We also loved seeing Jesús Freire, of the European Cyclists Federation, telling us about the project Eurovelo in Europe and in Spain. In addition to great friends like Carmen Aycart and Arantxa Hernández de  Greenways and Mercedes Muñoz of the European Greenways Association, speaking respectively of economic impact of cycle tourism in Europe, of the situation of the program Greenways in Spain and the force of the movement of Greenways in Europe.

Another important perspective was also provided by Iker Urcelay, from the Basque Tourism Agency, Basketball, who told us about the Greenways in Euskadi and, above all, how they have specialized their promotion based on segmentation and tourism product creation, with undoubted success. For us it is very clear that this is the right path, to create a product and segment to reach the audience of interest. Montserrat Jaén, General Director of Tourism of the Government of the Balearic Islands, presented “Cycle tourism: a booming tourism product in the Balearic Islands”.

The economic results are overwhelming, the figures show the importance of the sector for the islands. With a proposal quite different from the rest of the state, since in the Balearic Islands a much more sporty bicycle tourism prevails, with the road bicycle as a fundamental element and establishments very specialized in providing services to cycle tourists. Something that they have even favored at the legislative level, betting on considering improvements in quality of services that contribute to deseasonalize supply and thus they have recognized as such parking and garages for bicycles and other services intended for cyclists.

Rutas Pangea participated with a presentation focused on creation of bicycle tourism products, insisting that we must go beyond the mere creation of an itinerary, which is not enough to have a tourism product. We discuss the importance of two key actors: the first, the Clients, the tourists who do bicycle trips, our reason for being. AND second local businesses, they are the final recipient of a good part of the clients who visit the Greenways and other bike tours. We have to continue working, and the administration has to support decisively, to increase its tourism, management and marketing training to ensure that Spain can truly stand out as bicycle tourism destination. There are magnificent conditions, but we must continue working and be constant in that effort. We are firmly convinced that we are an ideal destination for cycling holidays in europe and we bet on this formula that is framed in the currents of the ecotourism and the Responsible tourism.

We leave you the presentation that we used on the day and also the document of the tourism product creation methodology which we carry out together with the Spanish Railways Foundation and the Vía Verde de la Sierra, Cádiz in the European project Greenways Product which ended in September 2014.

At the end of the day we had a brief business meeting, with the intention of laying the foundations for a working group that promotes the development of cycling products on the Greenways and their subsequent commercialization. A very necessary initiative and one that we trust we can continue to consolidate.

A abrazo.