After an intimidating check-in, security and departure process and an unexpected special escort right when I stepped out of the airplane in Israel I am now happy to be here. The hotel is right at the Tel Aviv Marina.
And the hotel is just on the edge of these nice beaches. With today’s 26 degrees it feels really warm compared to the recent Beijing temperatures.
The beach promenade has a two directional bike lane. Unfortunately many pedestrians do not care about these lines painted on the ground.
Funny was this part of the bike lane guiding you to ride directly onto the sand of the beach. That reminded me of some of the nobby tiles on the sidewalk for the blind people in Beijing streets that sometimes go right into a tree or a pole.
And as in most big cities around the world bike theft is an issue. Just to show the Beijing people who always claim bike theft is biggest in Beijing, here in Tel Aviv they steal anything off your bike. That hardly happens in Beijing. Be happy guys!
There is a nice view of Tel Aviv city from the hotel.
It was interesting to see how Tel Aviv deals with recycling plastic bottles. In various places there are these big cages for anybody to drop off their plastic bottles as well as unwanted CD and DVDs.
In the evening I finally got to meet Edan Topper who had contacted me years ago and then written an article about all kinds of cycling disciplines unknown in Israel. He included pictures of me doing artistic cycling. He was one of the guys that started the web platform Groopy for the diverse cycling community of Israel. That is now the biggest online cycling platform in Israel. There is also a whole article about track cycling and velodroms as there is none in Israel.
We had a great dinner together talking the whole time about cycling. He is a passionate road cyclist and loves riding. He would love to see better cycling infrastructure in Israel but is down to Earth in saying that the government should use the money first to focus on education and health care. After the dinner we went for a nice walk along the city promenade and then for some Spanish sparkling wine in Cava. It was very inspiring to talk to him.
