Over the Road

We spent most of the day clambering around Crystal Mountain, and posing with Mt. Rainier in the background. As we drove down to sea level, I aspired to a short bike ride. 

So I'm riding a Bianchi this evening. 

Once known for painting bikes only in dentist office green, in 1992 Bianchi created this bike in blue-purple and green.  This combination used to be extremely fashionable (I have a kayak and a pair of cycling shoes in these colors). It is not today's first choice, though. 

This little bike has extremely wide gearing, cantilever brakes, lots of braze-ons, and a woman's saddle. The seat is Ouch! for me, but acceptable for my sister-in-law. 

Here's my standard downward photo, as I got myself acquainted with the bike. It had a slightly loose headset, which we fixed after the ride. Love the matching green tape and cables?

I rode out of their suburban Seattle-area neighborhood, "across the tracks" and into a mysterious time warp - the homes, cars and atmosphere seemed to be a throwback to the Sixties. For example, the self-proclaiming Monster Truck:

Luckily as I wound around the streets and alleys, the atmosphere gradually warped back to the present ...

And I was returned to the magical atmosphere of the Cascade mountains. 

Around the Lake

We don't have many lakes in Southern California. The few we do have serve as reservoirs for the city water systems, so they aren't usually open for aquatic activities. Fishing perhaps, boating maybe, but normally no swimming, dogs, kids, etc. And because there are dams at one end, the paths tend to go 3/4 the way around and are not the most fun.
This is all a prelude to our ride around Green Lake today. What a nice place, but so active! Positively swarming with people enjoying a rare hot sunny afternoon by the lake. I took this picture between zooming skaters, runners, strollers, walkers, cyclists, etc.

We rode in the wrong direction on the bike path for a few hundred yards before we saw a rotational arrow painted on the sidewalk. Not that it bothered the other 500 people going the wrong way ...

Once we got things sorted, it was okay. Especially on this SE side where the swarms of kids and so forth seemed less dense.

I got a bit more familiar with Bro-In-Law's mountain bike. I adjusted the brakes and the seat; I was able to get all three chainrings and all the rear cogs going correctly. Just in case we have to do two climbs of l'Alpe d'Huez like the Tour did today.

(Funny that his bike needs work because his son owns 3 bike shops - but I suppose it's like the cobbler's kids going barefoot)

We didn't really spot any old cars, but I thought I would throw in this artsy shot of the next-door neighbor's plain-clothes Washington State Patrol car. Complete with small hubcaps and spotlight.

Something Entirely Different

I rode a Schwinn today, but not my Schwinn Paramount. It was my brother-in-law's Schwinn mountain bike. My first time with a Shimano index shifting group and I confess I was completely baffled. And slightly pained by a seat about 1/2 inch too high.

But hey, a bike is a bike, right? I was able to make it up and down a few hills, avoid all the rush-hour traffic (mostly speeding bike maniacs), and get home in one piece.

Two unusual factors of today's ride were the bright sun in Seattle (!) and warm winds.

For added excitement I was able to spot a few old French cars. This lovely LeCar (Renault 5) and the ever-desirable DS21 Break (Station Wagon).

I had one of these Citroens for about 10 years. White with a grey top, and black vinyl interior. I was glad to get rid of it but the sight of one still brings a twinge.

Luckily this Model A went by and distracted me for a moment, and the Citroen was forgotten.

Architectural Details

The architecture of our tandem predominantly features diagonals and triangles. Here's a bike shoe eye's shot of the rear triangle(s) of the bike.

One of the great things about riding a tandem is having a co-pilot who can hop off and pick up things that appear in the road as we are zipping by. Today we found a Jlab Bluetooth stereo player/headset in this alley.

Which, by the way, is the alley that contains the weather mirror. There's the ocean in the distance.

We also saw this atrocious purple shingled house, a mile or so away.

AND we saw this staircase up the side of a driveway, which should win an award for most over-used patterned Spanish tiles on the front of the steps.

There were no interesting cars, nor were there any Mustang Convertibles. Alas. 

But we checked in on the recently groomed Road Garden (doing well, thank you) and took a look out over the harbor. 

[Notice a Toyota Land Cruiser (one of two) featured in an earlier blog? And a Volvo XC90 (one of two) normally parked at this house? I'm not supposed to notice them because they are not "interesting"]

One More Time Around

I thought it was time for a reprise of the Cycling Cazalea blog premise.

I write this blog because I told my friends Mike and John back in February that I would start riding my bike again. They almost scoffed, but didn't. But I got their point. Too old to teach me any new tricks, eh? I think not. So I started riding and now it's 4 months later and I haven't given up yet. Good on me, as they say.

So we got on our single bikes tonight, wearing the old shoes and civilian clothes. Riding is riding, and I don't do it for exercise, utility or to impress. Just to ride.

I'm riding the Platano today because my Paramount got a flat. A thorn in the sew-up tires. No problem, I bought 3 new tires a couple months ago and I've been waiting to mount them. But not tonight.

For old times sake, we went by the "I Never Expected A Road Garden". My wife contributed the contents of her water bottle (I never seem to have one on my bike). We watered it. This little patch of green has survived total annihilation attempts by the sewer replacement crew, and it's still alive.

Watch Malcolm Guite from Cambridge sing his song about the Green Man! I saw him in live concert 2 weeks ago here in San Diego.


We went by the weather mirror. It showed a beautiful day. Some clouds in the distance.

We found a Mustang Convertible from the 1960's, so it qualifies for my wife's new rule of "we look for Olde Cars Only".

And we made a movie going down a dirt alley (and I nearly crashed like I did the first time I tried this).

Wrong Way Wrider!

I got up at six and down to the basement to watch the Tour de France on the big screen. Two hours of excitement, then I got up and out for a ride. Since it was a hill climb through the Pyrenees today, I went uphill. On the usual crummy road surface.

My wife asked if we could take a break from Mustangs, so I concentrated on looking for old cars. I managed to spot two vintage Toyota Land Cruisers (at different houses).

"Will they suffice for Car(s) of the Day, honey?"

This is an FJ40, I think.

Here's the bigger one.

I got a call after 30 minutes, asking me if I wanted to get out on the water today.

I said "Yes, in fact I am looking at San Diego harbor right now. Shall we make it the 10:00 boat?"
He said "Yes."

I was looking out at the harbor from the TOP of the hill. South-eastward:

And south-westerly:

An hour later, after breakfast and the newspaper, my wife dropped me off at the dock.  My friend was nowhere in sight.

 I called him: "Where are you?"
He said "At the dock, a hundred feet away on the bench." 
I said "Bench? What bench? I don't see any bench?"
He said "Where are you?"
I said "I'm at the dock. By the Midway, San Diego harbor. Point Y."
He said "Uh-oh. I'm at Seaforth Landing, Mission Bay. Point X."

Oops. Wrong boat, wrong harbor, six-seven miles is too far to walk in 30 minutes, expensive for a cab, didn't have my bike, wife was headed home and her phone wasn't turned on.

So I walked 3 miles (half-way home), calling every few minutes. She finally came and got me, but my legs are aching.

Luckily there are two whale-watching cruises today, so we could catch the later one ... and we did, spotting this very nice Fin whale near North Coronado Island.

Our Daily Chores

It's Friday after a Thursday fourth, and we are both off work. Chores today included:

• getting some extra sleep to make up for the Fourth of July festivities last night
• posting some watch pictures on my watch website

•  replacing the broken hood release cable on our Volvo (a very complicated job)

• shopping for dinner
• bicycling around in the park

When we got to Balboa Park, we discovered the parking plaza has been turned into a pedestrian plaza. We'd heard some talk that it might happen, but I thought we voted against it. We were astonished.

Our city government is an underhanded bunch of cronies who do what they want for their own benefit - probably like all local governments, worldwide - but they apparently have no interest in spending money to improve access for cyclists. Overall our road surfaces stink and there's nowhere to park a bike. However, this pedestrian plaza has a beautiful, newly-painted surface. [click to enlarge image]

Sitting near the Aerospace Museum, we got a little dose of Aero Space overhead.

Having completed our chores, we rode home.

Fourth of July

If you have time, here is the fireworks show from the Fourth of July, 2013 as seen across San Diego Bay.

We went to Coronado, rode our bikes around, watched the parade and skeedaddled home in time to avoid the massive traffic jams.

As you might expect, seeing Mustang Convertibles in Coronado on the Fourth is like shooting fish in a barrel. So I didn't even try to get them all.

But a few jumped in front of my camera lens anyway.

Along with horses of all sizes and descriptions. From tiny,

To enormous.

And military men and women reminding us of things that contribute to our nation's (sometimes precarious) tradition of liberty.

We saw "an historical drinking society"

We drove to the bay - which would have been an easy 20 minute bike ride (IF we had bike lights), watched people frolicking in the water, then saw the fireworks.

Later it took us 80 minutes to drive home 3 miles. Yawn.

Blog #100

I've written 100 blog postings, as of today, just about riding my bicycle. It started out as a way to prove
to my friend John that I was indeed riding "like in the olde days."



In the process, I have met a few homeless people and seen many more.  I imagined a few hundred were living nearby, but was told by a social worker that more than 1000 folks were homefree within a radius of a few miles. Many of them recycle for a living, while others panhandle. Lots of them have bicycles, and even more have dogs.

MUSTANG CONVERTIBLES

I've seen several hundred different Mustang Convertibles in my 100 days of riding. Why? I know not.

I've dialed in my old bikes. I bought new shoes for myself and "new shoes" for the tandem. I tried out a $10,000+ plus state-of-the-art Holland bike. I've located lots of the bike parts I didn't know I still had - kept some and threw away others. And I built myself a bike shed.

I discovered that I have a fascination with orange (socks, shirts, watches, and the Creamsicle Suburban).

And I discovered that I like whale chasing almost as much (some days more) than riding my bike.

Bikes take you to the rough parts of town. You find all the potholes, construction sites, littered glass shards and rude drivers.  You learn that many (most?) other cyclists are scoff-laws who, immersed in their own journey, ignore other cyclists, irritate drivers, and break traffic laws with impunity.

Other cyclists, more than drivers, make me NOT want to ride my bike anymore. I have to continually remind myself of a saying I learned earlier this year from Father Maximos of Mt. Athos;
"Yes, they are doing irritating things - but what is that to me?"

The most exciting thing to report at the end of this 100th day? The family of hawks that nested in the great eucalyptus (now gone) have come back. And they are feasting tonight, in my rubber trees.

So that about brings this blog to a close ... but as I check my clock and calendar, I see a need for one more photo: