But I always find myself forgetting the car’s home address when it comes time to return it. There’s a simple fix, and it would only cost a few cents extra per vehicle: stamp a sticker on the dash, with a QR code and URL that points to car’s home on Google Maps. Navigating back would be as painless as every other touchpoint.

The post Free tip for car-sharing companies: “get me home” appeared first on Chris Hoogewerff.

Good news! As you exit the Grand Canyon from the North Rim, you’ll find yourself in the Arizona State Forest grounds. A few minutes after passing the ranger booth at the entrance, you’ll start to pass unmarked dirt access roads running perpendicular to the highway.
Turn right, toward the canyon, on the first access road you see. After about a mile or so, park at a marked parking area (look out for the outhouse).

After just a quick walk along the trail from the parking lot, the trees will abruptly thin out, and you’ll be standing at the edge of the grand canyon. Pitch your tent, or sleep in the open air under the brilliant stars above you. I can’t say for sure, but from my experience I was the only one around for miles, and didn’t see another soul until I got back on the highway.

The post Free, scenic, and secluded camping at the Grand Canyon (North Rim) appeared first on Chris Hoogewerff.

The South Rim is the most accessible of the two, and is a relatively quick trip from either Phoenix or Las Vegas. For this reason, you’ll find more tourists, shuttles, tour busses, traffic, and paved trails here, which is generally a bummer for any true adventurer.

But the North Rim, just a few hours drive around the canyon, is a totally different story. You’ll find yourself driving through the Arizona State Forst for an extended period of time on your way in, and you might even cross paths with a herd of buffalo once or twice as you get closer.
The entrance to the park from the North Rim is a stark contrast from it’s southern brother. I recall just one lone ranger at a single booth to greet me. The road that follows continues through the forest, until suddently arriving at a lodge surrounded by several wood cabins. As you get closer and park your car, you’ll notice the forest makes way to the Canyon. The lodge, which seems primitive beside the South Rim’s ammenities, has a dining room for its guests, and a bar.

Do yourself a favor and order one of their local beers, and take a cup of chili from the bar out to the terrace. You’ll find a few rocking chairs on the stone overlook, from where you can watch the sunset over the Grand Canyon in piece and tranquility.

See my next post for the inside scoop on the best free campsite you can find just outside of the North Rim’s permiter, in the Arizona State Forest.

The post Finding peace at the Grand Canyon’s North Rim appeared first on Chris Hoogewerff.

The problem is it’s not always easy to get there. You’ll probably want to spend more than a day hike to enjoy the experience, but you need a backcountry permit camp outside of the developed campgrounds. Usually all the permits are already spoken for long before you even think about making plans for the backcountry hike. (The Grand Canyon permits, for instance, can be booked a year in advance!)

So what do you do? Give up, and just drive from scenic overlook to scenic overlook like all the other tourists? Take a nature walk along the sidewalk trail? I think not! Say  ”screw it” and do the overnight hike without a permit? That’s certianly not something I can condone here (and I’m pretty sure it’s actually a felony…). The answer is actually quite simple: be friendly, sociable, and make a few friends at the the backcountry office.

The facts:

• The backcountry permit offices always leave a couple permits open each day on a first-come-first-serve basis (but if you want one on a Friday, you’ll probably have to grab it on a Wednesday or Thursday morning). They also deal with plenty last-minute cancellations.
• You have to wait in line in the morning at the backcountry office to take advantage of this last minute availability. Before letting the line of people inside, everyone is handed a dated and numbered ticket to hold their place in line (just like at the deli). If there are ten groups, tickets one through ten are issued.
• People who came mornings prior will have “first dibs” at the available permits that day.
• Each ticket that hold a place in line is good for one group, no matter its size (this is important)

Your Plan:

1. Get to the backcountry office early in the morning. Like… way early. And come prepared to hike (You’ll probably get a permit for the following day(s), but it can’t hurt to be prepared.) Most offices open at 8AM, you want to be the first one there. (I’d suggest 6:30AM) You’ll be first in line when they open, and you’ll get a chance to meet every other group that joins you.
2. Make friends with everyone who gets in line behind you. Some folks will be just like you, waiting in line and hoping to take advantage of that day’s cancellations. Some of the people joining you will already have a voucher from the previous day. Those are the people who will walk out with a permit today, so you should be extra friendly to them.
3. Go in for the  ”kill”, and see if you can join in on any of these groups who got in line a day or two ago. For me, I found a couple of guys my age, we got along well, and I offered to pay for the whole permit (only $25) if they wouldn’t mind adding me on. Done deal!

You have to be resourceful for this to work, but if you’re like me you won’t let paperwork get in the way of your intimate experience with a national park…”

The post How to get a last-minute backcountry permit without a reservation appeared first on Chris Hoogewerff.

Rocky Mountain National Park Tour: (1,000 miles)

1. Jasper National Park
2. Banff National Park
3. Glacier National Park
4. Yellowstone National Park
5. Grand Teton National Park
6. Jackson Hole

Utah and Arizona National Parks Tour: (673 miles)

1. Arches National Park
2. Canyonlands National Park
3. Bryce Canyon National Park
4. Zion National Park
5. Grand Canyon National Park

The post Two road trip itineraries for those who can’t go cross-country appeared first on Chris Hoogewerff.

1. Shenandoah National Park
2. Great Smoky Mountains National Park
3. Boulder, Colorado
4. Rocky Mountain National Park
5. Arches National Park
6. Bryce Canyon National Park
7. Zion National Park
8. Grand Canyon National Park (North Rim)
9. Pacific Coast Highway (and Big Sur!)
10. Point Lobos State Reserve
11. Redwoods National Park
12. Banff National Park
13. Glacier National Park
14. Yellowstone National Park
15. Badlands National Park
16. Niagara Falls National Park

The post 16 “can’t miss” destinations for your ultimate cross country road trip itinerary appeared first on Chris Hoogewerff.

With all the support and friends we’ve made through the process, we thought it would be fitting to tell the story of Hello Parking from start to finish and explain what we learned and why we weren’t a smashing success. From the very beginning, we wanted to be in the business of monetizing vacant parking spaces, and it went a little something like this:

The Beginning:

This part could needlessly be dragged out, so I’ll paraphrase. Though at the time we’d never even heard of AirBnb, the analogy will help keep things brief.

“Look at all these empty parking spots in all these alleys in Boston. Wait, doesn’t Boston have some of the most expensive parking in the country?Let’s make an AirBnb for private parking spaces”

Great idea, right? Frankly, I still love it. The problem is that, while plenty of folks would love to rent your parking space for a day, almost nobody would agree to rent their own out to a stranger. In cities where parking is a big enough issue, those who have parking spaces guard them with their lives, whether or not they go empty for a night, weekend, or a month.

Okay, that didn’t work. Clearly, we have to own and control our own inventory!

When we couldn’t crowdsource an inventory of vacant parking, it became apparent that we had to control our inventory. Translation:

“Let’s become the ZipCar of parking spaces instead!”

Perfect! Brilliant! Now we’d be in control. Thanks to some free press from a Kairos Society summit where we pitched our concept (Inc Magazine, Portfolio.com, Northeastern University, BostInnovation and Bnet) we already had plenty of potential users of the service. The idea was to rent these parking spaces that are currently on the market out in bulk from property managers and real estate brokers at a discount and pass them on to Bostonians for $15 per day. Turnover on private parking spots in Boston is high enough that there are always about 500 on the market at any given time. The business plan was even good enough to grab the attention of Techstars. Of the 700 businesses that applied, we made it to the top 30 and were just a few slots away from spending the summer in Boulder, CO to work on the business.

We approached property managers and real estate brokers all over Boston, cash in hand, ready to strike a deal and lock down a few spots for a month as a beta test. Without fail, the conversations would go a little something like this:

Property manager: “Not interested.”

Us: “But aren’t these parking spaces just sitting there empty?”

Property manager: “yes..”

Us: “Ok. So we’ll give you cash right now for them. Don’t even take them off the market. As soon as you find someone to sign the lease, we’ll move on to the next one”

Property manager: “Sorry guys, it’s really not worth it to me. We make so much money on apartments, parking spaces are just an afterthought for us. If someone rents them from us, fine. If they go empty, that’s fine too. We’re only worried about filling  the apartments.”

Ouch. So the people who control everything just don’t care, and it seemed there was nothing we could do. With the advice from some of the folks we talked with at Techstars (Thanks Nicole!), though, we didn’t give up. We turned the business plan around and headed to where the real money in the parking industry was. Parking garages.

HelloParking – now it’s Priceline for parking!

After some magic with LinkedIn and some pure luck, we ended up getting in touch with one of the kings of the parking industry. It seemed as though he had a hand in everything that went on in the parking word, and he had all the contacts we’d ever need. Best yet, he wanted to help us innovate and he wanted to come along for the ride. Our new friend, to whom we will always be grateful, took us under his wing and taught us anything we wanted to know about the industry. What we learned is that very rarely do parking garages ever fill up. There are always vacancies. We then decided it would be our mission to turn these vacancies into cash by entering the deals game. We would do to the parking industry what Orbits and Priceline had done to the travel industry.

Our value proposition to the parking garage managers was simple. We’ll fill your parking garage with paying customers by offering unpublished rates. It was a simple “Name-your-price” model on daily, weekly, or monthly parking. Each reasonable offer would be submitted to a set of nearby garages, and the managers would have the option to accept, reject, or submit a counteroffer. And after even more press the offers started rolling in. Before long we had hundreds of folks naming their price on parking in Boston. The problem? *chirp chirp chirp*… not a single nibble from the garages.

We tried working with the huge parking management companies (LAZ Parking, Central Parking, Standard Parking) and we tried working with the individual owners. The common theme, once the offers were actually handed to them, was that they didn’t want to dilute their price. Translation? It seems that most of these folks are making plenty of money, and have been for ages, sitting there watching the money drive in each day. Why fix what isn’t broken? As it turns out, the garage managers are comfortable with their vacancies and would rather see them there than a discounted price on parking.

The final Hail Mary – group deals on parking

Well there seems to be a lot of buzz out there about group deals sites. Why not hitch a ride on the wave, we thought? One email came in about a woman who wanted to get a deal on parking for her husband’s retirement party downtown. Hm… great idea! We figured that if we could convince enough people to park together, we’d have the leverage to negotiate lower rates with the power of groups.

We spent weeks reaching out to conventions, conferences, and meetups around Boston offering to be their go-to parking price negotiators. Simply put, we’d work to find their group the lowest possible rate and take a piece off the top as profit. The few times we were able to get a deal, the magnitude of which was so small the business model proved unprofitable.

But we’re okay…

Listen, we’re doing just fine. We’re just two young entrepreneurs who learned more about business in the past 7 months than we did in a lifetime at school. We’ve made some wonderful friends and connections in the entrepreneurial scene here in Cambridge. We had our fun and now we’re ready to move on to the next big thing. For me, that means joining up with a couple startups in the area doing sales, marketing and business development consulting, with which I’m already having a blast! And for Neil that means figuring out how to meet up with his lady in Denmark.

What’s important is that we’ve put ourselves in a better position for the next business concept that comes our way to exploit.

Some key takeaways from this experience:

• Start young. You’re [relatively] debt free, with no dependents, and investors love students. Angel investors, especially, know that their money will go farther with a student who can live off cheap rent and Ramen noodles. The support for young entrepreneurs is incredible as well. There are so many different organizations and institutions with the soul purpose of helping student entrepreneurs succeed.
• Do the research and evaluate your market, but don’t let these things stop you from getting things done! Sometimes you just need to go with your gut and fail fast until you’ve found something that works. “
• Don’t just think about how to execute a great idea. Consider how that concept fits into the ecosystem of that industry, and where the money is. We found plenty of ways that would help bring value to vacant parking spaces. What we never considered was the extent to which property managers or parking garage owners would care. These things are important.
• Where possible, avoid creating a two-sided market unless there is asubstantial want or need on both ends. Plenty of folks in Boston wanted cheaper and more convenient parking options. With the original plan, though, we discovered that the promise of small rental revenue on a homeowner’s parking space was not enough to get them to list their parking space.  We would never organically accumulate the amount of inventory needed to sustain our business. Figuring out how to combat the chicken-or-the-egg problem is one of the most difficult challenges!
• If you’re in the Boston area, check out the Cambridge Innovation Center. Tim Rowe fittingly calls it a “frat house for startups”. No matter what stage you’re in, there’s a home for your business there. I should also express my gratitude to Bain Capital who sponsored our stay at the CIC through the Critical Mass program. Thanks for taking a chance on us Bain!  The CIC was and still is the perfect environment to get the juices flowing with like-minded people all around you.

Cheers,

-Chris Hoogewerff and Neil Hannah
Co-Founders, Hello Parking

The post From beginning to end, the story of a failed parking startup appeared first on Chris Hoogewerff.

I had the time of my life on this trip. It truly changed me. Being totally on your own for a couple months in absolutely unfamiliar places, while, never staying at each place more than a couple days, changes your perspective on life. Just as important, it changes your perspective on how to meet and interact with people.

Today, friends and strangers alike seem so much more approachable than they did pre-journey. Without learning in practice, one cannot understand the value in the ability to make great friends, even if just for a day, with any encounter.

The verdict? Driving cross country on a solo trip helps you become better at meeting new people, gives you an opportunity to discover yourself. You’ll come back more motivated, more self-aware, and more passionate than ever before.

And what would I change next time? If I could do it again, I would have visited fewer places, but gotten to know the parks I did visit more intimately  for longer stretches of time. But now I’ve a a whole lifetime to do that, so no regrets!

The post A retrospective on my cross country road trip appeared first on Chris Hoogewerff.

1. A fun, reliable car (For me, it was the Saab convertible): 

   Yes, the glorious 1996 Saab 900 Convertible. For 12,000 miles, she was my closest friend. And now she’s still going strong with 150,000 miles clocked.

2. America the Beautiful Pass: an All-you-can-eat National Parks pass for $80: 

   For $80, you get access to every national park in the United States for a full year. Without it, you’ll pay about $25 each visit.

3. My Kitchen – The Coleman Grill Stove: 

   Any Coleman car camping stove will do. For me, the Grill/Stove combo was perfect. Just pure awesomeness in grill/stove form. I used this baby at least twice a day (sometimes three times per day) for the full two months, without a single hiccup. It’s super efficient on propane, too – for the entire trip, I only consumed five small canisters (at $2 each).The stove half is perfect for frying up some eggs and boiling water for coffee in the morning.  The grill half did what you’d expect for the evening burger, grilled veggies, or chicken breast. It’s a kitchen in your trunk, and it comes in at under $100.

4. A good, supportive pair of sandals (Chacos or Tevas work great!): 

   I hiked across the continent in my Chacos! For a summer trip, hiking in sandals means one extremely important thing: no socks to clean! 

5. A quick-setup two-person tent: 

   Ah yes… home sweet home. I had great luck with my Marmot Titan backpacking tent. At 6’7, I can not fit in a one-person tent, but I found myself quite comfortable in this one. It pops up in just a minute, rolls up into a tiny sack, and it keeps the bugs and rain out. What else could you ask for? 

6. Don’t be cheap with your sleeping pad: 

   My ThermaRest Basecamp sleeping pad is no luxurious air-mattress, but it is was surprisingly comfortable and reliable. Like my tent, it rolls up into a small package and fits nicely in the trunk beside everything. If you’re camping for weeks or months, you don’t want to be waking up with back pain every morning, right? 

7. Camping Coffee Press: 

   I’m a coffee snob and in my eyes, no campsite is complete without a good cup of coffee in the morning. Paired with the grill/stove, you can make coffee just as good as if you were at home in your own kitchen. 

   Here’s a tip, for you late night road warriors: If you can’t keep your eyes open any longer, instead of buying coffee at a gas station that will taste like mud, just use your camping coffee press and “borrow” some of their free hot water from the spout. Just be nice and fill up your tank while you’re at it.

8. Your smartphone: 

   Ok I won’t spend too much time on this one, but my iPhone one was a lifesaver. For driving music, trail maps, navigation, and weather reports, it sure came in handy. And the AAA app was the best I found for cataloguing campsites.

9.  A camping hammock (and hammock straps) 

   Nothing beats a hammock for a quick place to take a nap on the side of the road,  or from which to relax when you find two trees and a view. I even spent quite a few comfortable nights sleeping out in the open in my hammock when the weather and conditions allowed it.

The post 9 essential products to get you through a cross country road trip appeared first on Chris Hoogewerff.

Check out the maps to the right once you’re in Picasa. The ones I took from my iPhone have coordinates assigned to them

Enjoy!

Road Trip, Summer 2010 (Best of…)

The post Photos of my 2010 cross country road trip appeared first on Chris Hoogewerff.