Travel Tips

WHILE on vacation in Barcelona with her ma last month, Laura Caddick had seen Torre Agbar a lot of people tooling around on red-and-white bicycles. But the bikes that she saw everywhere – part of the city’s bicycle-sharing program – were for use by local residents only. Torre Agbar

fortunately , Ms. Caddick’s hotel, ME Barcelona, had several bicycles for guests. ‘We rode down to the beach, then to the port and up to the Ramblas, stopping for drinks and lunch along the way,’ claimed Ms. Caddick, a sports wear merchandiser from Liverpool, Britain. She and her mother each paid 20 euros, or $26.40 at $1.32 to the Euro Buck, to rent the bikes for 4 hours and felt they saw more of Barcelona than they’d had they taken the Metro from their hotel. ‘We felt we were experiencing the town from a more local point of view.’

in recent times, from Paris to Rome, new urban cycling lanes and public bike-sharing programs have been gaining in popularity. And while some travelers aren’t able to link into all of the cycling opportunities – in Paris, for example, the check-out meters for the Vlib’, a public bicycle-rental program, won’t accept most Yank credit cards ( they lack acrucial microchip ) – there are several hotels that offer guests use of bikes for a little fee or no charge in the slightest.

‘It’s become a new way for hotels to show their greenness,’ asserted Jonathan Barsky, vice president for research at Market Metrix, which gauges customer satisfaction in hospitality companies.

The bikes, which are generally upright models, have proved to be favored, particularly among vacationing guests, though business travelers have been observed to cycle to an appointment, according to several hotels

The Hotel Gates in Berlin, which introduced 12 red bikes last May, making them available to guests without charge, has just ordered four more bikes for the high season

‘Sometimes the guests ask for a bike, and theyare all gone,’ asserted Kirsten Kurbjuhn, the general manager, adding that more than 60 percent of the guests who fill out the hotel’s customer-feedback questionnaire say the bikes are’a highly valuable service,’ and twenty p.c say they are one of the reasons they chose the hotel.

Astrid Boh, a management specialist from Frankfurt who scheduled a room at the Hotel Gates for a business journey at the end of March, did not know about the bikes before her arrival. But after hearing about them at the reception desk, she was pleased she had taken a taxi from the airport instead of renting a car.Torre Agbar.

‘Parking is a challenge in Berlin,’ recounted Ms. Boh, who pedaled to a business meeting, shops and even out to dinner at night. ‘I liked being able to get somewhere fast and get some exercise at the same time.’

Some hotels arrange with nearby bicycle shops to have bikes available for guests. A day’s use of a bike is included in the Green, Greener, Berlin package at the Mvenpick Hotel Berlin, which rents the bikes from a local company. The package also includes bath salts, presumably for soothing sore muscles after a demanding outing.

But increasingly hotels are investing in their own fleets – and picking models that reinforce the identity of the hotel.

In Aug, Le Meurice, a Parisian hotel that occupies an 1835 palace across from the Tuileries, unveiled 5 retro-style bikes in the blue-green shade of the oxidized copper roofs of the city, with matching helmets and front baskets emblazoned with the hotel’s gold trademark. American and British guests in their 30s are the most ardent customers, according to the hotel ; Le Meurice’s sister hotel, the square Athne, opted for zippy red bikes with panniers.

At the Victoria-Jungfrau Grand Hotel & Spa in Interlaken in the Swiss Alps, guests can check out Scott mountain bikes – the same model the Liverpool soccer Club, which utilised the hotel as its training base for the last two summers, rode to get to and from soccer practice, pedaling in their red-and-black training shorts and jerseys while fans lined their path.

Staff members at the ME Barcelona, part of the Sol Meli hotel chain, visited several bike shops before settling on the silvery fold-up bikes that were introduced in Sep at the hotel, housed in a modernist tower clad in anodized aluminum.

‘We always like to be on the fringe of technology,’ related Pete Zudyk, VP for brand invention and communication for Sol Meli.

of course, some hotels have given bikes for several years. The Hotel Hassler in Rome has had them for 20 years, according to Vivian Barsanti, the media and selling coordinator.

In bike-happy Copenhagen, that has special small traffic lights for bike riders and obviously marked cycling lanes, bikes have long been a standard hotel offering.

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