Teamwork on Two Wheels

Tahverlee [00:00:03]:
Welcome to the Bike Life podcast by Warmshowers foundation, where we will be sharing knowledge, experience, tools, and stories of touring cyclists and hosts from around the world. I'm Tahverlee, the woman behind the scenes at Warmshowers foundation, the leading platform for cyclists looking for hosts and to connect with a passionate international community. Find out more by visiting us at warmshowers.org. Now, onto the show.

Tahverlee [00:00:40]:
Welcome back to another episode of bike life where we are talking to the amazing, the well known, the returning guest, Ken Francis. And today, Ken has bought brought someone special to join us. So, Ken, would you like to introduce Philip, please?

Ken Francis [00:00:58]:
Yes. I would like to introduce Philip Robinson, my touring companion for over 25 years now. I thought it'd be fun to do a podcast with him just to kinda show everybody our chemistry, how we have traveled together over the years. And he is also a Warmshowers host in Seattle, kinda how we have shared cyclists even to this day.

Tahverlee [00:01:25]:
That's so interesting. So, Philip, let's go ahead and have you talk a little bit about about yourself. How did touring start, and, of course, how did you meet Ken? We want all the details.

Philip Robinson [00:01:34]:
Okay. I'll let Ken explain how we met, but, I actually actually started bike touring probably in the nineties. I, joined my, sister and her husband on supported tours throughout Oregon. So we did probably about 5 of those. And, they sort of had a change in lifestyle and all of a sudden sort of dropped off on that. And so I was sort of looking for, something different and sort of found Ken, you know, in the early days of the Internet. And, so we sort of connected. And 6 months later after that, we did our first tour from, Spokane to Calgary.

Philip Robinson [00:02:13]:
Now for Ken, it was, he went all the way from Calgary back down, but, I left at that point. So I'll let Ken explain a little more about that. So

Ken Francis [00:02:25]:
So this was back kind of at the the dawn of the Internet where you weren't supposed to meet people from the Internet, and he met in a chat room that was kind of based on out outdoor activities. And I knew that he was into cycling, and and he lived in the Pacific Northwest. And I was planning a trip from Spokane to Calgary through the Canadian Rockies and then down to Missoula. I wanted to do this trip, 2 or 3 years before that, but I wasn't able to get as much time off work. So I did kind of a truncated version of it through Glacier National Park and not making it into Canada. So I had the opportunity. He seemed like he lived in the area. He was a cyclist.

Ken Francis [00:03:04]:
You know? Hey. Would you like to do this? And his response was, really? You you you wanna go touring with me? And I got flack from people on my end. He could be an axe murderer. You don't know who this person is, and he got flapped out of his end for the same thing. And, the reason he went to Calgary is because he didn't really wanna commit to 2 weeks There's something strange around the Internet. 1 week was good enough, and he had a friend meet him and pick him up in Calgary, and they did a a van trip on the way back. And, when you got back, what did you tell me, Philip?

Philip Robinson [00:03:42]:
With that, I can't remember. Go ahead. Yeah. You said I

Ken Francis [00:03:46]:
I had a miserable depression.

Philip Robinson [00:03:48]:
Yes. That's true. And the van trip did not work out so well. Now my friend, she, I don't know. It was challenging at the time, so, but it didn't work out. And I probably should have stayed with Ken for the full 2 weeks. Yeah. Yes.

Philip Robinson [00:04:01]:
So but, all is good. Yeah.

Ken Francis [00:04:05]:
So that was in 1998. In 2000, we cycled from Spokane to Boise. In 2001, we did the Columbia River to San Francisco. 2002, the Big Island of Hawaii. 2003, crossed Colorado. 2004, crossed Wisconsin. 2005, bought Boston to Pennsylvania. 2, 2006 was our 1st Alaska tour where we had 2 others join us on that trip.

Ken Francis [00:04:33]:
2007, we did Hawaii again. Both both Hawaii trips, we had friends join us. 2008, Spokane to Seattle via the Cascades. 2009, it was our 2nd Alaska trip. 2010, loops for Utah. 2011, Arizona loop. 2012, Halifax to Boston, our trip started getting a little longer. 2013, Lower Mississippi.

Ken Francis [00:04:56]:
2015, Iceland. 2015, California Coast. 2016, the Rhine River. 2017, Thunder Bay to Minneapolis, 2018, the Danube, 2019, the Gulf Coast, 2020. I did the Cascades, and Philip joined me on the first couple days of that trip. That was during the pandemic. And then later, we did a pandemic tour, along the interstate from Flagstaff to El Paso, Texas. 2021, Europe and Germany, 2022, Knoxville to Savannah.

Ken Francis [00:05:30]:
And last year's trip was a little bit different because Philip injured himself. It was to be London to Amsterdam, and Philip just did wonder. And, how are you doing now, Philip?

Philip Robinson [00:05:42]:
Well, as you can see, I have a scar from a broken wrist. So, but anyway, I had a bike accident where I caught the heel of my foot on the top tube, went straight back and landed straight down on my wrist and, it shattered it. So I've been sorta, that took about 6 weeks, 6 to 12 weeks to heal so far. And, so there's a plate in there, and occasionally it does get well, anyway, enough of that. I've I'm healing. I've got a little numbness, but I'll leave it at that.

Ken Francis [00:06:21]:
We've never had a bad trip. So this is, like, the first obstacle that's come up. Now couple times, I I think in New York state, I think you and I hit each other and you wobbled and fell over. Right. And then and, I think the Danube trip, was that when you turned the corner too fast and hit the tree?

Philip Robinson [00:06:40]:
Yeah. No. I Wait.

Tahverlee [00:06:42]:
You must tell us that story.

Ken Francis [00:06:44]:
You got to tell us minor things.

Philip Robinson [00:06:47]:
Yeah. No. I actually the tire, I missed it. You know, they have a lot of trails over in Germany, which are great, and they're sort of curvy. And so I missed a curve, and the front wheel went off, and I just I barely missed a tree. You know? So I went down and, you know, all of a sudden, everything is just like everywhere. And it's like, okay. Where's Ken? So, but I did pick myself up, and I started pedaling.

Philip Robinson [00:07:14]:
And I did finally catch up with Ken, and he says, what happened? And so but, anyway, it was it was, yeah. It's one of those things that you just can't predict. And, but I was able to get back on and continue. So no entry on that one.

Tahverlee [00:07:28]:
So how many miles? Have you calculated how many miles you've done together? Because this is this is amazing.

Philip Robinson [00:07:36]:
No. You sleep. Ken oh, I was gonna say Ken pretty much does the mileage. You know? I I don't always keep track of that because it's just it's more about the adventure and not in so many miles. It doesn't miles don't matter to me so much. Mhmm.

Ken Francis [00:07:51]:
I must have a 100 then you're for almost.

Philip Robinson [00:07:54]:
Right. That's a 100 and then all of a sudden it was 98. Okay. I'll join him for the last 2 to get to that 100. You know? So but yeah. No. I'm I'm a good trooper with stuff like that. But

Ken Francis [00:08:07]:
it's all That was actually our our first experience. I think it was maybe our 3rd day on the road on our very first trip. We were in Radian Hot Springs in Canada. And I looked at my odometer, and we were at 94 miles. And I said to him, I said, I don't know when the last time you did a 100 miles was, but it's been a while for me. And I just can't stop at 94 knowing that I'm 6 miles away. And I said, you don't have to do this if you don't want it, but I'm gonna be riding up and down every street in the town until my odometer hits a 100. And he said, okay.

Ken Francis [00:08:38]:
I will I will join you. So that kinda shows kind of our relationship with, you know, spontaneity and flexibility and working together and communicating. And he he could have easily have said I'll see you at camp. You know? It would have been okay too.

Philip Robinson [00:08:53]:
Yes. I say, at that point, I thought, well, this guy's dedicated. You know? It was, like, my first, well, I yeah. It was my first time really with Ken in person. So I thought, okay. This guy's got a plan here, so let's go with it.

Ken Francis [00:09:07]:
And we've had 2 different styles, and I I think part of that is us adapting our styles. Cyclists that I've ridden with prior to Philip, I had expectations that we always did things the same way. We always travel together, and that created a lot of tension with the conflict. So with Philip, it's like, I'm gonna try something different. We're, you know, we're gonna be able to go at our own pace. And in the beginning, Philip was always way in front of me. Philip had much faster pace than I did. Hills are a little bit different.

Ken Francis [00:09:36]:
Hills Philip is slow and steady, and I tend to charge up more. And then I get off my walk, charge up more, and I get off my walk. And we tend to get it to the to the summit at the same time. And I think that's a good example, which is how we work together with our own individuality. Yeah.

Philip Robinson [00:09:53]:
We don't

Ken Francis [00:09:54]:
still travel together.

Philip Robinson [00:09:55]:
Yeah. We don't actually have to ride together. I have to say it was a little faster at the start, but today, I'm much slower. So Canada is like that. Going off the trail in Germany, it's like he was way ahead. And, but, anyway, it it's, it's all good. We all get to the destination in one piece, so all is good.

Tahverlee [00:10:17]:
What are some of the other important pieces that you think create a compatible writing partner? Like, what are some of the other ways in which you compromise or work together so you're, you know, having each other's back and still enjoying the journey and not feeling like you are completely changing the way you wanna experience it? And maybe, Philip, I'll start with you.

Philip Robinson [00:10:39]:
Let's start with Ken on that one. I love it.

Ken Francis [00:10:44]:
Well, there's there's a lot of stuff that that I feel I I taught Philip because I had done more self supportive Turing, and he was was doing supportive Turing at the time. And there's stuff that he taught me. And, I asked him to think about this question because, things that Philip taught me Philip taught me how to use a cell phone. I didn't have a cell phone when we were traveling. And one of the first trips, it was raining, and he said to me he says, it's raining, and I called ahead to a motel. And I thought, oh, you get the phone, and you can do that. And and, he also taught me how to use motels because I that was the m word. That was, like, not a part of my vocabulary.

Ken Francis [00:11:24]:
I would like wildcat before I ever, you know, spent money on a motel. And now it's like, you know, especially on a hot day, air conditioning can be really good, especially if there's a pool around. He taught me the, importance of always carrying electrical tape. On one of our last trips, my spoke liner was going out, and it was actually causing my bike to have all these multiple flats. And he would've got some electrical tape, and I was able to just tape my room and save me the rest of the trip. So always carry electrical tape, always carry pliers with all my tools. I don't have pliers. And when we did the trip, to El Paso, we were on the interstate, and the interstate has, all the blowouts from all the truck tires and these little wire beads.

Ken Francis [00:12:09]:
So I was stopping about every 2 or 3 miles and checking my my tires and pulling these little strips of metal out before they worked their way in to give me flat. I got a 2 of them the 1st day, and after that, I learned my lesson to check-in. And, the I think the most important thing I've learned from Philip is always carry ChapStick.

Philip Robinson [00:12:31]:
Yeah. Yeah. I'm never far from a ChapStick. That's for sure. You know? It's like, you know, if you're around me and it's like, it would be an it'd be impossible for me not to have it. So but, yeah, no. Speaking of flats, that El Paso trip, Ken was very lucky. I have fenders, so it's, like, really tough to try to pull out.

Philip Robinson [00:12:54]:
But, you know, living in the northwest, it's it's gets very wet here. So you do you need fenders up here. So, but, and the other thing I learned from Ken are zip ties. So I lost a bolt on my rack once, and it's like, okay. You know, zip tie will do it. And I actually had a zip tie on that for quite a while until I went to a shop and they took you know, put an actual real bolt in. So those kinds of things are good. And, I started to learn duct tape from, skiing, you know, because if you're you know, it it covers everything and usually holds most everything in place if you needed to get to where you need to go.

Philip Robinson [00:13:31]:
So, but yeah. No. When it came to cell phones, I I I had one for work because I was on call back then. And not that I was on call on that trip, but I started carrying it. You get used to using 1. So and then a motel, you know, that's what a credit card's for. So, there are times when it's like, okay. It's been a long day.

Philip Robinson [00:13:53]:
I need a shower. I need a real place to sleep. So, and as I've often joked, I worked for 40 years. So, you know, what else do I have to spend my money on? So but, anyway, those kinds of things.

Ken Francis [00:14:07]:
There's a couple of other things that I taught

Tahverlee [00:14:09]:
you. Shares. Keep going, Ken. Keep going.

Ken Francis [00:14:11]:
Yeah. And this was in the early days. We haven't done this lately, but I taught Philip how to hitchhike. There were times when it was like, okay. We are not riding now. We are we are hitchhiking. And that was something that Philip was just like, I can't see myself doing that. And we were in Idaho one time coming down this huge hill.

Ken Francis [00:14:33]:
And, we already climbed a couple 1,000 feet. And we got to the bottom of the hill. There was a river, but then the road kept on going back up again. So I had thought we'd crossed the paths and we didn't cross the path. We still had another couple 1,000 feet of climbing to do. And as we were heading back up the hill, I joked to Philip, and I said, this is where you should throw your thumb out. And there was a a truck passing by at the time, unbeknownst to me, and saw me do that and made a u-turn and pulled over and picked us up and take us to the top of the pass.

Philip Robinson [00:15:07]:
Yeah. That that convinced me right then and there. So and there were there was one other time, in the Oregon coast when it was raining, you know, just raining and raining and raining. It's like, okay. We're about 30 miles behind. And so go to a gas station and you just I had sort of childlike, you know, kidlike features way back. And, so I would actually go up to people and just, you know, hi. Can you help us out here? And, oftentimes, they would.

Philip Robinson [00:15:36]:
And one of my favorites was in Colorado where there was a FedEx, truck, and I went because I'm a former FedEx employee. So I went up to the guy and I said, would you be willing to help us out? And so sure enough, he he was able to pick us up and deliver us 30 miles later in Colorado. So that was fun. So

Ken Francis [00:15:59]:
Every time I see a FedEx truck to this day, I think of myself as a package that was still living.

Philip Robinson [00:16:05]:
Yeah.

Ken Francis [00:16:07]:
Well, the the very, very first time was in, on the first trip in Canada. There was a, like, a 30 or 40 mile stretch of road that was being resurfaced, and it was it was dirt. And they had flag cars taking the people through 1 group at a time. And we're walking our bicycles up to the front of the line, and we passed this huge, like, Ford F350 truck. And I made a comment to Philip as we walked by. I said, this would be the truck to get, and I stuck my thumb out. And Philip had never hitchhiked before. And when when the car pulled up alongside of us, the guy rolled his window down, he says he says, yeah.

Ken Francis [00:16:49]:
Do you wanna ride? And I said, absolutely. He didn't even ask Philip, do you want to do? Absolutely. So we put the bikes in the back of the truck, and the guy asked if we wanted to sit inside. And Philip was like, no. I I don't feel comfortable sitting inside, so he sat out with the bike. And I'm in the truck with the guy. And as we're driving, there was so much dirt in the air being kicked off. The guy said, is your friend okay? And I said, yeah.

Ken Francis [00:17:14]:
He likes he likes to be in the back of the truck. So I think you learned your lesson to to be inside after that.

Philip Robinson [00:17:22]:
Yes. After that, I'll go inside.

Ken Francis [00:17:26]:
So And then the other thing that I taught Philip, how to wild camp and how to how to camp in a city park. Those were other things that just seemed to have to be kind of, like, out of the question.

Tahverlee [00:17:42]:
Tell us about that,

Philip Robinson [00:17:43]:
Philip. Well, the city park you know, I thought, okay. City park. Sure. Why not? But we were in Wisconsin, and there was a shelter there. And, I managed to roll my sleeping bag out, and I actually slept fairly well. We were near, I I believe, a sawmill or a pulp mill, so that white noise actually put me to sleep. And, the next morning, we went to breakfast.

Philip Robinson [00:18:07]:
We sort of go to these sort of local breakfast giants, you know, where, I guess, your local people would hang out. And, sure enough, we met some other cyclists there. They were out just for a day ride. And it's just it's I swear, panniers and a bike. It's just an instant, welcome. You know, people are always curious about what you are doing and, like, where did you stay, when did you do. And they all seem to think I'd like to do that too someday. And so we did, and, you know, I survived.

Philip Robinson [00:18:39]:
The other ones was in Oregon once we left seaside, and we ended up having to wild camp there. And that was my first time taking a bath inside the restaurant club bathroom. So but it it worked out just fine. You just you sort of, you just, race to the occasion rise to the occasion, and, you know, it all ends up usually being pretty good.

Ken Francis [00:19:03]:
Yeah. I think in Glen Allen, Alaska, south of there before we got to Valdez, I think we've stayed in a rest area along the road. And this is before you before you had your ORT leads?

Philip Robinson [00:19:16]:
Yes. It could have been when I had those other, yeah, REI ones. Yeah.

Ken Francis [00:19:20]:
Yeah. And it was it was raining. And, Philip, we usually back then, we have dry have dry bags now. He has or at least. But, we used to back then pack everything in flat trash bags. So I I remember Philip, knowing that it was gonna rain, went through the the trash cans in the rest stop, and there were a couple trash cans that hardly had any trash in. So he took the trash out and used the trash bags, but then told me afterwards that his clothes smelled like garbage for the next couple of days.

Philip Robinson [00:19:51]:
But they were dry.

Ken Francis [00:19:54]:
So, yeah,

Philip Robinson [00:19:54]:
I know one time, we were in Alaska. I was like, no. I'm gonna put my tent up. And then sure enough, I guess there are enough mosquitoes out there that Ken decided that he was either gonna put his tent up or, you know, join me in mine. That's when I had a 2 person tent. So, but, yeah, it's just being able to be flexible and just sort of going with it. It's really part of the adventure.

Tahverlee [00:20:18]:
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Tahverlee [00:21:07]:
I was gonna say, were there times when it was harder to be flexible? Meaning, did you have any conflict? I mean, I'm sure in all these journeys, you must have had a couple of little bits of conflict. What was that like?

Philip Robinson [00:21:18]:
Oh, we've never had any conflict, Beverly. Sorry. It's all been it's all been tailwinds and downhill. No. It, I tend to like quieter roads. Can, you know, him go on a freeway in a heartbeat. And, but I've learned to appreciate freeways because you've got, like, a 10 foot shoulder, you know, so you can't go can't argue with that. But, our trip from St.

Philip Robinson [00:21:43]:
Louis to, to New Orleans, you know, it's like, no. I'd like to go out to do the Natchez Trace Parkway. You know, Ken wanted to do the regular road. So I take a detour. But at the end of the day, though, we sort of come back. You sort of do an assessment, and then, we work it out. So and we're actually flexible enough that we can work it out. You know, if Ken wants to do that freeway, great.

Philip Robinson [00:22:08]:
And then but, yeah, I'll take the I always try to take the road less traveled sometimes, you know, because like the sequoia, like the redwood, forest. I went through the grove of the sequoias, I guess, but it's called I can't remember now, in in Northern California. And it was really very pretty and can stay on the highway. But, you know, we we've worked it out. So once we've the roads rejoin, we're everything's fine.

Ken Francis [00:22:38]:
Yeah. I would say our conflicts are on a scale like 1 to 10, you know, maybe like a 2. The I sometimes I lose patience and, like, with the ChapStick, every time Philip stops, he has to reapply.

Philip Robinson [00:22:53]:
I I reapply, and I lick

Ken Francis [00:22:55]:
it right off. To come off. I mean, it's a ritual. The gloves come off. The sunglasses come off. The chopstick comes out. The glasses go back on. The the gloves go back on.

Ken Francis [00:23:04]:
So I have a smile. You know, that's the worst that you have with your touring companion. That's, that's not bad. And as far as being flexible and going with it, one of the other things I I taught Philip was how to ride roller coasters. And as he told me, he says, oh, I get it. You just gotta.

Philip Robinson [00:23:25]:
So, yeah, riding a roller coaster. So the first picture is I have this death grip on it, and everybody else's their arms are yay.

Ken Francis [00:23:32]:
You know? It's like, okay.

Philip Robinson [00:23:35]:
I look like a statue in the front of a log run, a log coaster. But, I've learned to have a lot of fun. And I will say one of our, more well, one of the great trips was, we went from Berlin to Krakow, took a train and to Energylandia, and that was a spectacular park. I have to say that had a rather impressive coaster, and I can see why people why that's on their bucket list for roller coasters. So

Ken Francis [00:24:02]:
And we had an incredible experience just getting on the bus to get there. I'm all excited. I mean, when we were planning the trip, we actually took a train from Berlin to to Grafow and to dock in Berlin. And in doing the process, This is, you know, once again, negotiating and I'm like, I really want to go there. But do I really want do we really want to spend, like, 8 hours on a train each way and take 2 days off of a trip to get there? You know, let's kinda look at this. Philip looked at me with a stern lift and said, oh, no, Kevin. I didn't get any on that roller coaster. Zodro by the way.

Ken Francis [00:24:41]:
So I'm all excited that morning, and we're waiting in line to get on the bus that's gonna take us to the park. And Phillips says, you know, this bus is getting kinda crowded. Let's get in line for the next one. So we get in line for the next bus. They opened the door. We go up above where there's this big, huge window on the double decker bus, and we're sitting in the front so we can see the whole Polish countryside. And I'm just chatting away about this roller coaster, and there's a a kid sitting next to Philip that says in perfect English. When you ride that roller coaster, make sure you sit in the very back lip seat.

Ken Francis [00:25:11]:
That's the sweet spot. And I looked at him and I said, it's funny that you should say that because somebody said this on social media about 2 months ago. He says, I know that was me. And I looked it up, and it's like, are you Derek? And he says, I am. So it was his 17th birthday, and he got to go into the park for free on his birthday and stayed with us the entire day. He wants to be a pilot and wanted to practice his English. He had a a girlfriend that was at the park there with with her friends that day, and I think he spent about an hour with her and then came back with us. And, you know, that was just like such an amazing random occurrence, and, I'm still in contact with Jared.

Ken Francis [00:25:54]:
So

Tahverlee [00:25:55]:
Wow. What a thing to happen that you saw it on social media,

Philip Robinson [00:25:58]:
and you heard him on

Tahverlee [00:25:58]:
the bus. Now what's the what's the message about the back left seat? Why?

Ken Francis [00:26:04]:
Oh, it it's just you get the most airtime. You know? Oh. Airtime, there's the ejector air time. There's floater airtime. You know? When you're a coaster enthusiast, you know, we're coming down the first the first hill on this thing, and Philip made a comment after we got off. He says, I thought I was gonna lose my head on that. And and those elements are actually called head choppers. When you're coming down really fast and it looks like you're gonna lose your head, those are called headchopper elements.

Ken Francis [00:26:29]:
So, you know, if you're into roller coasters, you know all the lingo. And, Philip, over the years, last few trips, not all of our trips, but the last, like, 5 years, we've been getting a lot of, theme parks. And, Philip's a really good sport.

Tahverlee [00:26:43]:
Yeah. You know what I love about this?

Philip Robinson [00:26:46]:
I I

Tahverlee [00:26:46]:
was just gonna say, you know what I love about this? What you just shared, Ken, was that Philip said, you're gonna go on that coaster. So each other's choices and wins became each other's wins. Right? Like, you were focusing together on each other's wins, and I love that.

Philip Robinson [00:27:00]:
Yeah. The fun thing was trying to get the tickets because we decided to take our bikes too. So we ended up having we have to get a reservation for your bike and the reservation for yourself. And, yeah, they actually start off on a German train, and then it ends up being the train crew changes. But just trying to get tickets, it was like, oh my gosh. But she the ticket agent there in Berlin was great, you know, and she wanted to make sure at the very end, are you sure you wanna do this? This is how's blah blah blah? And I one of my favorite comments is it's only money. And she looked at me like I'd landed from Mars and then she burst out laughing. But, you know, it's like, let's just get this over with, you know.

Philip Robinson [00:27:43]:
And we just need to get these tickets to get on this train. So and then she hands me this huge wad of paper, and I said, is there a ticket in all of this? And I'm not gonna have a problem with the conductor or anything like that. Oh, no. It's right there. You know? But, oh, gosh. Get tickets for your bike, tickets for you, but, it worked out really well. And it was a nice, pleasant train ride. So it, and the food was really good too.

Philip Robinson [00:28:06]:
So

Tahverlee [00:28:08]:
Interesting. So I'm curious. What's, I mean, now that, Philip, your wrist is healed, healing in the process of healing, what's next?

Philip Robinson [00:28:18]:
Well, we're gonna I mean, I didn't I couldn't ride on this last trip to London with Ken, but I did join him for about 5 days. So we sort of poked around there. So we're still sort of working on the trip. I've, always been curious about doing something from, like, Saint Louis to Boise, Idaho because that way then I can say I've ridden my bike across the country not all at once, but, you know, but, so I'm sort of poking around. I but, I think we're still working on a trip this for next year.

Ken Francis [00:28:49]:
Usually, I do one trip without Philip and one trip with Philip. And, this year, I'm kind of looking at and he doesn't know it yet. Not not Philip. Well, Philip doesn't know the city either, but we talked about doing a trip from Chicago to Toronto because there's a lot of good roller coasters between Chicago and Toronto. And while we're still old enough to have, you know, a heart and bones and stuff like that that are able to ride roller coasters, I wanna do that. I don't know if Len Bulmer yet knows, that that I'm coming. So he would be definitely he's told me he lives just a couple miles from Canada's Wonderland, which is the large theme park in in Toronto there. So, I do hope to be dropping him on him.

Ken Francis [00:29:31]:
And, you know, with with Philip being in Seattle and with me being in Los Angeles, we've hosted the same people. We had a person come from Tunisia a few years ago with a 9 foot sail on his incumbent trike. And he rode from here, started, and went up the coast, with Philip. Philip was here with, a gentleman from France, Leroux, a few years ago. Actually, it was during at one of our events here, a dead cookie party. Philip met him, and he came back last year and cycled from Seattle down, down here. Chantal, wave wave wave out to our friend Chantal in Switzerland, Freda and Marty on the Gulf Coast. I mean, we've we've we've met some amazing people on our journeys that we've been in contact with.

Ken Francis [00:30:25]:
Shout out to Martine in the outskirts of Amsterdam. Philip wasn't able to stay with her this time because he didn't do the bike portion of the trip, but this was my 4th visit with her. So, you know, we're like family at this point. There's so many really cool experiences we've had. Werner and Karen with the the the the bicycle festival that we attended in Germany. And we hosted a couple here from she was from Germany. He was from Tijuana, and they rode around the world. And, like, 4 years later, they hosted Philip and Be in, Munich.

Ken Francis [00:31:04]:
So Philip and I have, like, this network of of friends that goes beyond us because of all the wonderful experiences that we've had.

Tahverlee [00:31:13]:
Yeah. I I love it so much. Thank you both for being willing to come in and share and talk about all of your adventures together and how you work together and how it works and how to, you know, make it a a great journey for both of you even though you might have different styles and different desires along the way. But making it a win for both of you, I mean, really the epitome of teamwork for sure. So, Philip, any parting words that you would like to share with our warm showers listeners about writing with a writing partner?

Philip Robinson [00:31:48]:
You just have to you just have to oh, go ahead. That's a tough one. That's like almost like a job editing question. But, Ken and I have worked it out over the years, and we, you know, we do have our disagreements, but we're able to sort of come together at the end. And, either it's a compromise or it's something we both can live with, and we've done an excellent job of it. I can't say I can't say enough thank yous to Ken for, his generosity over the years and sort of taking me initially on a tour that's, it's been an amazing journey for the last 25 years. I've thoroughly enjoyed all of the rides we've done. And, it's you just have to you have to want to do it.

Philip Robinson [00:32:36]:
You know? And if you don't, well, then maybe you ought to find something else or find another partner. But you have to want to to do this together, and it's been I I look forward every summer to to taking another tour with Ken because it's just, excellent time.

Tahverlee [00:32:52]:
Yeah. Thank you. Very good. Ken?

Ken Francis [00:32:54]:
Well, Philip, you're one of my best friends. We did mention that in addition to our trips that I've done several trips to visit you up in Seattle. You've come down here and done, like, the Channel Islands several times, other things that we have done together. And, you know, it's it's almost like we're kind of as we're getting older and becoming this old married couple that we really look out for each other. We really help each other out. You know, just like this last trip getting on getting on the train. I had a bike. He didn't have a bike.

Ken Francis [00:33:26]:
It just, you know, with with this with this one arm helping me out, which really kinda, you know, was necessary and me helping him out because, you know, he wasn't able to have certain mobility and stuff. So just looking out for each other. And, every every time we're together, it's just a celebration of our friendship.

Philip Robinson [00:33:44]:
Mhmm.

Tahverlee [00:33:44]:
Yeah. Wonderful. Thank you both again so much for being here, and and I'm excited to continue to hear about your journeys and what's coming next. So please, as always Ken, keep me posted. And for everyone listening, thank you so much for joining us for another episode. And whatever platform you are listening, we would love a rating and a review or a comment, and it lets us reach more people with the bike life podcast. Thank you again.

Tahverlee [00:34:13]:
Thank you for joining us, and we hope you enjoyed the show as much as we enjoyed making it. Wherever you are listening, please leave us a rating and a review, as it helps us reach more cyclists and hosts around the world. Visit us at warmshowers.org to become a part of our community, or on Instagram at warmshowers_org.

Ken Francis [00:34:38]:
If you

Tahverlee [00:34:38]:
would like to be a guest on the show or submit a question, please make sure to email us at podcast at warmshowers dot org.