1,000-mile trek by ‘power people’ sends bright message

Liz Tylander, Lara Sheets and Kat Shiffler to focus on "Healthy Harvests"

By: Carolyn Foote Edelmann
   What happens when three young women — convinced that food grown locally is vital, and concerned that whole foods have taken on elitist overtones — put their heads together in search of solutions? They dream up "a people-powered" bicycle trip from Washington, D.C., to Montreal, beginning with a "guerrilla garden" in their own backyard.
   A guerrilla garden, you say? In their words, it’s "like squatting on a space of land and transforming it into productive ‘greenspace.’ People practice this by planting flowers in medians and vegetables in vacant lots."
   From D.C. to Canada, Liz Tylander, Lara Sheets and Kat Shiffler will magnetize attention to the healthy, the sustainable and, especially, the local in the realm of food. Their mission is to focus attention upon the "Healthy Harvests."
   Their journey was launched with 30 other cyclists on National Bike-to-Work Day. Its grand finale will be celebrated alongside Montreal’s Santropal Roulant, a nonprofit that combats "social and economic isolation" with meals-on-wheels — delivered by bikes and skates.
   "The Women’s Garden Cycles Bike Tour" is designed to alert the public to particular healthy food challenges encountered by urban and disadvantaged people. Liz, Lara and Kat insist that local healthy foods are the right of all.
   When they are not cycling, Liz and Kara are busy rejuvenating a community garden in D.C. Kat recently lived and worked as a journalist in Bhutan. Lara and Kat "freelance as natural builders in rural Maryland." Luckily, their freelancing endeavors also include "bike mechanics, as well as landscaping and substitute teaching."
   Their "roving documentary tour" will link establishments from Community Supported Agriculture (CSA) farms to schools, restaurants and beyond.
   Traveling on two wheels illustrates life beyond fossil fuels. The women’s concept is to "document local alternatives to industrial agricultural models." A team of filmmakers is creating a documentary of their excursion.
   Local experts coordinate tours in each town along their routes. In Princeton and Lawrence, the cyclists’ coordinator is Fran McManus, marketing and communications director of The Whole Earth Center in Princeton. Visit dates are Thursday and Friday.
   Local appearances include Isles Community Gardens in Trenton on Thursday. This flourishing inner-city program is known for its "understanding of health and environmental conditions." Isles works to "connect government officials with local residents and environmental and health professionals."
   The cyclists’ visit is intended to awaken non-city dwellers to the challenges encountered by inner-city gardeners, including debris, lack of space and severe pollution.
   The women’s wheels will then spin them to The Lawrenceville School, to Lawrence’s Neighborhood Service Center Garden and its elementary school garden. Chambers Walk Café is on their itinerary, along with a cheese tasting at Cherry Grove Farm.
   On their way out of town, the cyclists will stop at the bountiful Lawrenceville Community Gardens, which span the east side of Route 206.
   The women will next roll into Lawrence’s Terhune Orchards. Terhune provides foods and festivals year round. Mediterra Restaurant in Princeton will complete Thursday’s healthy food investigations.
   Princeton’s school gardens at Johnson Park, Community Park, Riverside and Littlebrook will occupy the cyclists on Friday.
   Beyond the elementary schools, the cyclists will wheel on over to the Forbes College Garden and Princeton University Community Garden. Lunch awaits at Small World Coffee, followed by a sweet afternoon interlude at the bent spoon.
   The cyclists, Whole Earth and the bent spoon travel similar trajectories. These missionaries-on-wheels lament the state of the nation’s "malnourished capital city." But the Women’s Garden Cycles Bike Tour highlights the malnourished condition of all too many Americans. If the D.C. cyclists have anything to say about it, from here on in, the towns, cities and villages along their route will think twice before reaching for packaged foods.
   Since key grant support fell through right before the women’s trip, donations are welcome. Checks should be made out to Women’s Garden Cycles Bike Tour, c/o Liz Tylander, 2603 Connecticut Ave., NW, Apt. 2, Washington, D.C. 20008. The women are budgeting $10 per person per day.
   To communicate with the cyclists, write to [email protected].
On the Web: http://womensgardencycles.wordpress.com.
To reach Fran McManus of The Whole Earth Center in Princeton, call (609) 921-0835 or write to [email protected].