Leigh Burdett, owner of e2ride Historic Bike Tours, taught me a new phrase: sustainable tourism.

She says her bicycle tours through historic Riverside/Avondale, San Marco, the Beaches and Olde Mandarin are examples of sustainable tourism - they show off local treasures and history, which tends to lead her guests to enjoy restaurants and retail in the neighborhood after the tour. Her efforts are the opposite of other attractions, water parks, for instance, which, Burdett said, "come into a neighborhood, change the face of it with their physical buildings, and then keep all the money from the attractions, novelty items and food without enhancing any of the other businesses in the neighborhood."

Burdett's inspiration to be a two-wheeled tour guide came during her long, therapeutic bike rides after she was laid off from her radio sales manager job two years ago. After enough miles, it occurred to her that she loved biking, loved meeting new people and she already had polished her tour guide skills showing off Jacksonville's Anheuser-Busch Brewery. Eureka! She would buy a fleet of bikes and show off our city's history in a way that just can't be done through a car window.

I toured Riverside/Avondale Saturday morning with Burdett, a local couple and three funny dudes from California who were in town for the NCAA basketball games. Burdett said this mix of locals and tourists has been the norm, and the age range wide, from people in their 20s to their 60s.

When I arrived at the designated meet-up location, my bike was all ready to go, complete with water bottle, snacks (it is a three-hour tour, after all) and a basket in which to keep my all-important cargo: notebook and lip gloss. The tour covered about 10 miles, with frequent stops to discuss points of historic, scenic and architectural interest. These included riverfront views, the Riverside Christian Church chimney where hundreds of swifts sleep during their fall migration to Peru and the 110,000 bricks that make up Bayard Place and Vernon Terrace, which Riverside Avondale Preservation volunteers removed and reassembled, because a city road work project didn't include preserving the brick streets.

While Burdett's information put me better in touch with my neighborhood and her emphasis on preservation illustrated the importance of not paving paradise to put up parking lots and McMansions, the biggest reward came from the simple waves to the people we rode past, from hearing their friendly greetings of, "Nice day for a bike ride!" Oh, the sense of community! I felt like I was back in the olden times of porch sitting and garden parties, only with a very advanced bicycle.