148 new of 291 responses total.
We are thinking of trying this with the wheels removed, the pedals turned inwards, and a large plastic bag as disguise. There is a particularly nasty conductor on the Chicago Ann Arbor route who won't let you turn the seats to face each other, making up different reasons each time. Not safe. Not enough space. Only if there are three of you. Our train was 1/4 full at most and it was obviously safe in the end compartment where the seats are always turned. I finally sat on the floor so I could stretch out my legs - no rule against that, luckily. 12 hour trip. Where on the trains do people put their bikes, at the ends?
Is that Caltrain or Amtrak? (re #143 that is...)
Amtrak. Caltrain has a special car to hold bikes. I haven't used Amtrak in years, but from what I hear they let people just take their bikes on and hold them next to their seats, no disassembly required. BART allows the same thing on non-rush hour trains.
Jim has just been hired by a neighbor (for $10) to fix up a bike that turns out to be missing a few spokes as well as having flat tires. This makes him a professional (assuming he gets it fixed). THe neighbor wants to give it to someone who needs transportation. Today Jim was also offered a free car by the neighbors who plumbing and chimney he fixed. It has a working exhaust system but a fair bit of rust (hole in the floor). We have never had a bike rust to the point of unusability, but have seen quite a few that did.
John and I went for our longest ride yet yesterday, about 20 miles. It took us a little over 2 hours, and we got back late enough that the cars all had their headlights on. We took the Kiwanis bike trail between Adrian and Tecumseh. A year ago, in Clinton and Manchester, there was a big to-do because of a discussion of extending the bike trail through those towns. The proposed path went through several people's fields and yards, so there was heavy opposition. One of the arguments used was that there'd be a lot of litter along the bike path. I've ridden the Tecumseh-Adrian trail twice now (going all the way along it just once) and have yet to see one piece of trash along the trail. Not one. The real point of the proposal was property rights; some of the proposed trail was right along the river, and the people who own that land want to keep it for themselves. I think they should be able to do so; it's *their* property. So far, Manchester and Clinton, being farm communities, see it that way, too.
Well, it's sort of their property. In a lot of cases I think the trails follow property that was sold to railroads, who eventually abandoned it. Now the people who live along it figure they have a right to get it back for free.
I thought the railroads still maintained the property even tho they no longer use it.
The bike trail is very, very nice. It's terrific to not have to contend with cars going by, and most of the trail is through the woods so it's great scenery for riding. As I've mentioned before, it's flat so it's easy riding. I'd like very much to have more trails like that in my area. If it's railroad land, it's probably easily and cheaply available, and yes, I'd support getting and using it.
In Minnesota the railroad had already sold their land to people after they destroyed the tracks, and all of it could not be bought back, so the trail was not quite as nice and straight and level as it could have been. I would like to keep the train service and also have a bike trail running near the train tracks so that you could bike places without needing to be near cars.
Sure, but people have a right to their property, too. There are not enough bicyclists to justify taking people's land for bike paths. But the bike trail that we used last night is really terrific. Are there many trails like it in Washtenaw County? I'd be willing to pile the bikes in the car to take my son on other rides. Does anyone know of others in Lenawee County?
It isnt really all that cheap to get the old railroad land but it is worthwhile. See http://www.railtrails.org/
I'd worry about toxic cleanup from all thsoe railroad ties, if I was planning on using the land for anything besides trails.
re #154: If you search around, there's a link to a list of trails, including biking trails. I found that useful. (http://www.traillink.com) There's information on Proposal 2 and it's benefits for bikers. I didn't see anything about the cost of old railroad land, though.
In W. Michigan the bike trail on the tracks was surfaced with a soft gravel that made it hard to bike, and ran through a very thin strip of trees with farmland on both sides. We found the regular rides preferable - plain hard dirt, few cars, and more to see. The bike trail was very crowded with very slow bikers and the dirt roads nearly empty. I would greatly appreciate a bike trail starting at Stadium Boulevard in Ann Arbor heading west for two miles as there is no safe way to get out of town going west.
You'd like the U Hills bike trail. Two lanes and paved. It used gto be an old right of way, before Sylvania and Ottawa Hills outlawed trains. I dont know how far it goes, but I see lots of people and thier bikes on it all the time.
I've watched a new bike trail being put in along Jackson, from Wagner to High Lake. So you've got part of your wish, I think, Sindi. On Thursday, I saw workers digging up a path on the south side of Jackson, from where the construciton is being toward Wagner. So you may have more of it. However, there may still be a bit of trouble getting from, say, Seventh and Huron to Jackson and Maple.
re #158: It sounds like it's in Toledo. I know even less about that than I do Ann Arbor. It does sound nice, though. Does it go anywhere interesting? Where does it start and end? I rode John over to his mother's house this morning, so I got in about a 13 mile ride. It was a great morning for bike riding. Much cooler than the day we rode the Kiwanis Trail.
If I remember correctly (it's been a few years), the Toledo trail runs from Sylvania to UofT, and there are a number of access/parking sites along the way. Note also that it requires crossing several busy roads, and that the trail is also popular with pedestrians and rollerbladers.
My definition of a bike trail is not something that runs along a noisy stinky highway. I know it is safer to bike on the path parallel to Jackson, but I think I prefer to risk my life on Liberty or Scio Church instead. Thanks for the information anyway. If we leave before 9 am on a Sunday morning it is not quite as bad. There is no problem getting as far as Stadium Blvd on side streets or even sidewalks.
Jim just spent a few hours measuring the rim width of all our aluminum wheels and he has selected the two narrowest (7/8" instead of 1 1/6") rims onto which to put wheels for my latest bike. Narrowest wheel on the front (with the least tread) and something thicker and wider on the back wheel which wears out faster due to more weight. He showed me how the tread was gone more on the back wheel of a matched pair that he had been using. So he is recommending that we put unmatched tires on our front and back wheels. The latest bike made two different sorts of noises depending which of the gear rings I was on - chain rubbing and a deeper grinding sort of noise. The cause turned out to be a bent derailleur which he straightened in the vise. A previous gearing problem on another bike was from the derailleur not being quite vertical. Jim's bike has a shifter that moves until you attach it to the cable, and a cable that moves unless attached to the shifter. They are all different on the inside. We have four or five of the two-lever variety now. In some you push the top to go up a gear, some you push the bottom to go up a gear. Some of them the levers stay where you put them so you can see what gear you are in, some they all come back to starting point. Some you push just a little, mine you have to push about 120 degrees (we had to rotate the shifter so I could reach it). There is one double-lever type where you push on one lever and pull on the other. Presumbly this is some sort of improvement over the single lever, which I had no trouble pushing AND pulling on. Sales gimmick? We are setting up as many bikes as possible with these double lever types so as to avoid the twist grips, which all come with bumpy and uncomfortable grips that you cannot replace with smooth flattened ones so as to rest your weight on your hands. You cannot buy anything but bumpy grips now (new). On the more used of the tires that we have the tread is worn down in the middle but never on the sides. I doubt anyone who abandoned these bikes ever rode them much on anything but pavement. We are choosing tires that do not have much tread on the sides, which saves weight. I could bike on grass and sand just as well with narrower tires. The knobby ones are more likely to trap gravel, I think.
I sorted tubes. The ones with disintegrating rubber had their valve snipped off (to be recycled as brass) and will become bungee cords. We found a 20", a 24", a 28" (?) which can also be used as 700 mm. The 24" is skinny and Jim showed me how to make it into a thin 26" for a 1.50 inch mountain bike tire as they have the same inside diameter. THere are also a pile of 26" x 1 3/4" inch which are for three-speed bikes. For mountain bikes we have 26" by various diameters. For the 1.50 inch tires there is 1.50-1.75 inch tubing. The tires come in 1.75, 1.85, 1.95, 2.00, 2.05, 2.10, 2.15 (?) and tubes in 1.75-2.00 etc. So a 26" tube will not fit all 26" tires or even all 26" rims, and a 24" tube will fit some 26" rims. We gave the 27" tubes to Jim's housemate with the racing bike. Did I miss any sizes? What do the old 1-speeds take? Jim spent much of today choosing wheels and tubes for my bike and when I left was doing the same for his. Yesterday he worked on my gears but got distracted redishing the 7/8" rear rim which had rounded nipples that needed to be fixed. Some people get obsessive. I finally biked home alone on a bike that fits perfectly (tho something is still rubbing in certain gear ranges).
My roof rack only fits one of my two cars. Unfortunately, I haven't seen a recumbent which will fit the kind of rack which mounts on a car's trunk lid (the tubes are far too large to go in the holders). Can anyone here recommend a good recumbent/carrier combo which can be swapped between cars easily?
My recumbent fits nicely on a back wheel / front fork carrier, which I have in a car-top rack. I think you're probably screwed for a trunk rack.
Jim has found a new use for his rear rack - groundhog transportation. He brought over his freshly caught one (a yearling, he says) in our friend's trap, wrapped in a large grey plastic bag, and then placed it in the shade under a grapevine behind my apartment. I tried to poke some edible weeds through the bars, but it just hisses a lot and won't eat them. 24 hours already without food or water. Tomorrow it gets a new home. I offered it to my landlord but he already has one. Groundhogs don't seem happy very far off the ground. We may offer it Barton Hills for a new home. This is at least the third animal caught in the trap. Not counting the cat. So far we are lucky that the skunk family has not found the bait appealing.
I think it's illegal to release that onto someone else's property without permission, so be careful in Barton Hills -- it's all private property.
I think I'd offer the groundhog trail mix -- even if it eats "edible weeds" in the wild, this may not be its first choice even there. Trapped, it's probably not in the best state of mind, so it would likely take something pretty special to take its mind off its predicament. Fresh water, in a bowl, would also likely be a good idea. It's not likely to either eat or drink while it even thinks you're watching -- as long as you're in sight, it's going to be much more worried that you're going to eat it or looking for a chance to escape, than in consuming anything under such conditions. Probably a park or a national forest would be the best place to release such a critter. There are several large and fairly wild parks to the west & north of A^2. I paid to have some racoons who were infesting my chimney deported to Jackson, although I don't think groundhogs are territorial enough for such a distance to be necessary.
The local critter control companies are now saying that they euthanize these trapped animals because it is more humane than releaseing them into another animal's territory. The intruder is more likely to die from slow starvation than be able to drive off the incumbent. Even parks and national forests are reaching saturation levels for groundhogs, racoons, and skunks.
The groundhog ate the wild amaranth after I left. I just poked some more in. I figure if I eat it, it must be edible. It has water in it. I don't feel like opening the trap to put in a bowl of water. We will find some park for it today that is not too close to houses, unless some other grexer wants it. Jim 'fixed' the neighbor's bike with the broken spokes by replacing the wheels and robbing a few other pieces off our bikes, and ajusting brakes etc. A nice quality upright-style ten-speed. He needs some clips for the cable housings, or string.
I would take it but one of my dogs would probably kill it so I am probably not the best choice.
From rhonda@boaa.com Wed Aug 7 17:19:56 2002 Date: Wed, 7 Aug 2002 15:02:14 -0400 From: Rhonda Foxworth <rhonda@boaa.com> To: "'keesan@grex.org'" <keesan@grex.org> Subject: Bike racks Just to let you know we now have 2 bike racks installed near the door off the covered parking area as you suggested. Thank you for your patience. Enjoy! Rhonda Foxworth, Marketing Officer Bank of Ann Arbor ---- I had emailed the marketing officer after the vice president expressed supreme disinterest. I pointed out that it did not do a whole lot for the bank's image to have bikes locked to the flagpole out front. The racks were on order for a long time. Today we took our groundhog's digital photo, then wrapped it in a grey plastic bag again, perched on Jim's milk crate on his rear rack, and biked along the river to Parker Mill. We photographed it and us again near the sign to the interpretive trail, where we walked in a distance and over the river, and opened the cage. It sat there looking the opposite direction for a bit, then turned around and scampered off. On the walk there a large dog expressed interest but the owner dragged it away. The groundhog's nose looked bloodied. Probably it tried to push its way out. It had stopped hissing. On the way back (with Jim's son, with whom we had a nice visit to be repeated shortly) we saw a bunch of geese and ducks with one white gull, and then two swans. Nice day to be out. My bike is much better than my old one. I could bike along the paved level trail in highest gear, and up the Spring St. hill in middle gear. I used to have to walk up the hill. .
I found the rhythm that Scott mentioned. It's something I'd once learned, sort of, but my muscles had forgotten it. Today I tried moving the crank all the way around with each leg instead of just pushing downward, and suddenly it clicked. Even going up a gear I was still pushing a lot faster with much less muscle effort, perhaps due to the lower peak forces. I made excellent time despite the wind. This probably means a leap in average speeds is in the offing.
I still need to ride more. I ran the opposite direction to what I usually ride, and found it was mostly uphill in this direction, gave me more of a work out, less coasting. I remember from my youth finding that circular pedal motion, and I tried it today,. Lots more of a leg workout, but also much faster time.
resp:174 ahhhhhhh... now I remember. Yeah, it was something taught to me when I used to ride with a rec group. I am terribly out of shape to really use it effectively now and will have to work back up to it.
I think there's a minimum fitness level you need to use that pedalling rhythm, like running effectively. Took a rather frenetic ride yesterday in that McMansion neighborhood off Newport just north of M-14. Lots of fun curves and hills, terrible architecture.
doubled my ride length today, and got a very good workout for my legs. Need to keep at it.
We are going on vacation! Island Lake Road, Tantree Farms (north and south of Chelsea), possibly a friend near Manchester, and Tecumseh (jep) - all the famous local sites. Only have to get our gears shifting perfectly, change Jim's stem and handlebars from short woman to long man's sizing so he does not have to ride upright, put on the pannier carriers, fix his water heater, someone else's bike, Tim's VCR, put together computers for two people, and we are off. The vacation includes computer lessons and a chimney inspection and possibly furnace installation if time. Jim's favorite way of relaxing. What is interesting to see in the vicinities of Chelsea, Manchester, Tecumseh and Adrian besides Hidden Lake Gardens?
Have fun!
Will we have time to do that, too?
Last night around 10 pm, as Jim was leaving my apartment, a raccoon climbed up on his bike to beg for food. It was a lot tamer than most of the cats around here. Jim was standing next to the bike and called me to see. The raccoon got tired of waiting for us and went to my neighbor's door and tried repeatedly to pry it open. We wonder if she feeds it. Jim got a couple of good digital photos (the sort where he sticks the camera into someone's face and hits the button and hopes they are in the photo - he was lucky this time). Big difference between raccoons and groundhogs.
Another raccoon in the trap at Jim's house. He is thinking Parker Mill again as it is isolated from houses. Good excuse for a bike ride.
A friend with the farm took the raccoon in the trap to some woods on the way home. Jim was going to take it along with us to Independence Lake. He says the extra weight is a good handicap so he can keep up with me. On the way back we saw two flocks of deer - 10 and 15 - plus some singles. No raccoons. There is another county park near Sharon Hollow with a working hydroelectric plant and restored mill, and Waterloo State Rec Area is not far out of our path. The bikes still need some work first. Mine makes a loud bumpy noise every time the wheel turns with the rear brake on, and a loud squeaky noise with front brake one. And some gear positions cause the chain to rattle or scrape. The book desribes how to keep changing gears and keep changing cable tension until everything works. Sounds time consuming. Barton Hills required all my gears - highest gear at the entrance where the hackberry trees are all in a row (they are edible), lowest gear climbing up to the country club swimming pool and after that I walked to the water tower, which must be the high point around here. Stein, Joy, Jennings are pretty level. At the lake we met someone using a mop handle as a cane who is attempting to get a bit of exercise to help recover from a fork lift injury. I forget to feel lucky that I can bike sometimes. The problem with biking to the lake is you get hungry, and after eating you feel like taking a nap, and then it is nearly time to leave in order to get back before dark. We swam one lap (a long lap).
I have a 2001 Specialized Rock Hopper. I bike to work every day (if it's not going to rain and it's not going to be over 95) the aabts looks cool, but I dunno if I'm ready for 20+ mile rides yet.
2001 is the year it was made? Jim is now a professional bike repair person. The neighbor who paid him $10 must have told a friend, as we found another old bike leaning against the housse (where it must have been for a while, through a few rains) with a wet note containing name, phone, and money attached. And another friend of a friend wants a wheel replaced for a found bike. We have all of tomorrow to get our bikes and camping gear and maps and food and pots ready for a 10 day bike trip. Jim needs to change his stem and handlebars first.
I went out just before dark today and got in a pretty good ride. I made good time despite the wind, chopping about 14 seconds off my best time of the last several rides (and 26 seconds off my last time despite more wind). I'm definitely going faster with the "spinning" technique than I was with the "mashing" technique, even at lower cadences. However, I'm concerned about efficiency. I drank a full oversize bike bottle and then drained the 2-liter in the aft pack, so I am only getting around 30 miles per gallon of water. Maybe I need a tune-up.
One thing that's curious... when I come back from an evening ride I usually have a number of small black spots on my face. Close examination shows them to be dead gnats. Apparently, they can't get out of the way of something moving at 15+ MPH and they don't survive the impact. (I'd opine that they drowned, but I've found them stuck in dry leg hair too.) If the Jains (?) are correct and we lose karma for everything we kill, however accidentally, I'm going to reincarnate as a slug... Does the happy-biker stereotype apply before the dead bugs are on your teeth?
In the weekend of August 26th I'll be going to Italy for a week to do some cycling. Yea! Sun, vino and mountains.
John and I rode for about an hour last night, which must have been 7-8 miles. We're not going to be able to ride further than that during the week, since it's getting dark earlier.
It is nice to read about people of so many different levels using their bikes. Jim asks Russ where he is going that he is measuring the time in seconds. We are usually happy to cut 15 minutes off of our time coming back from the lake.
I'd go nuts if I did the same route every time - I just like to go off and explore neighborhoods and then go really fast on open sections. I put the cheapo bike computer back on yesterday just to see how I was doing with speeds and such. Top speed 36.5 MPH (downhill and in top gear), which is about the same as last time. Probably 2-3 MPH faster overall, though.
In theory we are leaving tomorrow on our bike trip. Since we did not have time to figure out what the clunking noise in the rear wheel is when I use the rear brake, or get the derailleur working properly on my nice lightweight trek, Jim is taking apart the front derailleur on the heavier Raleigh 6 speed to make it into an 18 speed. The gears work perfectly and we replaced the wide curvy handlebar witha short straight one so I can ride bent over. Any suggestions on what to pack besides the following? tent, mats, bedding (layers - for temps predicted at 57 to 83), ground cloth pressure cooker and wok with cover, knife, small cutting board, curved spatula like strainer-like thing to use with the wok. For pressure cooking - millet, lentils. Boiling in the pressure cooker - oats. Stir-frying - peanuts, dried tofu, and vegetables given to us along the way. Olive oil and soy sauce. Garlic. Dried apricots from our tree. Two kinds of Chinese dried mushrooms. All in plastic tofu tubs. We may also buy some noodles. Will be fed by friends half the time. What else is light and compact and non-spoiling and vegan and whole-grain etc. that would pack well on a bike? Clothing also layers. Biking shoes or sandals, lightweight shoes for non-biking. Rain gear. Windbreaker, flannel shirt, lightweight long sleeves to keep the sun off, wool shirt for me, t-shirts, 2 pairs shorts, one pair thin knit pants for over shorts and for pajamas, sweatshirt, hat, thin sweater. What did we forget? Toothbrushes, floss, shampoo, dish/laundry detergent. Toilet paper. Flashlight? We can still see until almost 9 pm and did not need one last September and they are heavy. Digital camera? Bathing suits. A hankie. Money and maps and some paper and pencils, maybe a small notebook if I find one soon. One year we took a weather radio. Bandages and antiseptic cream. Sunscreen for Jim who turns pink otherwise. We will have four panniers each and larger items piled on the racks with bungie cords. Everything in large plastic bags as the panniers may leak. Please point out what we forget and what else might be helpful, tonight. In theory we leave tomorrow (after packing tomorrow and replacing Jim's stem and handlebars and putting on pannier racks on front, and Jim is fixing a neighbor's bike first.). The library has three MI county map books and an excellent large Washtenaw County map and a smaller Lenawee county truckers' map showing which roads for us to avoid. It labels quarries (good campsites if not currently in use), cemetaries (good for lunch stops), and some parks I never heard of including two in Sharon township one near a millpond. Various schools and camps and proving grounds. Hayes state park is not too far from Tecumseh. Waterloo is not too far west of our friends.
The front derailleur sort of works on the Raleigh if you push hard enough. The other method is to stop and move the chain over manually. This bike might be better for flat areas than the Trek. I was into the very highest gear on the Trek while not biking terribly fast. Jim thinks some oil might help the Raleigh. The brakes were all rusted together when I got it. But the rear derailleur has always worked properly. Perhaps the front one suffered from disuse. But surely the brakes would have been used if the derailleur was used. ?? Jim is busy working on the neighbor's bike. They got the wrong sort of rear baskets for the bike and attached them with a bit of thin wire. He is going to make something with bolts. Amazing how many different ways there are to design a basket attachment and how many ways to design a bike to take baskets or racks, and they rarely coincide. The bike arrived with a note saying 'please fix this bike'. I would have replaced the decaying looking tire but he says the sidewalls are not important and it has plenty of tread. He straightened the rims and replaced a worn cone in the bottom bracket instead. And put air in the tires (completely flat) - that might have been what needed to be fixed. They are holding air just fine.
Re #191: I ride a route that's fairly popular with cyclists and doesn't share much space with vehicles, which lets me ride all-out for exercise rather than worrying about traffic all the time. That also lets me gauge my performance with a stopwatch. It may be the same path, but the scenery is always changing. If I want new vistas, I can take off on a weekend and go though a park or rec area somewhere.
Hayes State Park is across the road from Wampler's Lake. It's about 20 miles from Tecumseh. There's a private campground near Macon (2 miles from Clinton), would you be interested in using that? That's the closest campground I know of to where I live. There are city parks around Tecumseh, but I've never seen anyone camping at them. I would think the Tecumseh police would frown on it. There are farmers all around here, though. I'd have tried to make arrangements for you, but they're all friends of Andrea's dad, and you'll probably have better luck just stopping and asking them yourselves. Take your cell phone. John is looking forward to seeing you. I can't give you any advice on vegan food. You can always snitch a few ears of corn if you're not particular (field corn), or buy sweet corn along the way. I saw a few herds of zucchini growers near the edge of Clinton, but luckily was near a side street and so I got away before they trapped me. Who'd have ever thought they'd learn to cooperate... usually they're in pretty stiff competition with one another. Bringing vegetables out into farm country this time of year is bringing coal to Newcastle.
We will be visiting friends with a large garden and then friends with an organic farm so it is just the staples we need to bring along. I might go buy a few treats at the coop this morning. 'Take your cell phone' means as much to us as 'turn on your TV'. What I am doing is forwarding grex mail to yahoo so that I can read mail at a library where they don't allow telnetting. (I did figure out how to do it with hyperterminal and Win95 but don't recall quite how I did it.) I should take a list of phone numbers of people we might visit. Looks like today will be the day for packing as it threatens rain. Jim is working on the neighbor's bike basket. Will try to remember about Macon and the campground but farmer's fields are usually a lot quieter than even the public campgrounds. There was one state park where they refused to take our money when we entered at 9 pm and then insisted on waking us at 11 pm to collect the money. (They took the $2 park entrance fee but not the $4 camping fee at the gate). Farmers are pretty nice to people on bikes. We were given a grassy spot by one private lake and then a tour of their steam tractor collection and egg factory. Some E. Germans on a bike tour with a baby stayed at a monastery and a dairy farm near here.
take your map of Toledo. When you get within 5 miles dial 419 514 7387. I'll come and see you.
We will not be within 5 miles of Toledo as Tecumseh is our farthest point south. Jim just adjusted our bike helmets and fixed my wheel so the brake would not hit a bump (it was out of true and the aluminum had been worn down). Works nicely. The other one has a front derailleur that works now but takes both arms to move it so we may want to replace the derailleur. Our friends near Chelsea expected us for lunch, got to call and explain that we are late. Jep, can you email us your phone number and address? You are not in the Washtenaw County phone book. I have addresses of four farmers to visit on the way back including Nemeth orchards and a guy near Belleville who used to bike everywhere on his 1-speed with coaster brakes, carrying his family on the handlebars. The roofer biked by today. I did not recognize him in helmet and shorts.
I shouldn't be in the Washtenaw County phone book, as Tecumseh is in Lenawee County. (-: This trip of yours sounds very interesting to me. Jim, why don't you join us in Tecumseh? I live in Conklin Estates, just off M-50 on the east side of town. Jim and Sindi will be here on Saturday.
We should be there if we don't break down or get rained out, anyway. (We have biked in solid rain before, though.) I know you are in Lenawee County as I went to the library and copied some maps from there. Sounds like an interesting place to visit and I hope the four of us can do some biking together on Sunday, maybe to Adrian. A few things I forgot - patch kit for the camping mats (we used up our glue last summer and the store is closed tonight), a lid for the small wok (Jim came up with stainless bowl but it is a bit small - stove fits inside both of them), old washcloth for bathing with (we packed shampoo to wash with). Still have to attach the front pannier holders and Jim suspects he left the bolts and U's on the bike he sold while removing the pannier racks themselves so will have to make some. Also hope to change his stem to add 3" length as he is riding a small open-frame bike same size as mine and mine is a bit small for me. Nobody makes large (men's size) open-frame bikes, unfortunately. He got the two for which we had longer seatposts, I got the others. Our friends near Chelsea were expecting us for lunch today ;(. I hope to be packed tonight but there is a long way to go. At least all the cooking stuff but the wok lid was in a box. Jim decided to take pepper spray for vicious dogs but I will have to go first so he can spray behind him and have it not go in our own eyes and noses. He has taken it before but we always outraced the attackers. There are no vicious dogs on our route to Independence Lake but there was one coming back from Bell Road Bridge. Last three times he took it and never used it. Have to come up with some bedding suitable for 57-83 degrees and humid. Down does not work well east of the Mississipi. Polyester is bulky. We may take light bags and warm clothing to sleep in. Long-sleeve jersey, wool shirt, hooded sweatshirt, wool socks, long underwear. We stayed warmer in a windy snowstorm than in 50 degrees and calm due to condensation, in Paw Paw.
This coming Saturday?? If so, I'll try, no promises. Sat is one of the best nights, but I may just take that night off since I work so much anyway. Mail w/ address. I'll email you as to weather or not I will be coming. omni18@juno.com
Have I mentioned here how much a wind, even a breeze, slows one down on a bicycle? I really took a speed hit on my ride today.
Try biking in a wind with 40 pounds of bulky gear on the bike. Hope to see you, omni. We had a couple of nice visits with your sister and her 'new' computer this week. We are nearly packed. Jim attached the front pannier racks somehow and is done choosing and packing tents, mats, groundcloths, bedding, cooking stuff, etc., and currently working on flashlights. The friend who we are visiting 'this weekend' cancelled Monday plans so she could spend time with us. Getting ready is half the fun but I wish it were not half the trip as well. I hope we can make it there for supper (about a 3 hour trip to near Island Lake). 50 degree lows predicted which makes for much nicer biking weather. We will both be highly visible. Jim gets the heavy stuff in a large orange bag on the back of his bike, and I get the light stuff in an old external frame orange backpack minus the skeleton, which we were about to get rid of when Jim started looking for something that would be visible in rain. Rain possible Monday and Thursday. Looking forward to visiting with both Johns and maybe seeing the annual Tecumseh corn festival parade and the llama ranch and gravel pit swimming hole and the fishes in their tank. Do any grexers have small lightweight tents that they no longer want? Something without strings, please, but need not be terribly modern. And does anyone want a very large blue dome tent without a fly, good for kids to camp in the yard? Anyone have unwanted used bike panniers? Ours are getting harder to mend.
Re #204: The bulk would slow me more than the weight, unless I was climbing hills; given how little I slow down with even a large reduction of effort, I'm running at the limits of air drag, not weight or rolling resistance. Cooling probably scales proportional to speed, but power expended against air drag scales as speed cubed. No wonder it's such hot work, pushing at maximum speed!
We arrived just at sunset. I was in lowest gear on the last hill and walked the last half of it. Jim proved he could bike it. There are at least three ways for a tent to get wet during a rainstorm: Rains in the screen door (at an angle). The groundcloth acts like a bathtub if a bit of it pokes out. When you zip up the door over the screening then your breath condenses on the underside of the fly, which since it is contacting the screen roof, then rains down more puddles from above to join the ones from below. Down sleeping bags make excellent sponges. My handlebar stem puts the handlebar at a slight angle with the result that I have to bike a bit tilted so the seat hits one leg. We will improvise a fix. Before leaving my sandal strap broke. Just as I was getting on the bike. Perfect timing. Jim's toilet also started leaking but he put a bucket under the tank. We have discovered two probable bugs in Kermit and Jim just fixed the printer. Our friend cannot think of any reason to get a faster computer (she has a 486) or modem (the phone lines only go to 14.4). She is happy rewinding old typewriter ribbons onto the proper spools for her 9-pin printer. They are free, paper is $1/box. 256 colors is plenty. We almost feel guilty for offering her a pentium.
Unless she has really bad phone lines, they should go faster than that. I live in the semi-boonies, and I get 23 or 24 using a 56K modem.
As I predicted, my speed took a big jump on today's ride. (Last time I didn't sit long enough to drink a full bottle of water before the return leg, so it wasn't comparable to my usual ride.) I set a new personal-best record and averaged over 16 MPH.
How far do you ride at 16 mph, Russ?
I'm more curious about how flat/hilly Russ rides. My own rides typically have me varying between ~5 and ~30 mph, due to the local topology.
Regardless of the topography, keep up the good work, Russ.
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Huron Valley is a very hilly area.
Yeah, Ann Arbor is not only in the Huron River valley, but glacial terrain as well.
We're on the so-called "Ft. Wayne Morraine," I think.
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No, I live in Ann Arbor. The Ft. Wayne Morraine stretches from somewhere north of A2 all the way to Ft. Wayne, hence the name.
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Yes, I live on top of it, about 1/2 mile from the end. Gee, I wonder I could organize a big Fort Wayne Morraine convention for next summer? We could hold it at Hunt Park and have skateboard races down Sunset where the morraine ends. ;)
Re #209: About 17 miles or thereabouts. I have no accurate measurement. I went out for a ride again tonight, because I had the time. I came back with more kamikaze gnats on my face. It's getting pretty comical. I'm not willing to tell people where I ride (it's crowded enough as it is, thanks) but it's fairly flat with the far end somewhat higher than the one near home; that accounts for part of the speed difference. I keep forgetting to take my altimeter on a ride and write down the readings. I have no idea how fast I climb hills, but I'll bet that I averaged less than 3 MPH going up the canyon switchbacks. I need to install the bike computer I bought (and grease all the bearings, and un-bend the chainwheel... <sigh> ). The last time I rode up Old 23 it took me about 50 minutes to get to the road which goes to Independence Lake park, and I considered that to be a picnic, difficulty-wise. The climb out of the valley is slow but then you have some pretty easy sailing.
"canyon switchbacks"?
I think Russ must be riding in Cedar Bend Park, since those are the only switchbacks I can think of on roads in the Ann Arbor area. I'm trying to remember if there are any switchbacks in Barton Hills, but I don't think there are. Hilly is, of course, a relative term. Before I'd spent much time in hilly areas, I used to think parts of Ann Arbor were hilly. I've had to conclude since that Ann Arbor is decidedly flat.
Hmm, so not *quite* north of A2. Learn something new all hte time.
Ann Arbor is hilly compared to anywhere in the Saginaw Valley. It's not hilly compared to Houghton. And Houghton is only moderately hilly compared to San Francisco. (Well, the steepness is about the same, but San Francisco's hills go on longer.)
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To clarify: Back in May I rode Utah route 7 (or is it 2? it goes from I-15 to US-89) east of Springdale, which has some switchbacks a few miles out of town. I'll let you get the maps to see where that goes. ;-) While catching my breath on the trip up, I took plenty of pictures. There wasn't time to snap pics on the way down, and it would have ruined the fun anyway.
Ok, that sounds like I'd probably count it as hilly.
Taking it easy and even stopping to pick up an abandoned bicycle to drop off at lost & found... walking the last half-mile... still averaged more than 12 MPH over time-in-motion. The difference between all-out effort and really slacking is remarkably small. Re #227: I bet you would. My altimeter said it climbed about 800 feet. Most of that climb was along a bit over 3 miles of road.
fag.
Were you in Barton Hills? Lots of hills, paved roads and very little car traffic. If anyone ever needs a bike part in Milan a guy on Main St. most of the way out of town with a big collection of old bikes in his yard can help. He gave us a tire when mine got damaged. He is willing to take all our old women's 3-speed bikes and find them homes with kids who cannot afford new ones. Someone on a bike at the supermarket sent us to him.
fag.
Back from Lombardy, Italy. It was great, but strainuous. (wet too, loads of thunderstorms) All'n all I estimate I climbed more than 12,000 ft. in four rides. Overall distance 320 kilometers.
My ride today: Los Altos (roughly Palo Alto) to Santa Cruz, taking a somewhat roundabout route to get more big hills in. 115 miles, 11,000 feet of elevation gain. Around 10 hours total, slightly over 8 hours of on the bike time. Scary moment for the day: Somewhere near the bottom of the final ten mile, 2,000 foot high speed descent to the parking lot, I was coming around a corner and found a patch of gravel. I remember one of my wheels starting to slide (it must have been the back wheel, since I don't think I could have recovered from the front wheel sliding at that speed), but fortunately it caught before it had slid far enough to make me crash, and I was able to stay upright and keep going. These $50 tires that wear out after a little more than a thousand miles seem well worth the cost. I later learned that somebody else had crashed there shortly before I went through. She smashed her helmet, and had some road rash on her leg, but fortunately seemed otherwise alright.
That makes my effort look pretty meager, Steve.
Steve is definitely Grex's answer to Lance Armstrong. I might be able to climb one such hill on a 30-mile ride, but over and over...
We just went maybe 200-300 miles (on mostly gravel roads) but it took 10 days of biking, about 2-5 hours/day. I will eventually post photos and travelog. Started north of Chelsea and continued in a big circle through Tecumseh, Milan, Dundee and back and forth staying in yards and once in pole barn while it poured. We met the owner while cooking lunch on the front porch at Bridgewater Lumber (they said their picnic table was the only one in town and it had a roof). Other high points included a private tour of the Dundee Military Pool (vehicle) museum after we stayed in the owner's yard, scones for breakfast after staying in another stranger's yard (he waved at us as we were going by around dark), tour of a dairy operation, the largest vegetable farm that sells at market (it was ten times as big before her husband died recently), orchard, organic vegetable farm, pawpaw grove, Tecumseh swimming hole and bike trail, unofficial Milan bike shop (he gave us a tire), and getting our photos in the Milan weekly newspaper just for being there. We brought back two colds, one poison ivy, and another camping mat. We were amazed to find that nobody we visited had a digital camera yet and that almost everybody had white Corelle dishes. On our trip we found no skunks or raccoons or helicopters and only one smoker (on a bike). But lots of smashed opossums and groundhogs.
opossum....two forks up!
I still seem to be improving. Despite the wind today, I averaged over 3/10 of a MPH faster than my previous personal-best record. On the downside, my front derailleur isn't shifting correctly. I need to see if the stop screw moved, the cable stretched, or the mechanism is binding.
When you figure it out, come fix mine. Did it possibly get bent?
If you're dropping the chain (shifting off the gears), one of the set screws moved. If it's shifting into the wrong position, it's a cable issue (or, possibly, the deraileur got bent). If it's getting stuck in mid-shift, and you're having to push hard on the shift lever to get it to move, the mechanism is binding (or the cable is getting stuck somewhere). These are all pretty easy to diagnose while riding, without even looking at it.
Re #240: It's reluctant to shift onto the largest chainwheel. I've fiddled with the cable adjuster, but the problem persists. It's hard to tell the difference between a setscrew, bent derailleur or stretched cable without going over it at close range.
I've never had a front derailleur that shifted *smoothly* onto larger chainwheels. I'd guess, though, that something has shifted so the derailleur isn't moving as far in that direction. The question is which of those causes is the problem. Usually front derailleurs have to move a bit past the chainwheel to actually get the chain to shift.
Have you got a triple (with granny) or a double in front? It might be that your front derailleur isn't fit for what you want.
someone stole my bike. I am really ticked off.
It's a triple chainwheel, and it's the same derailleur that's been on the bike since I bought it. It may well just be dirty.
Bruce, was it locked? Today at the library we met someone who said he had left his bike at the library (unlocked) and it was stolen. Today he found a bike in an alley (unlocked) and since it was still there a few hours later, he took it. Jim fixed the gears and brakes, etc. and will get him a lock. In Tecumseh we were told not to bother locking our bikes. In Ann Arbor things are different. If you rig up some way to keep the rain and sun off your bikes, we would be willing to fix you up a replacement. Leaving a bike unlocked around Ann Arbor is not a whole lot different from abandoning it - people assume the owner does not want it. You cannot blame them unless they took it from our yard (where you really also ought to lock it to the fence or some other bike).
They took it out of my back yard. They didn't take rhiannons because it had the flat. I put the spare tube in it and it blew. I bought a new tube and it seems to be doing well. If anyone sees a black huffy with white speckles and the name STORM on the frame with a shiny front wheel adn rusty rear wheel and a yellow tag hanging from the handle bars, call the A2 police.
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Nobody leaves his/her bike unlocked in Amsterdam. Hey, frequently locks are more expensive than the bikes they lock. Estimated, any average bicycle changes ownership six times before it's so run down it's a wreck. The changes don't happen by sale and re sale, but by bicycle theft. Bicycle theft makes crime rates in Amsterdam appear to be very high.
I am thinking we should lock our bikes in the yard together in 2s or 3s, so nobody will ride off with them.
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My bike, and the Trail a Bike, has been unlocked in the bike rack at my apartment complex all summer, and has been fine. They might be getting a bit rusty, and I should doubtless do something about that soon, but I see no reason to expect they'll be stolen.
It was bemusing, when Jim and Sindi came to visit, that they were very insistent about locking up their bikes each time they got off them. I do have a bike lock. I'll remember where the keys are, someday. Maybe.
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When I visited my sister in San Francisco a few years back she loaned me a bicycle... and *two* locks. The theory was that bike thieves only carried tools for one kind of lock, so I was using a U-lock and a high-tech cable lock at the same time.
Some bikes around town here have the frame locked with a U-lock and then a cable lock around both wheels. Some people also lock their quick-release seatposts. Thanks for the idea about locking front-to-back, but I don't think anyone could easily get two bikes even front to front out the narrow gate here. A bike we gave the neighbor was stolen off her front porch. She is locking the replacement to her ladder.
Um, taking an unlocked bike from an alley because it's been there for a few hours is stealing it. Maybe if it had been there for weeks it would be a different story, but even then going to the police to make sure it hadn't been reported stolen would be a good idea. Not taking proper precautions to prevent something from getting stolen perhaps makes it getting stolen predictable, but it doesn't make stealing it ok.
I am the one who took bur's bike; and I will be holding it hostage.
I think both where you're located, and the nature of the bikes, has a lot to do with the likelyhood of it being stolen. Right now, as students move in, is a particularly bad time to leave anything unattended near campus - this is prime hunting season for opportunists hoping to capitalize on careless mistakes made by students out on their own for the first time.
We have been invited to a tomato party in Olivet, east of Bellevue, Sat. Sept. 14. Are there any working passenger train stations in the vicinity that we don't know about? (I. e., does it stop in Marshall - I recall that it did not but I may be wrong). Marshall is only about one day's bike ride away. Olivet is about 20 miles west/SW of Eaton Rapids. The train tracks go through all these places and there is even an Olivet Station near Olivet but I doubt that there is any passenger service to it. Olivet pop 1185. Many of these little towns have airports but no public transportation. The party is in the evening so we could take an afternoon train back the next day if it existed and were within biking distance - may try to measure to Battle Creek in case it is within 30 miles. From here to Olivet looks about 80 miles so we could conceivable make it back in two days. Jim's housemate sometimes takes a truck to Battle Creek on weekends. We have biked to Paw Paw and back. John, were you planning by any chance to go to Eaton Rapids that Saturday?
Olivet is a reasonable biking distance from Battle Creek, or Marshall, and if we were to leave early enough, from Lansing. Are there any grexers headed in that general direction the 14th or even the 13th, who can take two bikes and some camping gear and two people along? The train to Battle Creek (without much advanced notice - that would have cut the fare in half) is $38 1-way for two adults, but they prefer the bikes to be in boxes which is an additional $12 per person and lots of nuisance. There are some nasty looking numbered roads in the way between Battle Creek and Olivet but I presume we can find some way to get around them with good maps. We went several miles out of our way to be able to cross 23 but there seems to be a bridge over 69 that is not a red line. Does anyone know that area. There is actually a Battle Creek (blue line).
JEP very kindly offered to make a special trip to take us to Olivet but I explained that we are trying to minimize gasoline burning, not cadge free rides. (We do have a motor vehicle). We may be able to go visit some people in Eaton Rapids some other time with the Johns. Jim's housemate is interested in tomatoes but has other plans. We may actually get some work done on the house instead of gallivanting.
We may go on a second adventure after all. Stay tuned for details. All we need to do first is pick lots of pears and grapes and apples, process them, freeze a crate of greens, recycle 6 more computers, make a computer, and pack things for camping and we have four days to do it in. Easy.
Adjusting the cable on the front derailleur made it work a bit better, but didn't fix the problem. Oil on the joints improved it further; I can now depend on it shifting, albeit not as quickly as I'd like. I believe the stop screw isn't even a factor (I couldn't see it protruding when I looked at the bike), so it's either dirt or it's bent. Either way, not too hard to fix or live with.
Feel free to fix my front derailleur now you are an expert. It still takes two arms to move it (or a stick to lift up the chain manually and move it over). Anyone know what might be making my front brakes really noisy? We could not see anything out of alignment. Cantilever brakes. The repair book said some brakes are just noisy and you should get earplugs. I feel bad using them at night (but it does get pedestrians to move quickly out of the way). Rain possible next weekend. I hope they move it up a few days. Eaton County has the distinction of having nothing at all mentioned about it in any of the library books about what to see in Michigan. No big cities or state parks or famous restaurants. Sounds very peaceful. Jim is getting us ready by fixing a tape deck, a VCR and a boombox (so we will have more space to pack). It was too hot to go outside to work on the bikes. He should put an aluminum front wheel on his Murray. The seat post is too short on his better one that already has the pannier racks - anyone have a super long seatpost?
There is a pretty famous restaurant outside of Eaton Rapids, though I can't remember the name. Eaton County is a lot like Lenawee County; a mostly rural farming county.
Re #265: Have you tried sanding the brake shoes to break the glaze, or getting new ones? My brakes tend to get noisy when the pads get glazed or the rubber hardens from age.
You probably need to "toe in" the brake pads. That is, make the front of the pad hit the rim before the back of it does.
Thanks, we will try both these fixes. Before the next trip, I hope. I really sound like a banshee going down hills. I have started posting our bike trip photos at www.usol.com/~keesan/aug02.htm. 20 photos (about a third of the trip).
Check your site, Sindy. Nice. It seems some links (to pictures) don't work. I invite you to have a look at my biking site: http://www.godutch.myweb.nl/ Working parts are: Slide show, 'behind me'; stories on Italy 1996, Pyrenees 1997, Alps 2000. Under contruction are Alps 2001, M. Ventoux 2001 and Italy 2002, and the 'front wheel' (quiting) It's ever growing and graphic intensive.
I will check out your site next time I am using a graphical browser, Clees. I found one broken link in the Aug2002 section (to Hanni's info - I typed the wrong URL) - which other ones were broken? For a while I had the jpgs in the wrong directory but they are moved now, please check again and let me know what else does not work. It is very slow for me to check them all with my modem connection. I will post more soon (today?).
Clees, may I put a link to your site at mysite? I have finished posting and would appreciate knowing of any broken links. www.usol.com/~keesan. Does anyone know how, using the command lines of cuteftp for DOS, I can 1. Go back to a higher level directory? 2. Move files between directories? I cannot find the manual for cuteftp anywhere online. Does grex have anything better than the list of commands that I get when I type ? in cuteftp? I figured out how to list local and nonlocal files, to put and get, to quit and close, etc.
Next time I am browsing I'll keep an eye to it, but it might take some time. As from next Saturday I'll be in your town for a week. And of course you made add alink on your site. I' shall put a link on my site, then.
We may miss you as we hope to go biking for a week leaving Saturday ;( I have asked a grexer with a DSL line that he could not think of much use for to check out my links to the photos. Clees, do you have a place lined up to stay while you are in Ann Arbor? What are your plans (I have not been reading your travel item).
My plans? Heh heh, Renfest, a BBQ, there is a birthday coming up. For the rest Ill just see what happens. Maybe have lunch with this or that. I'll be staying with Anne and Sylvia.
Clees's site (www.godutch.myweb.nl) has links to various other people's bike tours. There was one cross-country US tour made by three people who posted a long list of what they took (why do people bring shaving cream and razors on camping trips when they are travelling light, and three tents for three people). This one had a map, and journal entries for all three. Two of the journals were blank, the third had two entries in it for the day when it poured rain all day and the day when the kid's rear tire blew and wheel broke and he had to wait two weeks for a replacement (before joining the group a few hundred miles west - I get the impression they were not doing this for transportation). There was a more interesting bike trip by someone in D. C. originally from Michigan, done solo, with lots of photos, and his 1995 AIDS bikeathon with 3200 other people, 3 days Boston to NY. He took the train north and biked 3 days with the group (it rained, 700 gave up, they were all issued tents and food and luggage every night) and then 3 days by himself via hotel. Nobody else seems to bike in circles - they all depend on cars or trains or airplanes to get them somewhere or back from somewhere. Nobody listed the cost of their trip just the daily miles and what they took and what they saw. They stayed in $10/night campgrounds with showers and ate doughnuts. Our trip cost nothing for the bikes except our time. We already had the tents and sleeping bags and bought one $61 mat (marked down from $90 because someone had returned it) and three bags of corn chips (79 cents on sale). I paid about $2 for maps - photocopied the library county maps. We paid nothing for entertainment or museum admission or campsites or hotels. We ate once at a Milan restaurant for $4 each and JEP treated us in Tecumseh. The other trips were all along carefully marked transcontinental or east coast bike routes. We hiked two days once on the Appalachian trail and they must have been much like this. You keep meeting the same people and everyone along the way knows what you are doing and is bored with tourists. They took spare tubes and tires. We met someone interesting in Milan when I needed a tire. He sells used bikes out of his yard. They stayed in campsites. We stayed in a pole barn when it rained hard and met some llamas. THey ate in restaurants. We took along our millet and lima beans and dried mushrooms and peanuts and cooked with people that we visited. They bought expensive new bikes that needed replacement parts which you had to mail order. We got ours as 'offerings to the curb gods' and moved parts around. They went on paved roads. We went on dirt and since we were the only bikers ever to pass that way, got offers of yards to stay in and breakfast and conversation. They went hundreds or thousands of miles from home. Our circle had a diameter of about 35 miles and we met a wide variety of people and did not have to be anywhere at any particular time so changed plans often.
Jim's housemate went crosscountry one year in April and May alone on his recumbent bike. He told us of how many people thought he looked hungry and fed him. One biker kept him for a few days during a snowstorm. He was not following any set of biking maps and headed south when he got tired of snow, just in time to hit hot weather in Iowa instead of snow in MN. Time to pack our bikes for the next adventure. Jim is looking for a bottle for cooking oil, and the missing sheet.
planning a wesson party, are you?
We are nearly packed for our next adventure. This time I packed heavy wool shirts and long pants. Jim has a new mat cover that snaps all the way around. Little comforts (this one weighs over a pound but keeps the mat from being slippery and sticky) make all the difference. We saved time by putting all the cooking and other non-clothing gear into a box last time and the contents just go into the panniers, along with quinoa, split peas and the other basic foods and some clothing and bike tools. JIm refuses to take a spare tube. I seem to be much harder on tires than on tubes anyway. He is deciding whether to take a Goretex jacket (that works in light rain) or a nylon rain cape (that does not work as a jacket but does work in the rain).
Greetings from the Eaton Rapids library. WE had a nice visit and walk around town with the Perries (John I and Ruth) and now we know why John II was not afraid to make bookcases. Their house is full of professionally looking built-ins made byJohn I. But his mother is a great cook so he has no excuse. He says someone had to do the eating, they could not all cook. The town is very pretty, withseveral parks on the Grand Ledge River, a nice library, a Chinese-Polish-Thai restaurant, a hardware store, and lots of quiet and clean air. Heading south to visit someone with 120 varieties of fruit trees and then home.
That's the Grand River.
My parents enjoyed meeting Jim and Sindi. They thought Sindi was pretty inquisitive. They thought the house they're building was beautiful. They hadn't seen much in the way of digital cameras, and were very pleased to have the pictures of all of us for my mother's computer. They used a picture of me for their computer wallpaper. It was extremely helpful, to have Jim to help me load my dad's canoe, which I'm borrowing for a weekend trip with my son. Thanks!
Has nobody else been biking since last weekend? Thanks for the instructions how to fix our squeaky brakes. One of my front brakes had a reverse slope (the back part hit first). It is quiet now (except in the rain - which we had lots of Friday coming back). Friday is a good day to be biking in intermittent rain because of the garage sales. We came back with 50 pounds on my bike and 85 on Jim's including a large electric pressure cooker, a lightweight pan/pot/bowl/lid combination (we left them our heavy wok), an antique voltmeter, something equally heavy that you can set to behave like any two transistors, a large heavy drill sharpener, mouse trap, ant bait, carpet shampoo, mink oil, two videos (these small items were at the curb after a sale), a large bunch of files and handles. I am waiting for Jim to weigh all the new toys. Also about 5 pounds of home-grown black beans, a whopper onion. We ate the apples along the way. I pushed my bike up much of Newport Rd. Jim was carrying the toys - I was carrying the same as I was carrying most of the trip, which he claimed was all light stuff (bedding, clothing, a bit of food most of which had been eaten on the trip). Me and bike came to 195 pounds, Jim and bike to 290 pounds. He is 50% larger but 100% stronger. No wonder I could not keep up and had to go first.
BIKING! LEt me tell you about what my PT indstructor is going to put me thru! No. never mind. I'll save it for when I find out. But it ain't gonna be pretty.
What PT instructor? Do you want an exercise bike? Last trip something cut through both layers of the sidewall of my front tire. We replaced it in Milan and the replacement is fine. Today Jim noticed something had worn through the first of two layers of his rear tire. As he was replacing his, I noticed the same had happened to mine. What sorts of things cut through the fibers in sidewalls? Are we just three times unlucky? At least it did not get to the point where the tube was bulging. Jim is cleaning lots of sand from the bike and panniers. Wet sand from Hamburg south (and part of the way before that). Kearney Rd. is continuous potholes and they were all full of water while both sides of the road were underwater. Sometimes cars would slow down to pass us. Jennings, Joy and Stein were flat and nearly pothole free. During rush hour all the cars were rushing north from Ann Arbor instead of rushing south past us. Southern Livingston County is full of Ann Arbor people 'gone country' with horses. There is a Lakelands Linear State Park from Stockbridge to Pinckney which bills itself as a biking and hiking trail with a few sections open to bikes. It was poor quality (thick gravel) surface chewed up by horsetracks and full of droppings. We tried it briefly and switched to dirt road. A local resident said it is only used for horses and she left it and took M-36 instead (a really bad road for biking but at least level). At Lakeland we nearly went on M-36 but discovered that the DNR had taken over another section of the same abandoned railway bed. This had only one horse dropping and no obvious tracks and about 2/3 of it was bikable. The rest was deep in large round stones or sand, which someone had apparently dumped from a truck every 10-20 feet so as to produce a roller coaster effect. Very pretty scenery along the sides of cattails and bushes turning color. We went from Lakeland to Hamburg. The other way goes to Pinckney. On the short section we took of the State trail we saw NO bike tracks except for one triple track going both ways. We eventually met up with the creature that made it. They are now making 'jogging' baby carriages in luxury models that look just like the regular ones but have three large wheels. At one intersection with a road someone was selling tomatoes. They were rotten. As we were eating our grapes she came out and pitched them all across the road and put out fresh ones for us. In Stockbridge there is an authentic Mexican takeout restaurant where he uses no cans. We bought corn chips, which we later ate while waiting out the rain near the Huron River on the bike trail, crouched under some sort of metal cage type thing (Jim says it is used to haul things on railway cars) that someone had floored with screens and roofed with a few wooden boards. He sat under the crack on a broiler oven. We put our 8x10' tarp over the bikes and the doorway propped up on a screen. The next time it started to rain we waited under a plastic awning with four legs that was also sheltering the Hamburg Special Olympics rummage sale. The sale was continuing through the second annual Hamburg railway day on Saturday. Jim got a large voltmeter and a large object that substitutes for any transistor pair. We at the supper we had cooked under a tarp the night before. The third time it started to rain, just south of Hamburg, I spotted a garage sale sign. We bought a very heavy drill bit sharpener and 2' level and stayed to visit for a few hours until they closed up. They offered us a ride home in a truck. We were stubborn and left at 5 in the rain. It rained steadily until the Huron River, let up a few minutes as we crossed, then rained steadily until we got home, at which point the dams burst. So did the gutter over my back porch (it falls down regularly). This trip Jim could recognize poison ivy so only got some on his ankles.
Lakelands trail had a few sections open to horses (I typed bikes) and was supposed to be mainly for hiking and biking. No fun biking in horse manure and a surface like the craters of the moon.
I have been riding every few days, but just the usual exercise sprints. They don't seem to be worth talking about. I don't even read more than the first half-page of long screeds about road trips. If they come to dominate too much, I may just forget this item.
...and then you'll *really* be sorry!
We are hoping to make a short road trip this week to Slynne's grapes - are they still hanging on the vine? I need a bit more rest first. Tuesday after 4 might be a possibility. Jim's grapes are ripe but most of them got picked (or knocked down by raccoons) before they could ripen.
I think they are still there. I havent actually taken a walk back there in a few days. I'll do that tomorrow.
Looks like Lance Armstrong is poised to win his 6th consecutive Tour de France
You have several choices: