Will ride for ice cream

#99

Friday, August 19th

A largish group of casual bikers headed out late this afternoon on the American River Trail with the promise of smoothies, ice cream, or coffee at the end of the ride. We had people on road bikes with those bars you might remember from your 1970's 10 speed, upright-posture comfort bikes, a splendid white cruiser, a mountain bike, my friend with the trailer-full of kids, and me on my recumbent trike.

I had the singular honor of leading the parade down to the riverside trail (the fellow on the white cruiser was the actual leader of the ride) and I even managed to keep my speed down to a casual-friendly 10mph. I did a lot of coasting.

We did not see any deer or coyote, but there were a lot of turkeys around. Including some humanoid turkeys on motorized skateboards. Grrrr. Not supposed to be on the trail! Oh well. They buzzed off up the Fair Oaks bridge and out of earshot.

I eventually caved in to my need for speed and took off down the trail like my tail was on fire. I managed 19.4 as my top speed and I know I did not hold it for long since I distinctly remember some gasping going on. I cruised on at about 13mph after that.

We hung out at the pond at our turnaround point, carefully avoiding many fine deposits of duck-shit. Ick. Green and squashy.

As we made our way back to our starting point, dusk happened, so I turned on my lights, the Cateye Opticube in flash mode on the front and the Cherry Bomb in the rear. It was nearly dark when we got back to the Sunrise bicycle path, so I stopped to add the high-viz sleeves from my old windbreaker and some flashing bands that I picked up at REI. I think they are supposed to go on your arms, but I find I can wiggle them over my shoes and wear them on my ankles. I also had two flags with reflective patches on them and a rear reflector. There are also some reflective patches on my trunk bag and the edges of my seat.

I felt highly invisible even with all that. So I need to figure out how to add more lights and reflective stuff to my ride, especially stuff that will be visible from the sides. Must ponder this.


I know I turned off the bike path onto the correct street, but I somehow was unable to find the smoothie place. Hrmph. I suck at nighttime navigation. Heck, I can hardly find the place in broad daylight. My GPS enabled phone helped, since I could remember the name of another business in the same building as the smoothie place (which I already knew was not in Google Maps). So I got there eventually and had a lovely pomegranate something with bananas and granola on it. Yum!

While I was sitting in the store waiting for my order, the two kids decided that the flashing bands on my ankles were too cool! They lay on the floor at my feet (I felt like a disco demi-god for a while, with two devoted worshipers) happily poking the buttons to turn the flashing on and off.

I am just as smitten with my trike as I was the day I brought it home, but my appreciation of its capabilities has grown as my ability to take advantage of those capabilities has grown.


What will the next year bring?
More long organized rides (I'm registered for Foxy's in October and a friend reminded me of a ride in Lodi's wine area also this fall), and hills. Hills since I want to tour.

Speaking of touring, here's a sketch of possible art for a recumbent cycle touring business card.

The ancient Egyptians got nothin' on me.

Advocacy

Ride #74
Wednesday, May 18th

10ish miles in Sacramento on the Ride of Silence.

We had a small group for the ride (sort of a last minute thing with not a lot of advertising): at least 4 from one of the groups I belong to, 2 from another local group (I can tell from the jerseys), 2 folks about whom I have no clue, and a very interesting utility bike with a side car for the child. I might have missed a few people.

There are at least two ghost bikes near Sac State's campus, so we rode over there to add some flowers to those memorials. The person who ended up hosting this ride was recruited at the last minute (since the original planner was off in Moab for a few days) so there was not a lot of participation. She's thinking of a 100 person ride next year.

The logistics of getting even 10 bicycles clustered around a memorial without impeding foot or vehicle (I include bicycles as 'vehicles') was ... interesting. So I think the organizer's idea of having multiple destinations for next year's ride and splitting the group up (and starting in a place with a larger meeting area) are all Good Things. And maybe if the meeting area had publicly-accessible bathrooms that'd be nice also. A middle-aged bladder is Not Fun.

I encountered again the idea that folks who ride recumbents ride them because they have some disability that prevents them from riding a 'normal' bike. Sigh. As if I'd ever want to ride such an uncomfortable thing ever again.

Our route took us on quiet streets in Sacramento, some with speed-bumps/undulations. I would call them speed-humps (but many people I know would take that totally the wrong way) since they are low and smooth and easy to ride over. Some of these undulations are full width and some are two with a sort of a gutter in the middle. I was surprised by the gutter-type and it was a very strange feeling to have my two front wheels go over the humps, and my rear wheel not. Undulations are fun!

I blinged out my trike with extra front and rear lights, wore my yellow high-viz with reflective piping jacket, and used both reflective flags. I was determined to Be Seen!
Three forward facing white lights; one strobing and one steady on my ride's frame, and a wimpy cheap camping headlamp on helmet. For red lights, I have a Serfas seat-stay blinker mentioned in an earlier post, and a NiteRider Cherry Bomb blinker that is Very Very Very bright. Really, the CB is so bright the Serfas does not add a whole lot. I wonder if I can figure out how to attach a second CB to my headrest?
There are several schemes to add side-visible lights to one's bicycle. Some are passively reflective, like reflective bands on one's shoes or ankles, or reflective sidewalls, and of course the CA legal code mandated side reflectors; but some are active, usually battery or generator-powered LED lights. I got to get me some of those.

I've decided I don't like riding around a city at dusk/night. Especially if it is one I don't know too well. Of course, this attitude might come from having momentarily misplaced the car. I knew it was two blocks down and one right turn away from Fremont Park (our meeting place) but with all the one way streets around there it took me a while.
I did remember that I had parked across from a lively and loud bar.
There are a lot of bars in that area.
Oh dear, oh dear, whatever shall I do?
How about a bunch of U-turns on the handful of two-way streets!
Did I cross the train tracks? I think so....
Hey, is that my Prius?! It is.
Whew.

And now for a public service announcement.
Let the flames begin.

Bicycles are vehicles.
They belong on the road, if the rider so chooses.
A rider choosing to use the road has a few obligations that are mostly describable as:
"Don't be a jerk."

You are a vehicle. You are subject to the vehicle code.
Don't blow through stopsigns or lights.
Don't ride against traffic.
Be predictable, visible, and safe.

Running around loose

Ride #71
Tuesday, May 10th
9 miles of errands around town

I'm still chicken about the BIIIIIG hill in front of our house (up or down, does not matter - just give me a set of yellow feathers!) so I caught a ride across town with my sweetie and then rode back through town, erranding along the way.

Rolling small town street

The bank for a new PIN, the jewelers, coffee to kill time until my order was ready, back to the jewelers, back to the bank to double check the PIN, to the library to return some books and books on CD, to the pharmacy to pick up a 'scrip, then home. Whew!

Huge beautiful oak at the library.

I have got to figure out some high-viz clothing that does not feel like wearing plastic wrap. I shed my yellow jacket once I was in a less congested area, leaving me in a bright pink long sleeved light cotton shirt. I hate polyester and nylon and other unnatural fibers, but finding cotton or light wool in true high-viz yellow has so far proved impossible.

I, as usual, behaved like a vehicle, using left turn lanes and all that. I was pleasantly surprised how many of the automated signals in left turn lanes were bicycle-aware.
I got a congratulatory rebel yell from a passing motorcycle: probably because my ride is just plain cool and I was pedaling along at about 25mph at the time. I returned the compliment with a big Power to the People gesture.

Not all city lots have houses on them.

As usual, passing cars gave me plenty of room, and I tried to stay in the shoulder (what there is of it) where it was not full of dubious looking debris. My tires took a beating from my trip through Placerville: lots of little slices. I'm loath to get replacement kevlar banded tires while my original ones are still in reasonable shape but I often wonder how a blow-out will feel. I just keep an eye on all three tires, pick gravel out when I find it, and cross my fingers!

Another ride later this week (assuming no rain) and then some weekend riding fun!

Elementary error

Ride #63
Thursday, April 14th
21.5 miles on the El Dorado Trail

The parts of this trail that are paved are great.

All kinds of excitement today: wildlife, traffic, hills, repairs, human powered towing.

My triking friend and I headed out once again from the Missouri Flat Rd. trailhead of the El Dorado Trail. We worked our way up the grade, figured out a shortcut from our usual route, zoomed down Main Street in Placerville, over the nifty twisty bridge, and this time did NOT get lost picking up the trail again at Clay St.

Double Trike Madness? Enough flags, you think?

With two trikes and bright clothing and multiple flags. OH, and lights, we felt OK to take the lane and control the traffic behind us on the Forni Rd. downgrade. We decided not to take that shortcut on the way back since we would be in very low gears and there is no bike lane, no shoulder, and limited sightlines. And we wanted to stop at the local bike store later. But flying down that road was fun.

In Placerville

After we picked up the trail again at Clay St., we climbed steadily up the old rail road grade. We were loafing and chatting and generally in no hurry, so our speed to our turnaround point was a lousy 5.3 mph average. We saw a deer turn around and bail off the trail.

Yes, I know those are not deer.

We got to the end of the paved segment and decided to do a little dirt riding.

Since my trike has suspension all around, I came down hill on that dirt faster than my friend did. And I had many more mud-splatters on me then she did.

We made our way back to Placerville, this time skipping the curly bridge and just using Main Street. It is downhill in that direction through Placerville, so we had no trouble at all staying with the traffic through town. My friend was feeling bold, so we used the left turn lane to get onto Ray Lawyer drive and start up our last big hill.

Our left turn lane is at the left of the frame.

We were almost at the top of the hill when my friend's chain snapped! So close to the trailhead where we had parked this morning!
So we had a little chain-tool smackdown (my chain tool lost), and she successfully removed the bent link and reattached her chain. She has reusable rivets on her chain. Mine are not resuable so I would use a special replacement link in her situation. HOWEVER, we did not double double check the chain path before reattaching the link (we were too entranced with our mad chain-breaking abilities) and we crossed her chain.

Blah. Trike no go.

We did not want to mess with the chain again (I suppose we should have, but we did not, why I do not know. I figure we did not want to tempt the chain-tool-gods again) and we decided to go on anyway: coasting on the mostly downhill route. I gave her a towing assist on the flats, and she walked up the two short hills. We did a lot of unseemly giggling.

Try shooting straight over your shoulder. Obviously, I failed! We are on a trestle bridge, that's the wood platform. She's got a grip on the back of my trike's rear rack. Figures she'd be grinning.

Ooooh! A Tunnel!

Not in the flat land anymore

Bridge over US 50

Today's route. Dig that elevation profile!

Not Quite Hail

Ride #27
Saturday, January 1st

7.5 miles.
In Folsom.
In the rain.

Oy.

A bicycling club I belong to was having a hill-climbing smackdown on this first day of the year. I declined to ride the hill, but volunteered to take photos. So I parked at my usual spot in Folsom and pedaled over to the event on actual streets in bike lanes and everything!

I had both flags flapping, a high viz jacket on, one headlight and two blinking taillights. I overheated going up E Natomas to Sophia, so I stopped and shed a layer. Then when I was coasting (25mph) down Sophia to Alexandria, all I could think of were the gloves I'd just taken off!

It was not too windy, and the rain was mostly showers, except for one cloud burst that if it had been any colder (it was 37 degs F) it would have been hail. They were big fat cold high-velocity drops. Ick! The sun tried to come out about 1/2 way through the event, but then the clouds came back even darker!

I parked my trike at the gathering point, got the scoop from the organizer, and wandered off to take lots of pictures of folks slogging up the hill and then flying back down again. And doing it again. And again. And again!

I carried not only 3 cameras, a complete change of warm dry clothes (including extra rain gear), but an umbrella (to shelter the SLR digital I'd borrowed) and even an entire English-style fruit cake to share. I used my nice Arkel panniers to carry all that. They worked well but I had to adjust my mirrors so I could see something other than bulging bags behind me. The trike handled well, although I took it easy on the long shallow slope down from Sophia to Blue Ravine: kept the speed to 12mph. My brakes finally dried off enough to stop honking and squealing.

It was windier and still raining (maybe even a bit harder) when it was time to head back, so I added high visibility rain pants. They were noisy but kept the cold rain and wind off my legs. I was worried that I might slide around in the seat too much, but it was just fine. I plan on taking the cuffs in and adding zippers to keep them from flapping around.

I need to force myself to slog up hills more often. I got winded, but my legs did not give out. I did get into the absolute granny once, more to give myself a little break then because anything was that steep.

Now, this is not a picture of me, but it will give you an idea of what the day was like:

I have started this year as I mean to continue: cycling.

Happy New Year everyone, and be safe out there.

OMG! May I please borrow a lung?

Ride # 16
Tuesday, November 16th. A shade over 6 miles. In traffic. Ooooh yeah!

I love riding for fun, but I also plan to use my trike (as I used my bike) for running local errands. So today I did.

My doc changed hospital affiliations, so I needed to sign a form allowing the old lab to send my records over to the new lab. My sweetheart works at the 'business' end of town, near the old lab, so I took the opportunity to get a lift to that end of town and cycle back to the house on this beautiful sunny day.

For those out you who worry about cyclists on the roads I was dressed for visibility: wearing a screaming yellow windbreaker, both tail lights blinking, the very bright headlight on, and two flags flapping merrily away.

I scooted from one end of Cameron Park to the other, using a route made mostly of residential streets. When I am a stronger cyclist, I'll run errands via a round trip from home. All kinds of interesting things are just a short ride away: a good hardware store, the library, grocery stores, my dentist, my doctor, the pet store (but I'm not planning on hauling 30 lbs of dog food home), multiple places for coffee, even haircuts!

For the first part of the ride, I slogged up the hill on the way to the lab (not a big hill, but bigger than I'm really ready for) in the granny gear, huffing and puffing. I took advantage of my trike's stability and low gearing to simply stop and catch my breath at two spots on the hill. The second time I stopped was because of two dogs who had to come over and see what I was.

Uncontrolled off leash dogs worry me quite a bit, not because I'm afraid of them, but because I am afraid for them. These two dogs were on the other side of the road, and charged heedlessly across two lanes to have a visit.

In about 5 minutes, a pair of dogs will come over the hill.

A car in each direction had to stop to avoid the dogs. I stopped (I needed to anyway) and let the owners get their dogs back. A stationary trike is less interesting to the dogs, especially since I had spoken in a cheery voice, identifying myself as human.

Although my route home followed the valley that is Cameron Park, there are still little hills. Down hill is fun (that hill I slogged up at the beginning gave me 30mph on the way down!) but uphill is boooooooring. I am so out of shape I had to stop and just breathe in certain carefully selected shady spots. I suppose I need to do this some more?

Nice and quiet road, horrible chipseal!

I wore my usual cotton capris (since I can't seem to find my non-padded bike shorts) and a very lightweight wool short sleeved t-shirt. The wool shirt is MUCH preferable to a cotton shirt. I was about ready to shed my high-viz windbreaker, since I was getting rather warm, but I treasure the visibility it gives me so I just pedaled slower. Yeah, that's why I was so slow. The windbreaker. Wanna buy a nice bridge? Oceanfront property?

I averaged 7.7 mph, top speed 30mph, slowest about 3 mph. My cleats stayed put on the shoes, my trike shifted well (but I still need to check the limit screws for the rear) and I had no flats, despite riding on the shoulder for most of the ride.

The trike is fine, the 'engine' needs some serious rehabilitation.

I'm still hoping for a picnic on Sunday! If it is cancelled, I'll slap the fenders on and go for a ride anyway.