On a whim, I headed on over to the Jet Lites’ website to look for any new lighting systems and found out that Jim Taylor, owner and founder, was killed recently in a skiing accident! Very shocked and saddened by this.

I dealt with him when I bought my Starfire system years ago and he was friendly, personable and very patient. The epitome of who you would want to deal with in business and, I think, would make a great personal friend to anyone.

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Unfortunately not for me but for a friend of my sister’s and for my friend, AW. I’m not sure if I posted about this before or not but a few months ago a sister’s friend was chosen by Salomon to do something along the lines of “I am woman and I will do something extraordinary”. Heaven help me if I got that wrong but that was the impression I got when it was first mentioned to me. So, Dawn is going to bike-tour from the north of Spain all the way across the Iberian Peninsula to the south. Naturally, my sis thought that I would be the perfect candidate to join up in this crazy adventure. Just kidding!

With my paltry finances and common sense coming to the fore, I volunteered AW instead who readily agreed. haha!

So, the two of them are about to start up in a day or so after months of planning on Dawn’s part. AW, for his part, has been gallivanting across Europe like some sort of profligate jetsetter but he’s a solid addition to any bike tour. Hrmmm…do women worry more about the details than men? In any case, they are about to start out and it looks like rain for the first couple of days. Oddly enough, the rains not in the plain so I guess that’s one more homily out the window.

I am really envying Dawn and AW for this adventure and it’s worse because you can follow along every turn of the wheel thanks to the wonders of modern technology. Dawn has, natch, put up a blog and she is also using YouTube and AW has the uncanny knack of being able to sniff out every Internet cafe within a block or two for emails. With the two of them hammering away at the computer terminals, it will almost be like sharing their tent.

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Well, I managed to drag/rush myself down there earlier this afternoon to have a quick gander. I wasn’t sure if this year’s visit would be any better than the last one three years ago. That time around, I didn’t really need to buy anything nor was I really looking for much info.

This time around, I found that I do need shorts and a new multi-tool with the former being of more importance. Even so, I doubt that I will be going back to the show anytime soon. The admission price of $13 is scandalously high for what is really a moderately sized show with dealers blowing out old stock and a couple of dozen booths of various organizations handing out information about what they do. I guess it’s important for those organizations but it means that the organizers are getting their money and they’re getting the admission fees too.

I still had a decent time though. I didn’t buy anything since the selection was very slim (who knew that Pearl Izumi had so many Quest shorts?) and only two touring bikes were to be found as far as I could tell. I did talk to people over at Urbane Cycles who now have the first batch of their Urbanite touring model in black (and found out that their frames are made in China), talked to the folks who do randonneuring and had the usual beat-up looking bike set up and, best of all, got a chance to meet Hugh Black of True North Cycles. I actually looked to see if he was there because the folks who built Wike bike trailers had a couple of gorgous True North bikes on hand. Hugh seems like a pretty upstanding fellow and I will see what happens…if I have the cash. If not, it will either save up this year and buy something next year or just get a Trek 520 or Urbane Tourist. Although, once you start throwing on the better parts, the stronger wheels, the lighting system and so on…the price does start getting up there.

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