Bike For Breath

On World Asthma Day, carrying six panniers, two tents and one stuffed pink pig, Paula and Lorenz Eber set off on two tandem bicycles with their eleven year old daughter, Yvonne, and her thirteen year old sister, Anya. 480 days later, they returned to Washington D.C. having cycled a complete circle around the world by bicycle, raising $64,416 for clean air and asthma.

In 2022, Falcon Guides published a book about the family’s cycling adventures across Europe, Asia, the South Pacific and North America: Breathtaking: How one family cycled around the world for clean air and asthma. Filled with exciting stories of battling drug smugglers in Russia, an earthquake in Taiwan, a poisonous centipede in Tonga, and a tornado in North Dakota, Breathtaking not only inspires and entertains readers, but continues to raise money for asthma and clean air. Bike for Breath donates $1 to the asthma nonprofits, AAFA (Asthma and Allergy Foundation of America) and Saahns (which means Breathe), for every copy of Breathtaking sold.

The story does not end here. The Ebers founded Bike for Breath to encourage others to adventure by bicycle and help save our air, and lungs–one person at a time. The issues that motivated the Eber family to cycle across four continents and 24 countries around the world are becoming more serious every year. Many people in the U.S., Canada and now, Europe, have suddenly realized the importance of clean air as they battle smoke filled skies each summer—the result of rampant forest fires and climate change.  Meanwhile, asthma is on the rise; and is suspected to be a causal factor in Covid-19 deaths.

Bike for Breath’s goal is to encourage everyone—and especially families with children—to make our world a better place to breathe. We provide resources and education about asthma and clean air. And we offer events and an inspirational blog to encourage others to travel by bicycle—whether to the grocery store with your kids, or across the globe.