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An American in Cuba: No ordinary bike, no ordinary journey
November 26, 1997
Foster on his bike
Web posted at: 9:42 p.m. EST (0242 GMT)HAVANA (CNN) -- In Cuba, where cycling is the main form of transportation, a bicycle hardly turns heads. But what Kevin Foster rides is hardly an ordinary bike.
Crowds are drawn to Foster's bike, which he generously allows admirers to try out.
A Ferrari of bicycles, it cost $20,000 and took 18 months to build. It is made of carbon fiber and aluminum, has front and rear shocks, hydraulic brakes and something else most Cubans have never seen -- pedals that bike shoes can click into.
Most Cubans probably have never seen anyone quite like Foster, who calls himself Captain America and wears a cycling shirt and a head-scarf covered with stars and stripes.
Foster is in Cuba to become the first person to cycle from one end of the island nation to the other, through every province -- a 1,200-mile journey he expects to finish just before Christmas.
Long, arduous cycling trips are not new to Foster.
In 1990, he became the first person to cycle 2,000 miles along the Great Wall of China.
Back home in the United States, he took his bike a few years ago to the highest point of every state -- including Alaska's Mount McKinley.
It was in Alaska when Foster decided to make the trip to Cuba. The temperature had fallen to 40 degrees below zero.
"I was stuck in my tent for five days in Alaska freezing. I thought, 'This is too much. I want to go somewhere warm next time,'" he said.
But this trip is more than just an athlete's endurance test, Foster said. He wants to promote friendship between the United States and Cuba.
"I think it's time. ... If we can lighten up with China and Vietnam, we can lighten up with Cuba," he said.
Havana Bureau Chief Lucia Newman contributed to this report.
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