Testing, testing ...

A four-and-a-half mile trip home from the grocery store was today's test run for the trailer. The Igloo cooler weighs 22 pounds, and with 83 pounds of groceries it was quite a bit heavier than our planned load for the trip. Handling was still pretty good, but hauling all that weight uphill made for slow going. I didn't let the trike get up to full speed on the descents, and I took the corners at low speed.

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Lighting Up

Dale installed lights on the trailer box yesterday. We hope to ride mostly in daylight, but the lights could come in handy if we find ourselves on a country road after dark.

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Trip Preparations

How much preparation is enough for a bike tour? We've been reviewing routes, assembling a tool kit, tuning up the trikes, selecting quick-drying clothes, and doing some test rides. We still have more than a month to get everything ready, but previous rides have taught us that a little extra planning can save a lot of trouble on the road. (Having the right size inner tubes, for instance.)

Today's project was to hitch everything up, load the luggage, and make sure it all fits, and that nothing interferes with turning. So far, so good. The Igloo cooler holds three luggage organizers, a large bag for tools and spare tires, and a small packet for electronics. A Velo-Case and a Lone Peak seat-back bag will both fit on the rear trike, while the front trike can carry a Radical Design large seat-back bag.

There was time for some photos by Lake Harriet. I just hope the weather is this nice during the ride!

Green Travels

We are planning a greener vacation this summer, in recognition of the harm done by unlimited oil consumption, but also for the pure adventure of two 60-somethings setting out to bike a thousand miles -- from our front door to Wisconsin, joining up with the SAGBRAW group ride there, then riding to the Hostel Shoppe Recumbent Rally and home again.

We signed up for the events, reserved rooms in hotels along the way, and uploaded maps of the routes to our GPS. The next step was to get our Greenspeed Anura trikes set up so that either one could serve as the lead trike or the one pulling the trailer. We added a Weber hitch to the fork-grabber at the back of each trike.

In past years we rode a Hase Kettwiesel and an Anura linked together, but that required two sets of spare tires and tubes. Not fun when you are looking for the right one in the rain.

We're also exploring how to post to this blog from a mobile device, but getting photos to upload is proving challenging.

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Cycling in Copenhagen

We're in Copenhagen for the Velomobile Seminar (posts to follow), but also spending a few days biking around the city. Here's where we rode on Sunday, October 18:

Bike route 338766 - powered by Bikemap

The tour took us from our hotel, the Quality Airport Hotel Dan across the island of Amanger, where the Copenhagen Airport is located, to the Vestvolden bike path, then down through the city center and back to the hotel, a 30-mile loop.

We had rented a Winther trike, which weighs almost 100 pounds but carries just about anything you might want to transport. It's meant for carrying two children; we easily brought along a picnic lunch, camera gear, rain clothing, and some tools. The trike came from Copenhagen Bike-Rental, which supports bike-building and repair projects in Africa. We had a small-wheeled folding bike with us, but for this ride on mixed surfaces, we rented a conventional three-speed bike from the hotel.

The Vestvolden bike route follows an old line of fortifications from the 1800's. When advances in warfare made them useless, the system was abandoned, and it has been turned into a park. Much of the bike route is asphalt, but there are unpaved sections, and one bridge is accessible only for 2-wheelers. The small photo shows the trike and bike in front of one of the old forts.

Hundred-mile rides have a special allure. I've done eight of them now:
9/11/04 - 100 miles in a Cab-Bike, around 16 hours
9/11/05 - 100 miles on a combination of bikes, including 7 on a 1959 Raleigh 3-speed
9/10/06 - 100 miles mostly in the rain, on a Greenspeed GTO trike. Again, around 16 hours
9/9/07 - 50.8 miles on a double-delta Greenspeed Anura / Hase Kettwiesel trike tandem, then 40.2 miles on my old LWB (long-wheelbase recumbent) Osell; another 15-hour ride.
7/4/08 - tandem century on the Anura / Kettwiesel tandem.
8/8/08 - 105 miles on the Anura / Kettwiesel tandem as the third day of a 250-mile ride; this one took a bit over 12 hours.
9/7/08 - 100 miles on my Osell LWB.
9/11/09 - 104 miles, with the first fifty on the Anura and 54 on my Osell LWB.

My time was under 10 hours for the 100 miles, for an average speed (including rest stops) of 10.4 mph.

Most people who post reports of their century rides have completed them in less than 9 hours, and a lot of riders finish in less than half of my best time. I choose flat routes on local bike paths, loop back to home to change bikes and/or clothes, and -- until this year -- take generous rest breaks.

The century rides started with the realization that my September 11 birthday had lost a lot of its fun value after the terrorist attacks, and I needed to find a different way to celebrate.

Even with the slow times and the easy routes, the accomplishment feels good. And there's always the hope of finishing with a better time next year.

Fourth of July

We're just back from a 534-mile ride on a 2-trike tandem. We started in northeastern Wisconsin, up by the Michigan border, and rode with the GRABAAWR group along the Wisconsin River as far as Baraboo. At that point, we broke off and followed the 400, Elroy-Sparta, and LaCrosse River trails to LaCrosse, on the Minnesota border.

Today was the Fourth of July, and I rode a 5-trike tandem in the Edina Fourth of July Parade. Two of the other riders couldn't have participated without an option like this -- one was blind, and the other is in her 80's. The other rider carried a puppy on his lap -- not something you could do on a regular bike!

The title bar links to a video clip of several kids taking a ride after the parade.

Ice Bike Racing - 2009 version

The Minnesota Human-Powered Vehicle Association's 18th Annual Ice Bike Races drew a small enough crowd that I was able to win my class. (No other women showed up -- the only way I ever win these things.) Temperatures hovered just below zero Fahrenheit (minus 18 C), and the ice was rough. It had rained a few times early in the season, ruining the surfaces of most area lakes. Nonetheless, we had a little group of loyal ice bikers and a few spectators when we met on Medicine Lake, just west of Minneapolis. I rode a Greenspeed GTO recumbent trike this year, but the overall winning times were put in by riders on conventional 2-wheelers.

Fastest guy on the planet!!

Sam Whittingham has bicycled at 82.33 miles per hour under his own power and broken the (one-tenth) sound barrier, winning the DeciMach prize. This prize, which has come tantalizingly close to being claimed several times over recent years, celebrates the first human to bike at over one-tenth the speed of sound.

Infrastructure

When the 35W Bridge fell down in August 2007, it landed on a popular scenic route with bike and pedestrian paths along the Mississippi River. During the reconstruction of the bridge, those paths have remained closed, but for the Tour of Minneapolis bike event on September 14, 2008, cyclists were allowed to ride under the nearly-finished new bridge. We were on a trike tandem, so I was able to photograph the bridge from the back seat.

The Tour of Minneapolis passed under another troubled bridge: the Washington Avenue Bridge between the East Bank and West Bank campuses of the University of Minnesota. Ordinarily, the upper deck of the Washington Avenue Bridge is full of cyclists and pedestrians, but structural deficiencies that were discovered just before classes started for the fall have limited the upper-deck foot traffic to a narrow path down the center.



A small footbridge across the Minnehaha Creek along the Tour route was also gated shut because of crumbling supports, and we passed the Lowry Avenue Bridge -- closed to traffic because of structural inadequacy. We crossed the Mississippi River on yet another bridge with thoroughly-corroded guardrails.

It could have been called the tour of the crumbling infrastructure.