[Yak] China in October, Anyone?

[Andrew Bell]

Greetings - I'm a newly-minted member of the (umm) fold, having acquired a
gently used 2000-vintage NWT over the summer.  I am now contemplating my first
overseas tour; I'm posting this afternoon hoping to scare up additional riders
for a China trip that's scheduled for the first two weeks of October.

The tour operator is Tom Sheehan of the newly-organized "Pedalers Pub & Grille"
(he's also run trips for some time in the past, dba "Cycle Events" - with some
good reviews posted on those tours).  He's also a BF owner, and posted to the
Yak just last week offering us 10% discounts on all of his tours - that's how I
found out about him.

The tour that I would love to do with Tom is 13-days in the Sichuan province in
rural western China, at the eastern border to the Tibetan Plateau.  The way it's
mapped out, schedule calls for 10 riding days, just over 800 km of total riding,
 all on paved roads that should be lightly-trafficed.  With 10% BF discounts,
the tour price is roughly $2200, plus $1300 for separately-booked round-trip air
fare to the provincial capital (Chengdu), connecting through Beijing (the price
quote that I just got for flights from the U.S. west coast).  For the full
itinerary: http://www.pedalerspubandgrille.com/rides/ch-sich.htm

Is anybody else intrigued?  This is a first-time route for Tom and PP&G, with
support from a local agency in Sichuan.  The catch is, Tom still needs at least
two more riders to make sure he can run the trip.  That means none of us are
booking the plane tickets yet, until we know for sure that we're really going! 
Time is getting short, but I've researched the visa requirements and it does
look like there's still plenty of time to get them.

Please contact me off-list if you'd like to express interest, discuss in more
detail, etc.  You can write directly to Tom at rides [AT] pedalerspubandgrille
[DOT] com.

Andrew Bell (amb2 [AT] tdl [DOT] com)
Oakland, CA ('00 NWT)

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