for more about their plans for donated bicycles later this week.

NOTE:
Per Mandy Decker with the New Orleans Jazz & Heritage Festival, bike racks will be available at both the Gentilly & Savage Street gates to JazzFest.

Labels: charity, donation, Jazzfest, New-Orleans-JazzFest

By Larry Lagarde

When checking my email on StumbleUpon this morning, I had an email from Paul Sanchez. Paul's doing something truly extraordinary; he's the guy that was recently interviewed on NBC's Today Show while bicycling 10,000 miles around the USA for dyslexia.




The Hole - video powered by Metacafe

Paul's working to raise $1 million to create scholarships for 100 kids with dyslexia in just 33 days. To accomplish this heady goal, he has a series of sub-goals (like appearing on Oprah). I interviewed Paul about his tour around the country and about his project.

The Telephone Interview
Following are the 10 questions I asked Paul over the phone and his responses.

1. Bicycling 10,000 miles is an incredibly hard task; what motivated you to take on such a ride and how did you stay motivated?
I've been cycling since I was a kid and always wanted to bike the USA. I'm into causes and I have attention deficit disorder & dyslexia so helping kids with my condition just made sense.

2. Describe 3 of the most noteworthy experiences on your tour.
When riding through Cleveland, I met a guy with a grandson with dyslexia. He liked what I was doing and took me under his wing. Besides paying for my accommodations and meals there, he shared his rags to riches story with me. I came away with a greater sense of determination to complete the ride back to California. Another noteworthy experience was my appearance on NBC's Today Show. I arrived in New York behind schedule, tired and low on cash to complete the trip. The national TV exposure gave me some funds I vitally needed and pumped me up mentally to continue at a point when I felt like quitting. A third experience was meeting a real estate professional in Baltimore. The funds she contributed for travel expenses were enough to last me all the way to the end.

3. It looks as if you rode on many bike trails; how did you select the route?
70% of the route came from Adventure Cycling great bike route maps and 30% came from other long distance touring cyclists I sought out for routing advice.

4. How's the fund raising drive going; do you think you'll reach your goal of raising $1million?
I do. Thus far, I've raised $4250. That may seem small but a potential donor has been talking to me about contributing the entire amount. I'm pretty confident that it will happen.

5. How are you coming with the other 8 Wishes?
Pretty well. I'm going to the Sundance Film fest in about a week with a film I put together from the videos shot throughout the trip. It's about an hour long.

6. What are your plans after this project?
Things look pretty solid for a major project shortly after this one but I'm waiting to I've made the 8 Wishes before I announce something else.

7. What did you do to plan for the physical stress of the tour?
Believe it or not, the only preparations I did were planning the route and related details on the computer. I rode like three times before the trip. At the start, I weighed about what I am right now - 225 lbs. When I finished, I was down to a lean 189 lbs.

8. What tips can you offer to others looking to make a long distance tour?
On a long distance trip of a week or more, make sure to bring along enough bike shorts so you can stay clean even if unable to shower and wash clothes daily. The last thing you want to do is to get a rash or blister from riding on your rear all day and have it get infected from dirty clothes.

9. Would you do something like this again?
Yes.

10. How old are you now?
30

If you'd like to learn more about Paul Sanchez or help him with his project, visit his website at 8wishes.com for more information.





Paul Sanchez's 8 Wishes Video - 10,000 Miles Around The USA

Labels: 8wishes, charity, dyslexia, epic journey, Paul Sanchez, solo bike tour