Mark’s Travel Blog

In the summer of 1987, Mark Greksa and his wife Leah strapped four packs and camping gear to a pair of mountain bikes and rode 3,200 miles from Germany to Greece.

No support vehicle. No reservations. No phones, no screens, no itinerary beyond south. What there was, every single day, was a stranger — a farmer, an innkeeper, a mechanic, a family who pointed them toward a better road than the one on the map.

“That trip shaped the rest of my life in terms of seeking adventure, the unknown, and learning the importance of making connections with people from other walks of life,” Mark says. “I believe, in some respects, it was a better time to travel. Back in the ’80s we didn’t have phones and screens, so we could focus completely on being in the moment — something that’s sorely lacking in today’s fast-paced world.”

Nearly four decades later, that ride is still the clearest explanation of everything he has built.

Mark is CEO and Chief Visionary Officer of the Royal Gorge Route Railroad and Antithesis Fine Dining, both in Cañon City, Colorado. Neither one is a business he inherited an instruction manual for. Both are the result of a lifetime of saying yes to the harder, better, stranger option.