Party While You Pedal: Beer Biking in Amsterdam (Time.com)

On a chilly Saturday in October, Mark Hitchcock and nine of his friends from New Zealand kicked off a four-day bachelor party in Amsterdam with a bit of sightseeing. Rather than admiring the canals on a boat tour or sampling mild hallucinogens at a coffee shop, however, they opted for something a bit more active - the 10 men mounted a special 17-foot long bicycle decked out with a bar and, yes, a karaoke machine. It only took 10 minutes (and a couple beers) before they removed their shirts, relishing the attention from female tourists on the street. "How do we get on?" an American twenty-something asked. The group response? "Take off your underwear!"



Welcome aboard the Amsterdam beer bike. In recent years, the peddle-powered bar-on-wheels has become a popular draw for tourists who want to combine city cruising with daytime boozing. Ard Karsten, the Dutch founder of the company Beerbike.co.uk, says his excursions are not only about the drinking, though. He says they help to build teamwork among passengers who must squeeze through narrow streets and power themselves over steep hills. The beer bike also provides an environmentally friendly alternative to gas-guzzling bus and boat tours. "Riding a bike while having a beer is simply amazing," Karsten says as the Kiwis blast Eye of the Tiger from the karaoke machine. "It`s a new and unique way to see Amsterdam." (See a TIME video on beer-biking.)



But while tourists have certainly embraced the service - nearly 10,000 Americans, Brits and other foreigners rode Karsten`s bikes in 2009 - locals remain ambivalent about the booze bike. Those in the tourism industry understand that the city makes a lot of money from the legions of visitors who come to Amsterdam to get drunk and stoned. But as opponents point out, most tourists do so in bars or cafÉs - not on the street. "We look at it with horror," says Ton Boon, a spokesperson for the city`s Centrum Borough, the quaint, canal-lined central part of the city. "It brings in one kind of tourist and chases away another."



The bikes hold 10 to 22 people, and when the drinking starts, the noise pollution is difficult to ignore. Wanda Nikkels, a journalist who lives in the Red Light District, says that as the passengers consume more and more beer, they grow louder and peddle slower, blocking traffic. They also have a habit of verbally harassing locals, trampling flowerbeds and steering into pedestrian-only zones. "Recently there was a group of guys who parked their bike in front of some hookers and the girls made a live show and the boys kept screaming," she says. "It was just 12 o`clock in the afternoon." (See pictures of bikes.)



These days may be coming to an end, however. In January, city officials will unveil rules - months in the making - that could force the city`s three beer bike companies to provide designated drivers, cap alcohol consumption and follow pre-approved routes. The move follows a series of high-profile accidents last summer. In one incident, 11 women crashed their beer bike into a viaduct and several of them hit the pavement. One was hospitalized with a concussion, another broke several ribs and a third lost the tip of a finger. "It`s an uncontrolled projectile," says Karin Wolfs, an Amsterdam resident who broke a finger when a beer bike hit her motorcycle in June and sent her flying. "Who came up with the idea to drink beer while driving on public roads?"



That would be Karsten, whose beer bike company, founded in 2004, was the first in Amsterdam. Despite the brouhaha, he sticks by the safety of his vehicles, noting that both of these accidents involved rival companies. The cost of Karsten`s bike - two-hour tours with 30 liters of beer start at $680 - includes a tour guide and designated driver, as well as insurance "against damages to participants and third parties." (Read: "Conceptual Art`s Dutch Treat.")



Karsten also works hard to limit disruptions to local residents: he makes sure that the guide stops the bike every 20 minutes near a restaurant or hotel so customers can relieve themselves. "I hate when they pee on the street," he says. "It looks unprofessional." And, admitting that his drunken tourists block traffic when they struggle to peddle, he will add an electrical mechanism to the undercarriage in 2010 to "help push the bike forward." In a city known for its tolerance, these efforts may be enough to assuage angry residents - and keep the beer flowing, and the bike rolling, for years to come.



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