Help us congratulate our Bike Giveaway winner Jack W. from Stanwood, Washington!

When notified of his win, Jack said, “This is unreal, I never win anything! I feel so lucky to have won and can’t wait to ride my new Surly on some bike packing tours later this summer.”

Jack’s new Surly Straggler is on order at his favorite bike shop and should be in by the end of the month. We will share some pics of Jack and his new ride when it arrives at his doorstep.

THANK YOU to everyone who donated and entered the drawing!

Huge THANKS to all who took the time to complete our recent Technology Survey. Your feedback is greatly appreciated.

Congratulations to the winners of our drawing! These lucky users will receive either a Warmshowers Wooden Sign, a $50 Bike Shop Gift Card, or a one-year subscription to the Warmshowers Mobile App.

From England and Germany to Washington, Michigan and Hawaii, Larry and Patty Ehlinger of Rome, New York have welcomed bicyclists near and far for the last 13 years, most recently hosting their 100th guest.

As the cycling touring season ended in 2019, the Ehlingers had 99 visits. With the coronavirus raging in 2020, the couple wasn’t able to host a single person. However, on Memorial Day, the Ehlingers received an email from a young woman looking for a place to stay for the night. Aysha Habbaba became their lucky 100th guest!

Larry and Patty make it a point to never forget a single cyclist who has passed through their home. Numerous photos are taken during their stay, and the couple also records the dates of their visits, hometowns and a brief explanation about their journey. All this information has been compiled into now, a third album.

Thanks for being such great hosts. Here's to the next 100 guests!

For our second Host's Corner installment, I want to pass along some tips for creating a winning Warmshowers profile.

Over the years, I have read quite a few profiles of those actively riding and those who open their doors to host. Some folks spell things out pretty well; others simply do not share much at all.

When I first got into hosting in 2011, many of my local friend's initial reaction was, "Do you trust complete strangers to stay in your home?" To which I always answer, "Newsflash, criminals are lazy and not too bright; they do not ride 80 miles on a bike to come rob me. So yes, I trust them." And I've never had a reason to stop saying that. But I have learned to set expectations. 

We have TWO great shows for you to check out!

You can find Bike Life on all of your favorite listening apps.

Thank you to our partner BikeFlights for sponsoring the Bike Life Podcast!

Warmshowers is dedicated to providing a safe, supportive environment for all of its users. We are saddened by the recent handful of false reports and personal attacks against our volunteers, staff members, and participants in the community. Rest assured, Warmshowers continues to grow and flourish, and we are welcoming new users to our community each day.

A bit about us: Warmshowers started from a passion that became an interactive map of hosts across the globe. Over the years, this passion has grown with technology evolving from just a spreadsheet to its current web-based platform supporting over 180,000 registered users worldwide. Initially, our operations were 100% volunteer-based. Since 2015, and thanks to the generosity of our donors, we have had part time paid staff who work in conjunction with the board and volunteers to develop the web platform and grow our community. 

Lying prone on a sack of maize, hitchhiking in the back of a truck in Mozambique, I decided that I needed a new way of travelling. In Malawi, I bought a second-hand bicycle for seventy-five US dollars and a pair of Royal Mail panniers. For better or worse, when I was in Africa, I cobbled my gear together on the road, where quality consumer goods are few and far between. The other cyclists I met (and there weren't many of them) were sensible grown-ups with waterproof panniers and strong, reliable touring bicycles.

After one too many breakdowns that resulted in me screaming in a psychotic rage at my dilapidated bicycle and countless emergency roadside repairs, including a friendly Malawian using a corn husk to fix my chain and derailleur, I went home and bought a solid touring bicycle and panniers. When I set off through Latin America, I started to meet my fellow cicloviajeros again, but the roles had been reversed. I was now sporting cleated sandals and bulletproof tires; an Argentinian couple were riding bicycles they bought for five hundred pesos - roughly 25 US dollars. Mexicans, Costa Ricans, Argentinians, and Colombians were traversing the continent (in that mythical pre-pandemic age that was 2019) with varying amounts of money (somewhere between some spare change and literally zero dollars), bicycles you would hesitate to give to your teenager due to safety concerns, bizarre homemade panniers, precariously mounted racks and smiles as broad as the horizon.