Hospitality on the trail
Trail hospitality begins and thrives with you
Hospitality is present when something happens to you. It is absent when something happens to you. Those two simple prepositions - for and to - express it all. — Danny Meyer
Two fully laden bikes ridden by cyclists of my age stopped near me with phones out. I was preparing for an evening ride on the Heart of Ohio Trail. Cyclists often stop at this location, a photo-op with the Rastin Observation Tower, a repurposed factory smokestack, on the Ohio to Erie Trail.
Tom and JD were two months into a cross-country ride from Santa Monica, California to Boston, Massachusetts. Tom had lost his wife to sarcoidosis and was riding to counter his grief and raise funds for Sarcoidosis research. What a story that overcomes grief with an epic bike tour for the good of the cause.
My first weeklong bike tour changed my life and perspective on how I wanted to discover the world. One of the takeaways from that tour is a fascination with the stories of how people found themselves on a bike pedaling from town to town and why they undertake this style of tourism.
I am often engaged in conversations on making a community more welcoming to trail visitors. It often involves amenities, wayfinding, and visitor-friendly businesses. These are all important things to consider getting a person on a trail and into a community.
Hospitality. That single word has more impact than a thriving downtown with beautiful trail infrastructure and amenities. Amenities entice people to travel to a destination. Hospitality ensures that people return and invite others to visit. An inhospitable place gets a single visit and no social media love.
Hospitality ensures that people return and invite others to visit.
Trail encounters, such as mine with Tom and JD, go beyond my love of touring by bike and hearing others’ stories of adventure. The person or the other side of the conversation feels welcome and sees how their story relates to the other person. This is trail hospitality in practice.
I routinely greet trail visitors with “Good morning” or “Have a nice day.” I stop and offer help when a person is having a bike issue or appears to be lost. I engage others in conversation when they are open to talk. I share my local go-to spots. All of these are acts of intentional hospitality.
You make your community more hospitable when you acknowledge and engage others. Every friendly encounter is contagious and spreads happiness to others. Visitors see a community as hospitable through the interactions they have on their visit. Hospitality begins and thrives because of you.
Happy hospitable trails!
Tom on the Trails
