Experience Barcelona

WHILE on vacation in Barcelona with her mother last month, Laura Caddick had seen Torre Agbar plenty of people tooling around on red-and-white bicycles. But the bikes that she saw everywhere – part of the city’s bicycle-sharing program – were to be used by local residents only.

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fortunately , Ms. Caddick’s hotel, ME Barcelona, had many bicycles for guests. ‘We rode down to the beach, then to the port and up to the Ramblas, stopping for drinks and lunch along the way,’ said Ms. Caddick, a sports wear merchandiser from Liverpool, Britain. She and her mother each paid twenty EU Bucks, or $26.40 at $1.32 to the euro, to rent the bikes for four hours and felt they saw more of Barcelona than they’d had they taken the Metro from their hotel. ‘We felt we were experiencing the town from a more local point of view.’

in recent times, from Paris to Rome, new urban cycling lanes and public bike-sharing programs have been gaining in popularity. And while some travelers arenot able to hook into all of the cycling opportunities – in Paris, for example, the check-out meters for the Vlib’, a public bicycle-rental program, will not accept most Yank cards ( they lack a vital microchip ) – there are several hotels that offer guests use of bikes for asmall fee or no charge at all .

‘It’s become a freshly discovered way for hotels to show their greenness,’ asserted Jonathan Barsky, vice chairman for research at Market Metrix, which gauges customer satisfaction in hospitality firms.

The bikes, which are generally upright models, have proved to be popular, particularly among holidaying guests, though business travelers have been observed to cycle to an appointment, according to many hostels

The Hotel Gates in Berlin, which introduced a dozen red bikes last May, making them available to guests without charge, has just ordered 4 more bikes for the high season

‘Sometimes the guests ask for a bike, and theyare all gone,’ asserted Kirsten Kurbjuhn, the general executive, adding that more than 60 % of the guests who fill out the hotel’s customer-feedback test say the bikes are’a highly valuable service,’ and 20 % say they are one of the reasons they chose the hotel.

Astrid Boh, a management consultant from Frankfurt who prepared a room at the Hotel Gates for a business journey at the end of March, did not know about the bikes before her arrival. But after hearing about them at the reception desk, she was glad she had taken a taxi from the airfield instead of hiring an auto.

‘Parking is a challenge in Berlin,’ recounted Ms. Boh, who pedaled to a business meeting, shops and even out to dinner at night. ‘I liked being able to get somewhere fast and get some exercise at the same time.’

Some hotels organize with nearby bike shops to have bikes on hand for guests. A day’s use of a bike is included in the Green, Greener, Berlin package at the Mvenpick Hotel Berlin, which rents the bikes from a local company. The package also includes bath salts, possibly for relaxing sore muscles after astrenuous outing.

But increasingly hostels are making an investment in their own fleets – and picking models that reinforce the identity of the hotel.

In August, Le Meurice, a Parisian hotel that occupies an 1835 palace across from the Tuileries, revealed 5 retro-style bikes in the blue-green shade of the oxidized copper roofs of the city, with matching helmets and front baskets emblazoned with the hotel’s gold emblem. Yankee and UK guests in their 30s have a tendency to be the most avid customers, according to the hotel ; Le Meurice’s sister hotel, the plaza Athne, opted for zippy red bikes with panniers.

At the Victoria-Jungfrau Grand Hotel & Spa in Interlaken in the Swiss Alps, guests can check out Scott mountain bikes – the same model that the Liverpool soccer Club, which utilised the hotel as its training base for the last two summers, rode to get to and from soccer practice, pedaling in their red-and-black training shorts and jerseys while fans lined their trail.

Staff members at the ME Barcelona, part of the Sol Meli hotel chain, visited many bike shops before settling on the silvery fold-up bikes that were introduced in Sep at the hotel, housed in a modernist tower clad in anodized aluminum.

‘We always like to be on the fringe of technology,’ said Pete Zudyk, vice president for brand invention and communication for Sol Meli.

naturally, some hostels have provided bikes for many years. The Hotel Hassler in Rome has had them for two decades, according to Vivian Barsanti, the media and promoting coordinator.

In bike-happy Copenhagen, which has special miniature traffic lights for bicyclists and clearly marked cycling lanes, bicycles have for a while been a standard hotel offering..