Tour de Rural Ontario Farms

I often remis on my cycling days in the netherlands. There was this great bar called the "Hemelches" meaning heaven.  The bar was located in the middle of nowhere, but clearly on a cycling path.  During my husband and my long rides (100km+) we often wish there was a perfect place to bike.  So what how does this relate to agriculture or agritourism? I often hear from economic development officers that cyclist don't spend money in their communities when they come?  I think thats because the community doesn't know how to really enhance and provide for the cyclists day long and intense outing. Cycling is one of the largest growing sports and its growing in the older age groups like baby boomers, who also have money. I'd like to try to enlighten any community that would like to be heaven for cyclists and take advantage of this growing market. Stage One: Preparation: Cyclists plan a route ahead of time, and often in communities that they are not familiar with. A community who can help educate their cyclists about which are the scenic routes, which  are the busy roads, and which are the paved roads in extremely important. If you want to bring them back or put a cyclist in a good mood, give them a good route. Typical road cyclists ride anywhere from 60km, to 100km, to 150km+ in a days ride. Make sure you can provide scenery for that long. The roads: document all the roads in your community. The key criteria for a good road is:

• paved (and hopefully well looked after with minimal potholes), tarred and gravel will do in a pinch.
• minimal traffic - letting cyclist know which roads are the main arteries helps them avoid them. We don't come to your community to get run over and watch out lives flash before our eyes as transport trucks rush by at speeds of 80km/hr+. Main road that have at least 1m paved shoulders are acceptable.
• Beautiful scenery - whether you have lakes, farmland, forest, who it off! Tell us where these great views are so we can enjoy them. We don't come to your community to hear the rush of traffic (see point 2), we are looking to enjoy the ride at a slower pace than a car.
• keep the road information up to date so that if your constructing a road, and it will require a detour, let us know. A few rural concessions can be a 5km+ detour and on a bike that can be another 10-20minutes of riding when your butt is already sore!
• hills

Stage 2: The Start Line: Most cyclist will be driving to your community to start their ride. Provide designated places to park the car, unload bikes, and maybe even provide a WC. I once parked in a lot that got locked after the business was closed and ended up driving over the neighbors yard and the curb to not be stranded for the evening. Stage 3: The ride: Its about three items.

• The roads
• The scenery
• The fuel - most of us can't pay for a support vehicle that has spare parts, gatorade, and snacks, so we need routes that go through places where fuel is available. Variety stores, and small towns are great. Make sure routes don't separate these potential stops by too many kms.
• The journey - Cyclists are looking for an enhanced journey.

Stage 4: The finish line: Most cyclists arrive back at the cars, soaking wet, tired, and hungry. A community should support these immediate needs. Many longer rides can burn up to 3000 calories.  Thats more food that you are recommended to eat in one day! The problem is...we're sweaty, and not appropriately dressed for public dining (although many find those spandex shorts amusing). Along with WC a community might think about providing a shower facility. This will keep the cyclists in the community for dinner since we are no longer smeally and can be dressed for any dress code.  If calories cost anywhere from $.0010 to $0.01 thats a lot of dollars spent in your community to refuel!