Bikes 20 Jul 2006 09:12 pm
tandem, day 5
1.73 miles, our longest ride by about a quarter-mile. We went into new territory today, with a bigger hill to coast down. I complained all the way down about my impending death and then insisted on doing it again immediately. We also practiced pausing at intersections. And for once I said, “Faster!” on our way down a hill.
Cars are freaking me out a little less, I think. I can see us going up and taking a brief crack at 20th soon, at some low-traffic time of day when visibility is good.
It’s fun to see other people on bikes when we’re out on the tandem. We seem to give them the warm fuzzies. Awww, happy scruffy geeks on a bicycle built for two.
on 20 Jul 2006 at 9:43 pm 1.Rachel said …
I have to admit I’m really enjoying seeing your bike posts. I’m really fond of bike-riding.
By “pausing”, do you mean coming to a full stop, or doing that fun “almost-at-a-full-stop-but-moving-just-enough-to-keep-from-falling-over” trick?
on 20 Jul 2006 at 10:37 pm 2.Cam Sculpin said …
We’ve mostly been practicing coming to a full stop. Josh usually puts his foot down. But once we did go really, really slowly in that rolling-stop sort of way.
Mostly this is about getting my hindbrain to understand that we can fly down a hill at a roaring 17 mph and and still stop at the bottom very easily. My instincts have learned now that going down the hill itself is okay, but they are not quite sure that we will not fly into the intersection and be struck by a car and die or something. (Can you tell that I spent a lot of time in childhood being brainwashed about all the ways that cars could kill me and probably will? Can you guess that nobody wants to get in a car with my mother? Heh.) It’s also just a skill that needed building.
I’m glad you’re enjoying the bike posts! I thought they might be a bit dull.
on 21 Jul 2006 at 5:15 am 3.Rechercher said …
I agree, the bike posts are very entertaining. Can you possibly get someone to take a picture of the two of you on the bike? I’d love to see it.