Six years ago, Shannon Galpin walked away from her career as an athletic trainer and used her own limited funds to launch Mountain2Mountain and “be the change” she wished to see in the world. Today, Shannon and the M2M team, are just returning from their latest trip to Afghanistan where they launched the Streets of Afghanistan project and rode bicycles through Kabul to raise awareness of cultural barriers and empower women and girls in conflict regions.

As big supporters of Shannon and the M2M work she does, we’re happy to stay in touch with her and get period updates throughout her travels. That said, we’re also excited to share what she has to show and tell from those very journeys, the latest of which center around the Streets of Afghanistan project. Here’s the latest from Shannon both in words and in pictures. Enjoy!

“Yesterday we had the finale show of the Streets of Afghanistan exhibition at the Sound Central music festival — its up for four days throughout the incredible  four-day alternative music festival.  Yesterday was the women’s only day to kick off the festival, where young Afghan school girls attended the festival for slam poetry, a fashion show, Afghan rap duo, Afghan singer songwriter, Ariana Delwari, and White City — fronted by my long time friend, advisor, and founder of Sound Central, Travis Beard.  We brought three members of the cycling team to watch the concert and to help with the M2M Bike School.

All in all a full day. Streets exhibition set up and finale show at Sound Central Festival, M2M bike school and rock concert, finished with filming at Darul Aman Palace. Whitney, the co-director of Afghan cycles is leaving today, and then our crew is just a duo until we leave.  Whitney has been amazing, and creates a sense of community, friendship, and openness wherever we go, she interacts with the Afghans we meet with grace, humor, and authenticity that I have rarely seen.  Her infectious laugh combined with everyone’s exhaustion at the end of the long days makes for a slap-happy crew.

Exhaustion is starting to take hold, but perhaps that will just make the plane ride home go quicker as we sleep our way home.”

Active Lifestyle, Adventure, Advocacy, Bikes Around the World, International, Non-profits, Osprey Athletes, Osprey Life, Pedaling Change, Photos advenure, Afghanistan, bike, cycle, home, mountain 2 mountain, shannon galpin, Streets of Afghanistan, travel, women

We are so utterly grateful for the incredible shots our Osprey fans share with us on a daily basis on Facebook because we love seeing where your packs get to go! Here’s one of many, many awesome shots shared with us most recently (above).

Keep ‘em coming, Osprey friends!

Thanks to Brian Buckle for sharing!

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It’s time to celebrate; May is National Bike Month! That means wherever you live, no matter what city or state, you can take part in something as simple and beautiful as riding your bike.

The League of American Bicyclists has a fantastic website with all of the key dates for this month’s happenings, so if you want to stay in the loop, check here. If you want to partake in an event in your neck of the woods but don’t have the inside scoop, search here by city, state or zip code.

Looking for more National Bike Month info to digest? Check out the League of American Bicyclists blog for inspiring, motivating and informing posts centered around cycling. And while you’re at it, check out the video at the top of this post, a PSA of sorts created by the San Francisco Bicycle Coalition that asks the question: “Why ride a bike?”

Happy cycling!

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We love it when Osprey owners share shots of their outdoor adventures with us, especially when they’re as amazing as this!

The above shot — which makes her mountain biking buddy look like he’s cycling on top of the world – was posted by Andrea Codda.

Happy adventuring and happy cycling!

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Just a little over one year ago, Adventure Cycling Association teamed up with Blanche van der Meer and her WorldCycle Videos group on Vimeo and launched their first-ever Bicycle Travel Video Contest. The premise of the competition was simple: “to celebrate the booming trend in bike touring and travel documentaries.” The result, thanks to some fantastic volunteer judges, is several fantastic videos that capture the essence of cycling.

This beautiful video won for Best Portrait of a Traveling Cyclist. Adventure Cycling Association explained its win in these words:

“It’s an upbeat, humorous video focusing on Erin Inglish’s preparation for her Earth*Bike*Banjo tour down the California coast. (One judge’s take: “Fun, and funny!”)”

The film synopsis itself goes something like this: “One new album. One Bicycle. One banjo. One Month. One thousand miles. “Mama Like” is truly a one-of-a-kind comedic homage to Mother Earth through music and Charlie-Chaplin-esque cinematography.”

Watch and enjoy the lighthearted nature of this delightful short film.

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Just a little over one year ago, Adventure Cycling Association teamed up with Blanche van der Meer and her WorldCycle Videos group on Vimeo and launched their first-ever Bicycle Travel Video Contest. The premise of the competition was simple: “to celebrate the booming trend in bike touring and travel documentaries.” The result, thanks to some fantastic volunteer judges, is several fantastic videos that capture the essence of cycling.

The above video won for the category of Best Overnight Bike Video. Here’s why, according to Adventure Cycling Association:

“Inspired by the work of one of our judges, Alastair Humphries, Sam ventures by bike into the Catskill Mountains for the first time, and on a cold winter weekend to boot. This video nicely illustrates that even the shortest of bike tours can be long on adventure.”

Stay tuned for the third of these winning films, which we’ll publish next week!

Active Lifestyle, Adventure, Pedaling Change, Video adventure, Bicycle Travel Video Contest, bike, bike tour, Catskill Mountains, cycle

Just a little over one year ago, Adventure Cycling Association teamed up with Blanche van der Meer and her WorldCycle Videos group on Vimeo and launched their first-ever Bicycle Travel Video Contest. The premise of the competition was simple: “to celebrate the booming trend in bike touring and travel documentaries.” The result, thanks to some fantastic volunteer judges, is several fantastic videos that capture the essence of cycling. There were three winning videos, including the above, which was considered the Best Long Distance Tour Video. Watch Northern Europe by Bike by Stefan Böhm of Germany and enjoy! All submitted films were also considered for the Bike Travel Spirit Award, and this film took the prize. Here’s what Adventure Cycling Association had to say about the film:

Only two and a half minutes long, it’s a powerful piece of work. According to one of our judges, it is a “creative, entertaining video that demonstrates you don’t need fancy graphics, effects, or a soundtrack to tell a good story. Unlike many other videos that were submitted, he included the locations, which we liked. He documents the good, the bad, and the ugly of bicycle touring, while including the bizarre and noteworthy encounters he experienced along his journey. Shooting and editing were great too.”

Stay tuned for the following two winning films, which we’ll publish in the coming two weeks!

Active Lifestyle, Adventure, Bike Europe, Bikes Around the World, International, Pedaling Change, Video Adventure Cycling Assoc, bike, cycle, Europe, Germany, tour, travel

“I still remeber the simple pleasure of riding my bike to little league baseball in my uniform.” Andy Traslin graduated to carrying his skis.

Osprey Athletes the Traslin Brothers (Mike & Andy) have been skiing their entire lives. Growing up in the mountains, their snow endeavors were only natural. As such, this photo by Mike Traslin of Andy riding with skis on his back is exemplary of their lives. We hope it inspires you to get out and go!

Thanks to Mike Traslin for sharing this shot with us on Facebook!

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March came with the onset of spring. April comes with the opportunity to ride your bike every single day. It’s time to throw out your excuses and pull on your bike shorts! 30 Days of Biking has a motivational vid (above) and all the information you need to get started (below):

30 Days of Biking, whose fourth year begins April 1, has one rule: Bike somewhere every day for 30 days—around the block, 20 miles to work, whatever suits you—then share your adventures online. We advocate daily bicycling because we believe it enriches lives and preserves the Earth. A worldwide, thousands-strong community of joyful cyclists has been forming around that idea since April 2010—and will further amass in 2013! We ride our bikes every day.

Sign up at 30DOB.com

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We love when we get the opportunity to see our packs in action — especially when our very own customers send shots of themselves or their friends getting everything out of a pack we had ever intended for it. The photo above, posted to our Facebook Page by Melissa Liebling, is an incredible shot of the Osprey Verve 9 doing it’s duty out on the trail.

Thanks to Melissa for sharing!

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