'Hearty greetings' from S.L. to Torino

Via the miracle of cell phone, Michael Dunn was on the line live from Italy, speaking from the back seat of a taxi as it negotiated through what Michael described as "the Olympic-torn streets of Torino."

This was yesterday morning — midafternoon Torino time — not long after Salt Lake City Mayor Rocky Anderson got off his bicycle at the Town Hall and, on behalf of the people of Salt Lake City, Utah, delivered a copper cannister to his counterpart in Torino, Mayor Sergio Chiamparino.

The message on the parchment inside the cannister began: "To the citizens of Torino, we send you hearty greetings and best wishes as you are about to welcome the world for the 2006 Winter Olympic and Paralympic Games. May the Games provide a means for people from throughout the world to come together in peace, celebration and goodwill."

Thus was continued the tradition that began in 1994 when the Norwegian Olympic city of Lillehammer sent a message of encouragement to Nagano, Japan, host of the 1998 Olympic Winter Games. The Norwegians thought it would be a nice touch to send their message without using fossil fuel. They even used a dog-sled along part of the route.

The people of Nagano followed suit, sending a message nonfossil-fuel style that arrived on bicycle in Salt Lake City four summers ago.

Rocky Anderson was so impressed he not only copied the bike idea but rode it.

As Michael Dunn explained, the mayor was one of seven people representing Salt Lake City and Park City (Utah's other Olympic city) who bicycled several hundred miles through Europe to get the parchment to the site of the 2006 Games. This group included Sarah Wright, director of Utah Clean Energy; Bill and Celia Underwood, insurance agents from Park City; Salt Lake City deputy mayor Rocky Fluhart and his wife, Gretchen; and Tracy Lyon, Rocky's girlfriend.

I know, I know, I thought the same thing.

Why did it take seven of them?

Actually it took more than seven. Two men — Jeff Niermeyer, deputy director of Salt Lake City Department of Public Utilities; and Mark Wangsgard, a Park City attorney and developer — biked the parchment from Salt Lake City to New York City during April and part of May. In Manhattan, a sailboat captain named Joe Hoopes picked up the cannister and put it aboard his boat, the "Palawan," for a monthlong voyage across the Atlantic to Zeebruge, Belgium, where the two Rockys and the others stood waiting on their pegs.

Meanwhile, Tyler Curtis, Salt Lake City's event manager, sat in his office and quarterbacked everything, from routes to restaurants to hotels.