howies®

March’s Archive T-shirt of the Month is ‘Breathe’

By bike, by board, by foot and by yourself.
Get out there and find your diversion.
Look for some solitude.
And breathe it in…

Inhale, exhale.

Available in Sinatra Junior for men & Banana for women.

From 10pm until 2am our servers-somewhere-in-the-sky are under going maintenance.  So if you can’t read our blogs don’t worry we’ll be back in the by the time you wake up tomorrow.

It’s only affecting our blog not the main howies site.

So while we’re down, why not step outside and stare at the sky.

If you need an internet fix, you could head over to Ye olde brainfood blog circa 2008.

I really like this.

Fixed on the road. BMX off the road. Perfect.

Amy from Big Top Design just emailed in asking us to persuade her husband to wash his jeans!

James has had them six months and has worn them every day apart from when he was at wedding according to Amy.

We think they look amazing plus think of all that saved water too.

Here’s a tip to stop the ’smell:’ Freeze them over night, kills all the dirty bacteria.

Dear Rider,

This just a heads up to let you know that entries for the 2010 howies Dyfi Enduro will opened at 10am today. Spaces are limited to 650 riders.

We have been busy working hard to ensure that the 2010 is another one to remember, bands, films, beer, good food and a long ride in the woods. No better way to spend the May Bank Holiday weekend.

Cheers for now.

The howies Dyfi Enduro team.

The Do Lectures have announced their 2010 speakers over on their blog.

Looks like a pretty impressive bunch.

I’m especially looking forward to Maggie Doyne and Daniel Seddiqui. Read about them both over here.

The majority of our Spring catalogues have been posted out now. If you enjoyed our reading about the tales of our Ancestors Patagonian-Pioneering- Adventures, then head over to our flickr to see more of the images from our adventures.

The gallery contains James Bowden’s photos. All shot on film with either a Rollei 35 or a Hasselblaad 501CM.

If you find flickr slow and ugly I Hardly Know Her provides a much better visual experience.

Also James has a photo set of all his Hasselblaad portraits here.

Finally if you like to receive one of catalogues or download the PDF, fill in this form.

Way back in the Winter of 2008. Tim set a challenge: “The howies 36 hour door-to-door Bivvy bag challenge.”

The basic premise was this:

Armed with no more than a bivvy bag and sleeping bag to sleep in you leave the comfort of your homes for a night and do not come back for at least 36 hours. From the front door to front door, no motorized transport allowed at all and you must travel on foot for a minimun of 30 miles, sleeping out under the night sky in your bivvy for the evening. You can go where you want but it must be door to door and on foot. To keep it fair each entry will be classed as one even if you are not alone on your bivvy expedition.

Tim apologises for his lack of haste in blogging this as it has been a fair while! But here it is, Dan & David’s written account of their trip:

The phone call went much like this: “howies have got this challenge on their website, walk 30 miles and sleep in a bivvy bag” I said with much enthusiasm to my brother David on a Sunday a week before Christmas. “I’m up for that!” he said with eagerness, sealing our fate.
It was decided, we we’re doing it. Saturday 27th was our start date and we were aiming to walk the Camel Trail (http://www.ncdc.gov.uk/index.cfm?articleid=13629) from Wadebridge to Wenford Bridge and then walk up to Bodmin moor to sleep in King Arthur’s Hall. Easy! (Route link: http://explore.ordnancesurvey.co.uk/os_routes/show/6725 )
Sadly, training was aborted when a bus knocked me flying off my Vespa damaging both my knees. Thanks bus! Thankfully David managed to fit in 30 minutes of rowing…once.
Saturday morning, we’re up, packed and ready to go. It’s freezing, it’s dark and we are in shock partly due to the 23 kilos on our backs. Silently we get our first mile out of the way and start to enjoy it. The sun is coming up and we walk past places we played when we were younger. This isn’t going to be so bad after all.
We trudge on enjoying our surroundings and manage to scare a dog so much it runs backwards with its owner in tow. Later on David is told that his sleeping matt which is wrapped in a black plastic bag looks like a vulture. We put it down to that.
With effort we make it to Wenford Bridge and spend 2 hours cooking, relaxing and drinking tea. Feeling energised we head up to the moor before dark where we meet our Dad who walks the last mile with us. Having made it to King Arthur’s Hall we just have to survive the night!
By 9pm are all tucked up in our sleeping bags watching the stars. We can’t believe our luck when for a split second a shooting star appears, only the second one we have ever seen making our trip worth it.
A few times during the night we thought each other might have frozen to death when we couldn’t hear any breathing over the wind but we both wake up in the morning, cold, exhilarated and alive!
As we head back home we are surrounded by a flock of starlings flying somewhere after roosting for the night on the moor. Amazing.
It got a bit tough in the afternoon but a bout of hysterical laughing got us through the 25 mile mark. We stop at a picnic bench where we make tea and eat a lot of food, hoping it’s enough to get us home!
The next 5 miles are a lot easier and we stop to eat the last of our mint cake back at the start of the trail with big smiles on our faces. We head off home to a celebration and cup of tea.
People thought we were mad. Now they know we are mad.

Thanks howies!

For the full image gallery click here (or the image at the top)

We just had the first box of catalogues arrive here.

Nothing beats that smell.

The boys did good. It’s a great story of our welsh ancestors that left Wales in 1865 to find a new land: Patagonia.

We did the shoot in 2 parts. Half was done here in Cardigan. The other half was our journey to Trevelin, Patagonia (our twin town).

It’ll be dropping through your letter box sometime next week (request one here).

Our spring range went live on the website last night and you can view the catalogue PDF here if you can’t wait.

So Tim mentioned I would be unveiling something the other day.

We have started a blog over on tumblr. Everyday we will post a photo from our window of the transition from field to concrete. In the previous week things have really kicked off. Despite numerous protests and objections by the local community, the development has gone ahead.

Click here to view the blog.