A Load of Potential

This week Garbage Eve netted The Geek this very neglected Supercycle. It is now sitting in the yard with one of two bikes from a previous trip.
And when I came back from the farm yesterday, I brought with me a cutting table (to be elaborated upon in a different post) and these two bikes.
This is a Venture Caprice that I bought second hand in 1985. I rode it all over that year and it travelled with me to Flin Flon. Now we will have to see what further adventures it will have.
And this well used Supercycle bike is destined to be a road bike for N1 in his future triathlon endeavours.

And, of note. As of this moment, there are on the property 12 bicycles of various sizes and stages of usability, one bicycle frame, eight assorted wheels and parts, and one unicycle.

One-Legged Donkey?

The Geek tries a unicycle.

Another Wire Donkey

I have been referring to the garage as the stable and to the bikes inside as 'steel ponies' .

After my mountain bike was run over in 2001, I replaced it with another Giant mountain bike. After awhile though, my neck started to bother me. So in 2006, Ruzter raised the handlebars for me by about 3 inches. I rode around with that modification for awhile, but my neck still bothered me, and my wrists, elbows and shoulders were not very happy.
I bought a Specialized cruiser-type bike in 2007 and that bike helped my wrists and my neck, but for some reason, when riding it, my knees started to hurt badly. The Geek and I measured the seat/pedal/ground angle and found the Giant's seat was three degrees less upright than the Specialized. I went back to the Giant as my neck and wrists hurt less on that bike than my knees did on the Specialized.

Then on Thursday, Dea, my athletic therapist, told me my sore wrists were in fact carpal tunnel. I decided then that I couldn't use the Giant anymore, even tho' I did ride it to work on Friday.

Luckily for me, The Geek stopped by Natural Cycle to pick up some cable and said their stable of Batavus bikes had been replenished.
I had been test driving a Batavus off and on for about a year both at Natural Cycle and at Red Bike in Edmonton. (The folks at Natural Cycle were starting to tease me about 'visiting my bike' whenever I came in.) Yesterday I went and bought this one. Be a tightwad, I wasn't ready to spend the money on a truly upright bike, but I figured it would be cheaper than extensive therapy or possibly surgery on my wrists.

Tina and I haven't measured the seat angle, but it feels considerably less steep than the Giant.
The Specialized is for sale. I liked it alot and I am sorry it didn't work for me.

Oh, and in Germany, bicycles are colloquially called Drahtesel. Wire Donkey. I think that is so cute!

More Backyard Improvements

On Saturday I went and bought some Eco-Lawn grass seed. It supposedly grows in the shade, so last night The Geek and I moved the rock edging for the garden and shovelled some of the dirt to the rough area beside the back fence to flatten it out. I spread the grass seed while she went on her first garbage eve expedition for 2009.

So far the birds haven't made a feast of the seed. Hopefully there is alot of other food out there for them right now and they won't be tempted.

Closer to the house, the tulips are starting to get serious about this spring stuff. Maybe there will be flowers by this weekend. And The Geek's first haul from garbage eve. These two bikes, plus another one that is slightly larger than N3's blue bike.

The neon orange and green show up alot brighter at dusk.

The Blue Bike

A few weeks ago my sister and her husband bought N2 a new bike. While they were at Woodcock, N3 was zooming around on a pedal-less push bike.

For the next while, all he talked about was 'My blue bike'.

Last summer, The Geek found a little bike on one of her garbage eve trips.
She took it apart, fixed the brakes, and painted it blue.

The magenta rims are all that is left of the original colour, but it gives the little bicycle a bit of pizazz. The Geek intentionally left off the crank, since N3 doesn't know what to do with pedals anyway.

N3 likes the bike, but it is a bit too big, and he can't touch the ground.

The Geek modified it slightly, but it was still too big. So she modified it more and while it doesn't have the same curb appeal,
he can touch the ground. It will be only a matter of time before he is off to the races.

Holland

This part of the Netherlands is just as flat as our part of Manitoba.

Bicycles galore, as one would expect, and even more providing transportation outside.
A curly hazelnut tree (if I understood correctly).
Some very cute houses that seem to have a remarkable amount of individual space with a very small footprint. At least if D and D's house was anything to go by.

Narrow, tree lined roads.
And best of all...

D and D, a pair of incredibly spunky octogenarians with energy levels that would put most 20 year olds to shame. They ride their bicycles and and hike regularly. She swims everyday in the summer and she just recently gave up bowling, a sport that he still enjoys. They kindly gave us a wonderful tour of local towns and historical spots that took up most of Thursday, then stayed up at least three hours longer than The Geek and I managed.

We had great fun during our visit.

Westphalia

This is the view from The Geek's family's living room. I was told with that view, it is like being on vacation everyday.
We were taken on a tour of the area, starting in Marl and then on to Münster.
Marl had one of the biggest bicycle stores I have ever seen. The Geek found a small part for her recumbent that she had been told here was no longer available. They just pulled out a manual, found the diagram, she picked out which piece it was, and they brought it for her. It doesn't get much better than that.
In Münster, the flowers were on sale everywhere, a wonderful sign of spring. Münster is known as the city of bicycles, and there were definitely many of them around.

Many of the older buildings were damaged by fire during the war, and the blackening still remains. This is St. Lambert's Church. It was apparently destroyed during the war and rebuilt again, with

the three cages above the clock no doubt replaced as well to make it look just like the original. These cages held the bodies of three ringleaders of the Münster Rebellion.
We had coffee and cake at a cozy little cafe that The Geek's dad frequented when he was in University and all in all enjoyed ourselves thoroughly.

The trip home was my first high-speed experience on the autobahn. If I saw the speedometer properly, we were doing 180 km/hr.

Get Smart!

We rented a Smart for the rest of the trip.

There is a surprising amount of room behind the back seat, holding both of our little bags and the two big backpacks and the tube holding The Geek's conference poster (which we figure we will forget on the plane in Toronto after dragging it all over Germany and Holland, but that would be another story).




And, conveniently enough, the new tires The Geek
bought for her 'bent may just work if we should need a spare tire.

Bikes are Nice

In this part of Canada, when you see a number of bicycles parked together, you might be right in thinking you have found a bicycle store. In a small urban center like Winnipeg, which is very flat, there is no reason why bicycles aren't used more.
Where we visited in Germany and The Netherlands, bikes were a widely used and accepted form of transportation. They are given space on the road and it would seem there are very few accidents, as almost no one wears a helmet. When a traffic light changes colour, there is a small separate light for biccycles that lets them enter the intersection a few seconds before the motorized traffic.
Signs like these are a common reminder that both bikes and people may use the sidewalk.The sidewalks themselves are marked in a similar fashion.In fact, in the Netherlands, they have a divided area in which they can ride.You are encouraged to take your bike (and baby carriages) onto the subway. The subways have special areas for them to stand as well as spaces where the seats fold up so you can lean your bike in that area. I did not see one person irritated by this. This was one of the bigger bike stores we saw. The biggest one was in Marl; this one was in Musselkanaal.

This is the bicycle parking area at the Dortmund Hauptbahnhof. One side was fenced and guarded, the other side was just a regular place to lock your bike.

Tina didn't know what these containers were for. They were near the trainstation in Witten-maybe longterm storage?

And there is no reason not to take your children or stuff. This bicycle has seatbelts for three children. Some bikes had big compartments on the front for groceries and other stuff.
With the ease of public transit and the acceptance of bicycles, I suspect many people do not own cars.

A Bicycle Built for ...Five?

I took a quick picture of this bike when it went by, but didn't really have a good look at the bike itself. Looking at the picture later, I thought there might be seats for five. On Friday before I left, I happened to be on a bus right behind this bike and did a seat count. Six, plus the 'driver'.

Two for the Price of One

Last weekend The Geek took a wheel building course and made a spare wheel for her hybrid bicycle. She enjoyed it so much that she bought the parts to make a flip-flop hub.
If you have the wheel mounted one way in the frame it is a fixed wheel. Turn it around and it becomes a free wheel.

Sheldon Brown's website is quite interesting and The Geek just thinks he looks cool

Cycle or Drive

I was taking my bike out of the garage this morning when it started to rain. I briefly toyed with the idea of driving, but it was already after 0800 and I wouldn't have had time.
The sad thing is, I can ride to work in about 20 minutes, whereas it takes about 25 - 40 minutes to drive the six kilometers. Summer is better; I can drive and ride in about the same time, but once school starts, that is it. I guess the kids all drive to school, or are driven by their parents.
It is a sad situation all the way around.

Re-inventing the Wheel

Or rather, the crank that turns the wheel.

The Geek had removed the crank from this garbage-eve special to see if it would fit her 'bent. It didn't so when she re-installed it, she didn't initially notice that the pedals were parallel to each other rather than on opposite sides of the crank.

The Geek did not need much encouragement to try it out the new arrangement.
You may want to shut off the sound when you view the video; there are some annoying thumping noises.

I wonder if this is the type of accidental discovery that results in an "ah-hah" moment for famous inventors.

Free spirit

Wednesday after work I was to meet The Geek at Dynasty, a bathroom supply place on Logan, just east of Isabel, to pick up a sink and tap. I asked her to get there before they close at 1700 incase I was caught in traffic. Things went well for me and I had the sink in the truck by 1645, so I parked my truck in a vacant lot west of the store and waited for The Geek. At 1700 I called her office, no answer. The same with her cell. It should have only taken her 15 mintues to get from HSC to Dynasty as all she had to do was ride east down McDermot to Isabel and then north to Logan.At 1710 I left the vacant lot and drove to HSC to see if she had become ensnared in some drama at work. Her 'bent wasn't in the bike lockup. Puzzling. Then as I'm driving back to Dynasty to see if she is there, planning to drive back to HSC following her possible alternate route to the store if she wasn't, she calls and tells me she has arrived at the store. A few minutes later we have loaded her (who has a big sheepish grin)'s bike in the truck. The Geek tells me she left HSC around 1630 but got lost when she couldn't remember if Logan was north or south of the Salter Street bridge. She was well north of the bridge when she sees another cyclist riding a recumbent bike possessing a short wheelbase and underseat steering. She decides to follow said bike. She then ends up chatting with the fellow and test driving his bike. Then remembers she has to be somewhere else and rides south on Salter and over the bridge to Logan and the store.Tina is now apparently looking for a 'bent with underseat steering.

The Bent

I talked with my Dad about my recumbent bike (aka "bent") a little while ago. I think his idea what it is is a little off. But, better than explaining, I'll just post a picture.
Not to launch into a sales pitch, but bents are easier on your arms and wrists and more aerodynamic. They are, however, much more difficult to do a trackstand on. ;-)

Here's mud in your eye!

and grit in your hair.
On the ride home from work Friday after that heavy rain, I could fell 'stuff' thrown up by the back tire pattering against the back of my head and my neck.
I asked The Geek to make me a splatter guard, and she came through with this highly aerodynamic looking device, which shows up all the better against the green of the car.