Zephyr Adventures was founded in 1997 in Minneapolis as the world's first inline skating tour company. 26 years later, it still offers vacations for inline skaters around the world.
Inline Skating Tours
No one really knew whether inline skating vacations could work. Nevertheless, in April of 1997 the founder of Zephyr, Allan Wright, quit his desk job at Cargill to travel to The Netherlands to set up its first tour location. The Netherlands was perfect: very flat, thousands of miles of paved paths, and exotic enough to attract the attention of the press and skaters alike.
The tour company ran three small tours in The Netherlands that first year with a total (across all three tours) of 11 customers. It was just enough to give Wright the motivation to continue. The next year, Zephyr was running skating vacations in The Netherlands, Minnesota, and California's Wine Country. It even ran three-day tours in the Pennsylvania Amish Country, hiring an Amish skater as a guide and escorting dozens of inline skaters as they cruised alongside horses and buggies.
On an inline skating vacation, travelers enjoy a favorite activity in a scenic area of the world, while also getting to relish in the culture and cuisine of the destination. This unique vacation opportunity is especially distinctive because a skate tour is comprised of a keen group of enthusiasts who share the same enthusiasm for the sport and often leave with new friends from around the country.
Zephyr at the NorthShore Inline Marathon
Zephyr first sponsored the NorthShore Inline Marathon back in 1998—25 years ago! Since then, the tour company has been at the marathon every few years, whenever they were not traveling the globe running skating vacations. Even while races have come and gone, and the ranks of skaters have ebbed and flowed across the world, the NorthShore Inline Marathon and Zephyr have supported the inline skating industry.
The Evolution of Zephyr Adventures
After inline skating peaked and then saw less new enthusiasm for the sport, Zephyr survived by expanding into other activities, running trips around the world focused on hiking, biking, kayaking, snowshoeing, and more. The company is a collection of three small travel brands, also including Taste Vacations with food, wine and beer tours across the globe, and Travel Montana & Yellowstone focused on bringing travelers to the state and national parks to explore and adventure.
Inline Skating Here to Stay
Skaters enjoy the tours because they get to do what they love in the company of other skaters, in exotic locations, with all the details taken care of by Zephyr and its skating guides. In 2025 Zephyr Adventures will be running inline skating vacations to TWO new destinations! This niche sport translates into one of the most exciting vacation experiences when coordinated in a destination with an ideal trail system, which is definitely the case on Germany’s Flaeming Skating Adventure, September 18-24, 2025. Go international to possibly the best multi-day skating location in the world in a region that manages its paths to be ideal for inline skaters, with 10-foot wide, car-free, pristine pavement in a series of connected loops. Plus, explore the cute small towns and enjoy the scenery of the Brandenburg region south of Berlin. If you’d like to try out the concept closer to home first, then don’t miss the Iowa Inline Skating Adventure, October 2 – 6, 2025. With hundreds of miles of concrete, off-road, flat, interconnected paths it is perhaps the best and most unexpected skating locale in the U.S. Give Iowa a try for fantastic skating, farmland solitude, and a great variety of Americana and a capital city to explore.
Zephyr Adventures is proud to support the NorthShore Inline Marathon and invites its community to join them on an inline skating tour.