For most of us, vacations are a time to relax and slow down. But for Ed Springman and Roger Winter, it’s an opportunity to put their physical fitness to the test as they explore natural and cultural wonders around the world. Whether it’s walking up a mountain slope for eight hours—wearing skis—for a thrilling 6,000-foot descent in Alaska, scaling an ice
crevasse on Mount Kilimanjaro or diving among sharks in the temperate waters off the coast of Belize, Ed and Roger are living proof that hard work at the gym really pays off, especially for two guys who turn
70 this year.
Age has yet to slow down these intrepid travelers. At age 63, Roger successfully climbed to the 19,570-foot summit of Ecuador’s Mount Cotopaxi in 1999. His guide said he set a new record for oldest climber, surpassing the previous record holder who was 55. As for Ed, he was back lacing up his hiking boots just six months after a hip replacement several years ago.
Most Ed-ventures, as Roger calls them, take place on their road bikes, which have logged thousands of miles both locally and abroad. These road warriors have participated in group rides, such as the 157-mile, 10,000-feet vertical gain RAMROD (Ride Around Mount Rainier in One Day); the 200-mile STP (Seattle to Portland); the 185-mile RSVP (Ride from Seattle to Vancouver, British Columbia, and Party); a 100-mile ride from Wenatchee to Lake Chelan; and an arduous climb to the top of Mount Evans in Colorado, a climb of more than 4,000 feet to the 14,200-foot summit.
Ed & Roger walked up an Alaskan mountain slope on their skis for eight hours.
Internationally they have biked through the Canary Islands and Morocco and pedaled from Spain
to Portugal and from Prague to Budapest by way of Vienna. “You see a lot more than if you were
driving through,” Ed says.
Bellevue Club friends joined the pair on a cycling trip to the Canary Islands: Phyllis Lindsey, Ed Springman, John Rogers, Steve Skony & Wes Williams (l-r).
For their latest cycling Ed-venture, the two headed to Vietnam, a destination only just being discovered by Western tourists, and biked from Hanoi to Saigon. In and around Lang Son, a northern city close to the Chinese border, and the former capital of Hue, they rode mountain roads with a dazzling view of the South China Sea below them. Their endurance impressed their Vietnamese guide. “He said that Ed and I are the oldest guys he has ever had,” Roger wrote in e-mails home to his wife, Marlene. “And we were the only ones to bike over the mountain passes. All his other parties had to be picked up on the way up by the van!” They had plenty of company on the road, since bicycles are a major form of transportation in this developing nation. Riding along one day, a group of schoolboys in black pants and white
shirts rode up beside them, wanting to race. “Bicycling is so much more personal than driving along or being on a tour bus,” Ed says. Meanwhile adults rode by
on their bikes with squealing pigs, honking ducks, even a small fishing boat strapped in back, or yoked with baskets brimming with rice or fruit. Everyone makes room for each other, but as Ed and Roger quickly learned, water buffalos always get the right of way.
Going to a country once a battlefield for American soldiers also made the trip special. “Many people are hesitant to visit Vietnam because of the war,” Roger says. But people were never less than friendly and welcoming. “People wanted to meet us,” he says. Vietnamese on the street and in the villages constantly waved and yelled, “Hello.” On one stop along the road, farmers harvesting rice showed Ed how to use a threshing machine to separate the grains from the stalk. As Northwesterners, Ed and Roger know how to deal with the rain, but cycling in a monsoon required different riding skills as the downpour turned
Roger & Ed cycling in Vietnam.
ruts in the road into canals and potholes into vernal pools. One almost sent Ed over his handlebars. “It was a puddle of water, about eight inches deep,”
he says. “When I got to the end, I found out it was eight inches straight down.” Despite the surprise when his front tire hit the edge, Ed managed to keep his balance and avoid a spill in the muddy red dirt. “After that we learned to ride very slowly through those ditches,” he adds.
Roger traded his bike for a different form of transportation in Morocco.
Still those muddy roads seemed easier to traverse compared to crossing the chaotic streets of the cities. Trucks, bikes, mopeds and pedestrians jockey for space on roads that hardly seem wide enough to accommodate everyone. But Ed and Roger quickly figured out how it’s done. “You pedal through at a consistent speed, not too fast, not too slow
and avoid people coming the other way,” Ed says. “Somehow it works.” On the 16-day trip, they rode between 40 and 60 miles a day with still enough time to enjoy visits to elaborate mausoleums of ancient emperors, Buddhist pagodas and a 300-step walk up to Marble Mountain in Da Nang to view an impressive image of Buddha carved into the rock.
Roger calls adventure cycling “the perfect excuse to staying in shape.” But it’s not the only excuse. “Both
of us have young wives we have to keep up with,” he jokes, referring to Marlene, and Ed’s wife, Jane Hague.
In between trips, Ed and Roger can be found at the Club’s Indoor Cycling spin class three times week starting at 5:30 a.m. They credit the high-intensity workout, along with regular weight training, for building the strength and endurance they draw on so heavily in their outdoor spinning. It’s an exercise routine they’ve followed for more than 15 years. But in addition to burning calories by the hundreds, the class and its regulars can be a source of motivation, mostly in the form of
86-year-old John Rogers, a fellow indoor cycler also known for his salsa dancing. “He’s a real inspiration to people like Roger and me, who are still young,” Ed says.
Roger & Ed took a break to visit the Thanh Hoa mausoleum, south of Hanoi.
Physical fitness has long been a passion for both men, going back to their teen years. On the East Coast, Ed was a regular on the Appalachian Trail, while Roger was ticking off successful summits of Mount Rainier and peaks on the Olympic Peninsula. Both men earned Eagle Scout rank in the Boy Scouts. But being fit isn’t enough for some of their more daring travels. It’s also attitude, and the two easy-going friends, who’ve known each other for more than 40 years, make for a very compatible traveling team. “We take things as they come,” Roger says. Plus, Ed adds, “Nobody else wants to come with us on some of these.”
