Every Sunday morning, car fans from around the Santa Barbara area gather at Manning Park in Montecito for a 2 hour informal car show and BS fest called Cars and Coffee. I’ll admit that I’m still a car guy so I drop into the C&C most weeks. Yesterday, I decided to show one of my exotic cars – my Milan SL. I pulled my ratty Odyssey mini-van into one of the outer parking spots (the inner spaces are informally reserved for the exotics and high dollar cars). A few people took notice when I opened the back door, slid the Milan out and set it on the ground.

After answering a few of the usual questions, I hopped in and did a slow lap around the lot back to my car. When I climbed out, I was surprised to see that quite a few onlookers had left the exotic cars and followed me to have a look at my “No Motor” velomobile. I explained the design and some of the features of the Milan to these observers in car terms such as “monocoque” and “Macpherson Strut”. I heard a lot of “thanks for sharing this” and “this is so cool”. I’m sure there were no converts among them, but I think they developed an appreciation of my “bicycle for car guys”. It was fun.