By Kristina Charania
Photos by Jenny Waters
With bike parking indoors, Musette Caffe is Vancouver’s first bike-friendly cafe
In life, there are those who can text on their iPhones with one hand, sip a coffee with the other, ride their decked-out bike, and look like total bosses, all at the same time. But whether you’re a practiced cycling acrobat, an amateur mountain biker, a mom of two, or a sleepy kinesiology student, Musette Caffe is a cyclist-oriented coffee stop open to everyone.
“As a cyclist, you always start off with a coffee in the morning,” says Thomas Eleizegui, the owner of Musette Caffe. “I thought Vancouver could use [a bike friendly cafe], being a cycling city as it is.”
Located down a West End alley, you’ve got to turn off Google Maps and use your good old fashioned sense of direction to find this bike-friendly Vancouver gem. Although the lunch menu is simple, the gluten-free snacks like the made-in-house salted chocolate walnut bars and brews featuring 49th Parallel beans will rock your helmet off and prove that quality is truly better than quantity.
Putting food and drink aside, Musette Caffe is a far cry from your regular cafe. Imagine the picturesque, cozy hangout that you’d find as a substitute for Central Perk if Joey and Phoebe from Friends were pro cyclists. The coffee stop’s mom-and-pop shop aura is brought to life by displays of cycling memorabilia that pay homage to European bike culture.
Eleizegui has collected the cafe’s decor for over a period of six years – a warm turquoise Bianchi bike fastened onto a side wall compliments a collection of hung jerseys and trinkets ranging from cycling Lego sets to a cluster of Russian dolls from the U.S. Postal Cycling Team.
The most intriguing part of the cafe is the back wall, which features a picture collage of Eleizegui’s favourite professional cyclists and a few photos of Didi Senft, a man who dresses up as an angry red devil for every major Giro and Tour de France.
“Eventually, I want to fill the wall up with pictures of the guys that regularly come in here,” says Eleizegui.
Unlike the majority of staff at popular coffee house chains, each Musette Caffe employee goes the extra mile to cater to individual customers and build lasting relationships with every customer, whether they have any cycling knowledge or not. “It’s not just about the coffee and the commute. It’s about our atmosphere and having everyone together to watch a race, or hearing stories about someone’s ride,” says Eleizegui.
Most importantly, the cafe does its share to engage the community it serves by taking fair advantage of the nearby Hornby Street bike route. Musette collaborates with Lululemon to host Monday morning and Thursday evening bike rides, open to cyclists of all experience levels. “Anybody’s welcome to come, and one person will stay back so no one gets dropped. It’s an easy ride to start off the week,” says Eleizegui.
As the cafe establishes its niche and gains a following, Eleizegui aspires to take another step forward to give back to Vancouver’s cycling society by bridging the arising gap between younger cyclists and older professionals that are ready to retire.
“Next year, I want to start putting money back into a junior cycling team. A lot of people are getting into it, now, but we’re still missing a big gap with the kids.”
Eleizegui also mentions donating to a cycling charity that sends bikes to Africa to improve local transportation. Efforts like these are difficult to realize in the first few months of a small business, but with the cafe’s success since it opened in March, those dreams are close at hand.
