Saturday, August 9, 2008

Breaking in the bikes


We picked up the bikes from L&M (our local shop, really local, like walking distance to the house) before we left but it was so darn hot last week that we really couldn't bear to do any riding. But the weather broke while we were away and since we got back Thursday night and I had Friday off DK1 and I took the bikes to the main bike route along the Arkansas River near the museums downtown. (For those of you not from here, the river is pronounced like it's spelled.) DK wanted to go see the bodies exhibit at Exploration Place, but a quick look at the website showed it was expensive to get in ($2o for me, $18 for her) and we'd come home in part because we didn't want an additional day of admissions charges and meals out, so we had to back-burner that. I still hope to do it with her, maybe for her birthday.

Anyway, we rode the path basically from Central to Harry, it's about 6 miles round trip. We'd never done it before so we ended up on the wrong side of the river and we had to walk our bikes across a bridge at one point, but the day was beautiful, the bikes worked really well, we had sandwiches that DW had made for us that we snacked on before turning back. We had a good conversation. We stopped for a minute at the museum also (the free part, we have a membership). It was fun! (And can I also mention here that the new seats were a very worthwhile investment!)

It felt a little weird to drive the bikes to a place for a ride, but I would almost have to do that to any bike route at this point, especially if I have a kid with me. John B. linked to a place where you can commit to riding a certain number of miles instead of driving, and I plan to ride to work most days (Larry B from KMUW, who's an avid rider, helped me plan a good route for that), but I couldn't even really ride to the grocery store at this point because the only way there from here is along a 6 lane road. Yikes!

But... this Friday ride was a very good start!

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