Kilroy1988 

Today I did 98 miles that took me into the foothills to Springville via Frazier Valley, then came back down by Lake Success and Porterville with a final stop at the memorial park in Lindsay. I'm beat... I purposely put myself to the test in honor of Memorial Day and the countless servicemen and women who have managed to do incredible things that they never knew possible simply because it was necessary to survive. I'll forever be in awe of what the human will can accomplish.

Mercifully the low gear on the '54 Carlton managed to work well when I finally tried it on some hills (it's nice having four speeds) and I was very comfortable most of the day. However, it was about 100 degrees out by the time I got home and I hit a wall ten miles out that left me dragging. Now I'm lounging by a fan after a cold shower eating sliced oranges in my birthday suit.

I hope everyone has a splendid memorial day weekend - I'll be in rapid recovery before hiking in the high Sierras on Sunday.

-Gregory

C0UG4R

Rode my MB-1 to my school this morning. It was the 1st time I've ridden to school ever. FYI I'm in 8th grade.

Kilroy1988 

Looks like a practical bike! Keep on riding and stay safe!

-Gregory

Sir_Name 

A buddy and I met up last weekend for a quick overnighter. The rendezvous was a train stop in New Haven, then we made our way out to Powder Ridge to catch the Eastern States Cup MTB races. Enduro races ran to around midnight; it was a lot of fun watching all of the runs through the day and night.



There were around 200 competitors total.



On the way home the next day:

rccardr 

Rode the 'temporarily 650B'd' Schwinn Tempo on the O Loop yesterday late morning. Turned out kinda drizzly but still a lovely way to spend time on an old friend.
Not the best conversion, as it turns out. What had been a lovely, sprightly, good handling quick rider became dull, lifeless and slow feeling. Geometry just didn't work with the fatter (38mm) tires and non-aero levers.
Spent time in the afternoon converting it back to 700C, pics will be forthcoming once the rain stops here.

Resprayed Hugger Orange, also known in Pontiac-speak as Carnival Red, same color as the '69 GTO Judge

cooperryder

Not a long ride today...just a ride to two grocery stores.

zukahn1 

Very nice weather today in the mid 70's which is a nice change from the 3 feet of snow we had early in the week in Fairplay. There's still a lot of snow in places so I took a short ride over to town on the second clunker challenge bike which rides way better than it looks.

ExPatTyke

First post on here for quite some time; a new job at a local uni' campus along with losing my mother has left me with very little in the way of spare time recently. Fortunately things have settled down now and I'm looking forward to a summer of C&V cycling.

Anyhow, last weekend my wife was working on the Saturday and my daughter was working, so I went out for a ride rather than spending a day at home with just the cat for company. I planned it as a 200km DIY Audax, submitting the route in advance to the local organizer, to give me an extra incentive.

I rode one of my BSAs; I use it as a commuter and it has a rack fitted meaning I could pack a pannier with tools and plenty of food and drink.

The route I set up took in a good part of north Somerset; I started by going up the coast from Weston. It was here the first mechanical arose - I'd had a puncture on the way home from work one evening in the week and just changed the tube quickly without paying too much attention to the tyre beyond a quick check on the inside for thorns or glass. The tyre went flat again between Puxton and Congresbury, and looking properly this time I found a large cut in the tread. I'd bought a pack of glueless patches a few weeks back and put them in the pannier, so with nothing to lose I put one on the inside of the tyre and one on the tube and said a prayer to the gods of roadside bodges. The prayer was answered, and both patches held, and I carried on into Congresbury and onto the Strawberry Line path to Yatton.

From Yatton the route went into Clevedon and Portishead before crossing the Avon M5 bridge into Shirehampton. From there it was along the Avon Gorge, under the Clifton Suspension bridge and into the centre of Bristol, then the Bristol-Bath railway path, before taking the Two Tunnels route from Bath to Radstock. The Two Tunnels is a path over the old S&D trackbed, taking in the Devonshire and Combe Hay tunnels; the Combe Hay tunnel is over a mile long and has speakers playing classical music along its length - quite an experience.

Leaving Radstock it was the Colliers' Way, another path on the course of an old railway line, into Frome, and then into Nunney where I stopped at the village shop to replenish supplies, taking time out to sit by the river and pour a cold beer and an ice cream down my neck (odd combination, but it went down very well at the time).

From Nunney I had to put up with a few miles on a busy A road, after the lane my route planner had selected turned out to be a gated private road. A quick look at an OS map got me back on track and into Shepton Mallet, before turning off for Wells. I hadn't planned to stop at Wells, but there was a concert on at the Bishop's Palace so I took a few minutes out on one of the benches by the moat to listen to Finlandia.

Wells to Glastonbury put me on the homeward leg. Glastonbury High Street on a Saturday evening is an interesting place to say the least - fortunately Audax UK don't conduct drugs tests as the amount of passive smoke I inhaled might have caused a positive...I left Glastonbury and headed over the moors with a smile.

The sun was starting to set as I crossed the Ham Wall and Shapwick Heath trails, before passing through Burtle and Mark. Heading from Berrow to Bleadon I thought I had the 200km in the bag, with plenty of time in hand. Turning onto the Weston road with less than 5km to go though there was a crack and a rattle and my chain disappeared behind me. A few rude words were said before I picked up the chain, thought briefly about walking the last bit, then decided fixing the chain was the best option. The chain was spliced back together under a street light, and I made it into Weston and home with about 15 minutes spare.

Overall a great day out on the bike, I saw a lot of Somerset including a few corners I'd never been to before, and the couple of mechanicals were sorted reasonably easily. I can recommend the Park Tools glueless patches - the repair I made is still holding - and can also recommend adding a chain tool to your toolbag.


Leaving Weston - view over Sand Bay from Kewstoke


One puncture (my fault for not checking the tyre) and one broken chain (arguably my fault for buying a cheap chain from Amazon) - not bad for a 40 year old bike.


M5 Avonmouth bridge - quite a steep ramp as it rises to over 100 feet. Apparently built this high to allow shipping headed to Bristol to pass.


The Alham Valley near Cranmore,


Front of Wells Cathedral, and the Cathedral Green.


Wells Bishop's Palace


Descent from Wells towards Glastonbury with the Tor ahead.


Sunset over the moors with Brent Knoll in the distance.

rccardr 

Sorry for your loss
Happy for your ride.

botty kayer

The sky was filled with cotton wool type clouds in London today. and the streets are getting busier with the summer influx of tourists.

The flags and the bunting is going up across the country as we've all been 2 extra days holidays next week to celebrate our Queens platinum jubilee.


Royalists and non royalists alike welcome 2 extra days holiday, and as the weather forecast looks dry and sunny next week there will definitely be a few extra pints consumed.

A couple off new art works in Leake St tunnel

And i finish the day in Hammersmith...

...no there's not been an earthquake, the ripped building is an artwork by Alex Chinneck, more info here: https://www.dezeen.com/2017/07/31/al...-installation/
He also did this excellent sliding house in Margate https://www.dezeen.com/2013/10/01/fr...alex-chinneck/
and upside down house in London https://www.dezeen.com/2013/12/06/al...ilding-london/
and an upside down pylon that looks like it fallen from the sky. https://www.dezeen.com/2015/09/17/al...festival-2015/

BFisher

Just a neighborhood stroll after the rainstorm.

rccardr 

...And here it is, MUCH happier (and much faster) with the Dura Ace bits, WI hubs, etc. Still gotta polish those crank arms, tho!
IMG_5629 by Doc Mertes, on Flickr

nlerner

Just a couple of Brit bikes out on a rainy Saturday:



We did have one wildlife encounter:

cooperryder

Twenty two miles today but it felt like more with first 11 into gusty wind and hauling 32 pounds of precious cargo in rear added to the effort.
We had a good lunch and then headed back.

Of course for the returning 11 miles we had a tailwind which helped.

At any rate it was a good workout and fun had by all even if the rear passenger fell asleep for about 30 minutes on the return trip.

Spaghetti Legs 

A little bit of gravel riding today. I took a side road to check out Buck Mountain Ford. In the increasingly less common dry spells in summer one can drive across it or tiptoe with your bike, just getting your feet and ankles wet. After the last spell of downpours, about 1.5 to 2 feet in the middle today. Our new subtropical climate gives us drenching downpours every few days and I wonder over the long term effect on our dirt roads. People will either need to spend more money dumping new gravel more than once or twice per year, pay for paving, or be content to drive/ride/walk on washed out badly rutted roads.

nlerner

^ It's a road! It's a river! It's a road! It's a river!

Spaghetti Legs 

Consider yourself lucky. I'd considered including this on the Bikeapalooza tour.

rccardr 

Yeah, but last year it was dry.
And hot.
Sooooo hot.

nlerner

One more pic from yesterday's ride--classic underbiking!

droppedandlost 

I think the smile says it all

Dylansbob 

Our co-op is doing a fundraising ride of the nastiest hills in town next weekend. So I did a prepatory ascent of arguably the nastiest, 18-24% for 2.5 blocks.

etherhuffer 

Duwamish River. Lots of warnings to not eat chemical laden fish

Ships in Elliot Bay waiting to load up grain.

A friend waiting to become Hassenpfeffer

Rose Garden in Myrtle Edwards Park

Ongoing sad state of affairs in West Seattle as elsewhere.

Windy and cool and still no summer. This sucks this year

JacobLee 

Yes, it has been wet and cold in the PNW. I like it, but that's just me. The Rose Garden is still very sleepy at the start of the Rose Festival this weekend.



There's the sun! (It didn't last) It'll be upper 70's on Wednesday and I'll be complaining that it's too hot.

bironi

Washington state or D.C.?

merziac

Great work on the riding to school, it used to be an automatic right of passage at a much earlier age but not any more.

Please tell me there is a U lock attached to that cable, I know you guys live in a smaller town but MB-1's are targets for thieves.