Bicibur bikes in their docking station, just waiting for someone to take them for a ride!
Here’s a pretty cool idea that the Spanish Government came up with to both cut back on car pollution and keep people healthy at the same time: bicycle renting. Basically, bike “docking stations” like the one pictured above are starting to crop up all over Spanish cities. The idea is that a user can go to a docking station, swipe his ID card, and take a city-owned bike out for a ride. When the user is done with the bike, he can return it to any docking station in the city, eliminating the need to use a car to get from point A to point B.
Burgos recently implemented one of these systems (under the name “Bicibur”) and I think it’s actually a pretty ingenious idea. The cost of renting the bikes is really low — about two Euros for an ID card that unlocks the bikes and can be used for life – and the bike docking stations are pretty well-located within the city to allow users to pick up a bike at one location, drive it to their destination, and just leave it there without necessarily having to return it to its original location. In short, I’m pretty impressed with the program.
Still, I do see one small problem, at least in Burgos. Here, the bikes are really old and a tad on the crappy side. They generally work to get you from one side of the city to the other, but they don’t seem to be very well maintained. I suppose it’s too early to tell if the city is going to let the bikes deteriorate even more or step up and make repairs.
Another slight problem with this system is that I don’t usually see too many people using it (at least not here in Burgos). That leads me to something that we can debate in this post’s comments: if your city had a program like this one, would you use it? Why or why not?Continue reading this post…
I don’t know if this is exactly what Quad City DJs had in mind when they created the song “C’mon Ride the Train” back in the mid-1990s. It’s the Burgos “choo choo” tourist train and, for a small fee, it will take you to the most important monuments in the city of Burgos for your sightseeing pleasure.
I still remember the first time I saw this unique creation creeping along the streets of Burgos at a whopping 5 miles per hour. I was just walking along the sidewalk — minding my own business — when I suddenly looked up and my eyes laid upon it for the first time, a thing of beauty: the choo choo train. You know, it’s not every day that you see a motorized, wheeled train chugging down the street, obeying traffic rules, and generally running without a train track; thus, my first reaction was to chuckle a little. After the initial chuckle, I looked inside the train and saw all the tourists — cameras in hand – comfortably seated in the “passenger compartment” and I chuckled a bit more.
Obviously, after seeing the tourist train, I just had to ride it. A few days after the initial “sighting,” I got together a group of my friends and we had at it. The ride lasted about 45 minutes and it passed by all the most historic places in Burgos. The train came complete with an overhead loudspeaker which explained all aspects of the ride to the passengers: where the train was headed, what we were currently passing, etc. To my surprise, the ride wasn’t that bad. Of course, I don’t know if I’d rely on the Burgos tourist train to get me to Madrid (I suppose Renfe is better for that), but I guess it isn’t bad if you’re a tourist who wants to see the most important parts of the city. Continue reading this post…
A garbage can brims over as the Burgos Festivals come to an end.
My regular readers know that, over the last couple weeks, I have been writing a mini-series on the 2009 Burgos Festivals – the biggest party of the year in the city of Burgos. To finish up the mini-series, I thought it would be appropriate to write this post about the tons of garbage that were produced (and needed to be cleaned up) as a result of the massive partying during festival week.
For those of you who have never been to Spain before, let me tell you that Spaniards are known to party hard until the wee hours of the night and all this partying can sometimes leave behind “trace evidence” in the form of empty food containers, bottles, etc. Judging from the amount of garbage in the container pictured above, the recent festival week in Burgos was no exception to the general “party all night long” rule. Still, despite all the partying, we have to give the Spaniards credit for always cleaning up their mess afterwards. Just take a look at the picture below to see what I mean. Continue reading this post…
I thought I would upload this short video to give you a look at one of the fireworks displays during the recent Festivals of Burgos. There were fireworks every night for an entire week during the celebration and I was pretty impressed with the quality of the shows. Of course, I should let you decide on the show quality for yourself after viewing the video. Continue reading this post…
Today I bring to you a guest blog post written by Ross Hudgens. Ross is a travel writer for Low Fares Blog and an avid world traveler and blogger. You can find more of his writing at Low Fares where you can find cheap flights and discount airfare. Here’s what he has to say about Barcelona:
Barcelona is known for its intense night life. Barcelona is known as one of the great contributors to Spain’s worldwide reputation for a rowdy and sensational party scene. If you’ve ever seen a Barcelona match on television or heard about the passion of their fans, it should be no surprise to imagine how their nightlife mirrors it.
After Barcelona wins a match on the pitch, which it does more often than not, a night out on the town means carrying over that excitement and fervor to their exquisite night clubs. Continue reading this post…
Members of a peña march in the parade with their instruments. The interesting thing was how these people kept themselves hydrated.
The fiestas of Burgos wouldn’t be complete without a parade — and there was a gigantic parade about halfway through the festival week that included clowns, street performers, marching bands, dancers, and even giant inflatable floats like the dragon one pictured below. For the most part, the parade in Burgos was basically the same as any parade that I’m used to seeing in the USA; however, there was one slight difference in “hydration techniques,” so to speak. Continue reading this post…
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