Who and What You'll Meet on a Bicycle

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While cycling around Penang Island several days ago, we passed a man riding a bike with his miniature schnauzer sitting calmly on his front rack and a cat cage bungee corded to the back. While catching my breath at the top of a very steep hill, I decided to wait for the bike and dog to see if I could snap a photo. Also waiting in the shade at the top of the hill was a tandem bicycle with a young man with an older Chinese woman standing beside it and a single bicycle with a young Chinese woman holding it up. The young man and young woman were speaking French and I mentally made up the scenario that the couple were married and the older woman was the man's mother-in-law.

Several minutes later the man with the dog arrived.  I asked if I could snap his photo. He smiled and said, "Sure but why not take the whole family?" He invited the three bike riders to stand beside him. After snapping a few photos, we started the usual get-to-know-one-another questions...

The young man, Emilien, is from France and his wife, Xinhan, is from Shanghai. They are nearing the end of a two-year 38,000 kilometer (23,700 miles!) world bike tour on a tandem bicycle. The older man, Rickee, and his wife are from Penang and they had been following Emilien and Xinhan's blog/website for over a year. The four had  met the previous day and were getting to know each other with this island bicycle tour.

Meeting these amazing cyclists generated rapid-fire questions from me so Rickee suggested we get off the dangerous-shoulder-on-a-blind-curve-of-a-narrow road and meet for coconut water at the cafe half-way down the mountain.

A few minutes later while sipping coconut water(not my favorite but it sure works like Gatoraide to re-energize you)at an outdoor cafe we learned that Emilien and Xinhan plan to end their tour in 10 days in Singapore, find jobs, and settle down. I pulled up a quick mental map of Malaysia and realized we are "on the way" to Singapore. We immediately invited them to our home for a clean bed, a hot shower, and a meal.

Last night they arrived as planned. Our French/Spanish next door neighbors also joined us and we all enjoyed a meal learning about places I'd only head about and but can't even picture on a map.

I'm anxious for them to wake up because I have even more questions....

If you are interested in learning more about their trip, here's the website:

http://theglobelovers.com/worldbiketour/