Great to hear that your home safe and sound and giving Mrs Mick due care and attention :whistle:Mickdb1 wrote:Touchdown to Chezzer at 1300 Today. Kissed the wife and started to pack tuther bike for a C2C this weekend.
I thought the Albarracin/Algarbe doo was unbelievable. The trails around Colgatts are better ( but a tadge harder)
Thank you Simon and Polly and all the attendants for making it remarkable
Mick (Harry to The Quiet One)
Definitely back next Sept to finish the rest of the trails I didnt have the opportunity to dooooooo No pictures though - sorry
This reminds me of (one of) our conversation on Friday - which got waylaid by ten other topics as usual :whistle:
For everyone else who wasn't there: quite a few people have said that they would like to bring their wives, sweethearts, significant others, etc. to a HISS and indeed there have been a few - and IMHO these meetings have been all the better for it - but many of the folks of a more tender disposition aren't keen on the camping element of the HISS.
So far there have been two solutions to this; a) folks have come en famille with their own camper vans, e.g. Oilcan and Archie, and b) at the first Aragon meets we used a camping that had bungalows. On Friday's conversation both Mick and Archie were keen for the latter option - I think Archie has sold his camper.
But for us this is a problem. Basically there aren't many suitable camp sites that also have accommodation. For various reasons we have moved away from the site at Albarracin and won't be going back there for a HISS - not that there is anything wrong with it, far from it, but it just isn't suitable for large groups as it's too popular with other campers!
Furthermore, although we'll be staying at another site in the region in October while we explore more HISS trails in Aragon I'm determined to use Algarbe site again next year as it is such a perfect location for an 'Adventure' event - which is what the HISS is all about after all!
Back in Catalonia, there really is no alternative camping with bungalows that is close enough to the centre of the HISS trails - although this may change in 2017 - and this bring me to a) a reminder of the thinking behind the HISS, and b) the Made-to-measure events that I described on my The Spanish Biker LLP topic way back in January.
Firstly: my original idea for the HISS is for a 'total' adventure experience, ideally for me starting with firing up your bike outside your front door. But obviously trailering bikes or coming down by van is practical for many reasons - not least sharing resources and, as happened this year, allowing one rider to fly down to Barcelona and join in the meeting from there with his tent and bike ready and waiting. For this reason I am very reluctant to move away from that central idea.
Secondly: again, as I stated in my LLP page, the HISS is not-for-profit despite being organised through the LLP, which allows me to offset the expenses of researching and running the HISS against the tax man's wolfish appetite. But all of the income from the HISS is 'ring-fenced' into more research - next month's trip to Aragon will wipe out a cool €1,000 from the slush fund let alone the weeks Polly and I are going to spend this winter extending the Catalonia HISS into the area to south of Tremp that Phil, Skippy, et al had a foretaste of last week.
Which leaves two issues - where do we make money and how do we meet everyone's wishes for the holiday that they want? Well this is where the made-to-measure comes in.
These are literally what it says on the box: all of the trails and guides are tried and tested thanks to the HISS, whose participants get the amazingly cheap deal - especially once they've become Veterans and get 50% discount - but in exchange are to an extent are Guinnea-pigs for the trails, guides, etc.
There is already one 'Bespoke' event booked, a twin shock only meeting based at Collagats that has been arranged by Brian, aka, Picosmestizo*, who has very generously offered it to anyone else who wants to join - note that these are not HISS events as such so there is no 'Veterans and Virgins' deal, but there is a sliding scale of prices so that if a group is large enough the fees per person become very competitive.
But a made.to-measure deal could also be based in various accommodation options; other campings with bungalows, hotels of various degrees of luxury/price or self catering farmhouses to name but a few. NB my/our accommodation at these venues would have to be paid for too.
And here's the 'real deal' - as with the HISS events, prices are per biker - so wives, children, dogs, etc. come free! (thumbs)
Regs
Simon
* I'll be asking Brian to start his own thread on this once we've had a few more mails about the 'small print', etc.
