Most people ride their bike for exercise. Some people, mostly kids, ride for fun. Even fewer ride their bike for transportation. I ride for all of these reasons. As a kid in my purely fun days, a Trek Antelope 800 carried me on my journeys. Growing up near Washington DC, that hybrid bike took me anywhere I wanted to go: to and from school, up and down the C&O Canal, friend's houses, basketball courts and soccer fields. It gave me freedom at a young age.
During my undergrad years at Ohio State, I rode my bicycle to classes as well. I vividly remember riding to school in the rain, with my notebook safely zip-locked and arriving to class just in the nick of time. My dripping pant legs formed a massive puddle during the 50 minute lecture. It was also during those college years that I learned the importance of always locking up my bike and taking it in at night. Bicycles are commodities regardless of the condition they are in, which brings me to another point: regardless of the condition your bike is in, it doesn't take much to fix it up for riding condition and take it to work or school. After I graduated, I moved to Arlington, Virginia and rode my bike to work, moonlighting as a high school teacher. You can pretty much say that my bicycle has been my main source of transportation throughout my life.
These days, mountain biking is one of my favorite ways to stay in shape. Living in Southern California, near the hills, there are miles and miles of trails in close proximity to my house. This means I take a loop from my garage to Sycamore Canyon Wilderness Park, which is about 14 miles round trip. Thus, not requiring the use of a car. Convenient, given that I don’t own one. And sometimes, I see the most epic sunsets. In the one below, you can see a snow capped Mt. Baldy in the distance.
I will be taking many trips to the beach this coming year. One of my goals will be commuting via bicycle. Yup, Riverside to the ocean. The annual 'Smog to Surf,' leisure ride which now goes by the more playful name, 'Riverside to Surfside' is the route I plan to take. I am hoping that Colleen will occasionally follow my lead, riding behind me on her new custom made Trek FX. We will see how 60 miles treats her spirit, her bike, and her butt. When was the last time YOU rode your bike for over 2 hours? Do it! Tomorrow! It gets easier after the first 45 minutes.
you should try and make your way down to us here on the gulf coast of florida,pensacola has plenty of fresh sea food, white sand beaches,CLEAN AIR, well...cleanish, during the summer the beaches crowed with collage kids and locals, some who play beach volley ball, most just lay out and catch rays.
if you come down during the summer, expect thunder and lightning storms, they are amazing to watch, oh and the OCCASIONAL hurricane, don't be scared by what you see on tv, SOME times they make it look worse than it is.
my best wishes to you
ED
Posted by: ED | January 29, 2010 at 05:40 PM
yay!!
I love bikes too and don't have a car. Fortunately Denmark believes in bikes and walking. In København more than half of all trips are done on bike or foot. There are places to park your bike and it is quite safe on the streets. Today it is -7 and snowing but the streets have many cyclists. The bike paths receive the highest priority for cleaning.
Mostly I have a man's style Batavus as my legs are too long for the women's models. These are Dutch bikes that are made for errands and commuting. It is great in the rain and snow and requires very little maintenance. Most bikes here are like that. It has fenders, a generator for the lights in its hub and seven speeds. The brakes and gears are internal which is necessary. I ride at least an hour a day just getting around and usually more.
When you need to carry a lot of things you can rent bigger bikes or cargo tricycles like a Christiania. Many families own such monsters. They are the Danish SUV, hee hee.
For fun I had a custom bike made to fit my body. In the US she would be called a "fixie" there is only one gear and there is no coasting. You can pedal backwards and go backwards too. When you are stopped your foot does not have to go on the ground because you balance and pedal slightly backwards and forwards. She is bright cherry red so I call her Kirsebær. She is handmade and soooo beautiful. We ride together and chase colors around the city. We go so fast and my hair tries to catch up with us.
One of the bicycle groups here made this movie on biking in the snow and had it on Copenhagenize.
http://vimeo.com/8597651
You can ride in any weather!
For the question on the last time I rode a bike over two hours. That would be one week ago today when I rode about two hours at dawn in a light snowstorm. Jheri injured herself on a treadmill and can't ride for a few weeks. I am very frustrated as are both of my bikes.
Posted by: Jheri | January 31, 2010 at 09:18 AM