Tag: bikes

My Year on the Wheel 2025

I made it to 10,000 miles for the eighth year in a row. It wasn’t easy but I pulled it off. Of the 10,164 miles that I rode, 723 were indoors on various contraptions. After we joined the local rec center, I decided to ride there and use the recumbent bikes for an hour, saving me from the elements. The rec center machines are cruel masters; the feedback from the display screen gets me riding much faster than I do outdoors. At the end of the year, I brought the CrossCheck indoors to try it out on my resistance trainer. It still beat up my body. By comparison, Big Nellie, my recumbent, on the trainer is almost as good as a massage.

The Mule was my bike of choice for most of the year, except July and August when I rode Big Nellie, my recumbent, exclusively. I experimented with an underseat steering recumbent, an HP Velotechnik Streetmachine, and found it just didn’t work for me. I rode it 119 miles before throwing in the towel after tipping over and injuring my right shoulder. I rode my Bike Friday only 201.5 miles. I rode my CrossCheck 1,142.5 miles, mostly during the Spring. That’s about 2,000 or so miles less than 2024. Since then, except for using it on my resistance trainer, it has gathered dust.

My biggest mileage month was April – 1,019 miles – mostly because of the tour I did on the Natchez Trace Parkway. My shortest month was February – 676 miles – no surprise. My mileage during the warm weather months was assisted by hiring a lawn service. I’ve learned that I would much rather ride than mow.

My longest ride of the year was 90 miles which came on the Natchez Trace tour. This is the first year in ages that I didn’t do a century (100-mile) ride. I did ride my age on my 70th birthday, albeit in kilometers. When you get old, kilometers rock.

I did my usual event rides, the WABA Spring ride (20 miles plus 30 riding to and from), the 50 States Ride (62 miles), the Great Pumpkin Ride (62 miles with my rear wheel falling off) and the Cider Ride (60 miles of hurt).

And then there is this:

Clockwise from upper left: Big Nellie, The Mule, The CrossCheck, and Little Nellie. 196,121 miles in all.

So my first goal of the new year is to put 3,879 more miles on my bikes. Check this space in May.

I had hoped to buy a new bike (or trike) in 2025 and get rid of one of my little-used ones but that didn’t happen. I also thought about an inn-to-inn tour in County Cork, Ireland but I let that slide. As for this year, I have no plans at all other than to avoid big metal things.

Cookin’ in June 2025

Weather

We’ve been dealing with heat waves and violent thunderstorms. One of the latter dropped a tree that partly fell into my yard. I worked on cleaning it up and hacking back invasive vines for an hour and was soaked in sweat by the end. I did another assault on run-away vegetation a week later and looked like I had jumped in a pool. I have a method that keeps me from doing too much; I own three 30-gallon garbage cans. Once they are filled with clippings and other debris, I stop. One more round of yard work to go and I can find another way to trash my aging bones.

Bicycling

I had three unstated goals this month. One was to reach 5,000 miles for the year. I ended the month at 5,211 miles. Yay me. I wanted to hit some thousand-mile milestones on my bikes. I hit 33,000 miles on the Tank, my Surly CrossCheck, on June 5. Five days later I hit 52,000 miles on Big Nellie, my Tour Easy recumbent. On June 25, I hit 80,000 miles on The Mule, my Specialized Sequoia touring bike. My last goal was to hit 1,000 miles for the month. This may seem like a lot but I’ve done it every year since I retired in 2017. This year I fell short by hitting only 50 miles. I guess it helps to be on a tour.

I spent the last week of the month on my recumbent to get my “bent” legs back. Recumbents stress different parts of your body so they do take some getting used to after riding conventional bikes for over a month. Once I get dialed in, and have no other problems, I’ll test ride some tadpole (two wheels in front) trikes.

Reading

1776 by David McCullough. The story of the rag tag US Continental Army’s fight against a massive British force augmented by Hessian mercenaries. British General Howe had the US forces in his hip pocket at New York but let them escape. The ultimate outcome, American independence, according to McCullough, “seemed little short of a miracle.” My last McCullough book. Not a bad one in the lot.

My Brilliant Friend by Elena Ferrante. The plot focuses on the coming of age of two girls in a working class neighborhood in 1950s Naples. Both are intellectually gifted. Their relationship evolves as they grow into their middle-teen years. Their lives become intertwined with their family and neighbors. Basically, it’s a soap opera. It sold extremely well and was praised by critics. I suppose if I had read it in one sitting I’d have liked it much more but, in the end, it wasn’t for me.

Watching

Good Night and Good Luck – CNN broadcast a live performance of this Broadway play about Edward R. Murrow’s confrontation with Senator Joseph McCarthy. It is based on the film of the same name In the film Murrow was played by David Strathairn, one of my favorite actors. Strathairn is now 76 years old so he’s aged out of the part which is taken by writer/producer George Clooney. (Clooney played Fred Friendly, Murrow’s boss, in the movie.) It was very well done. The sound, staging, and acting were all first rate. It shares one rather depressing thing with the Beatles’s Get Back. Like George Harrison in that film, Murrow is constantly smoking. Murrow died in his 50s from lung cancer. (The cloud of cigarette smoke from virtually every cast member is constant.) Harrison died from throat cancer that spread to his brain. The whole time I was watching I wanted to reach into the television and slap the cigarettes out of their mouths.

Mat Ryder Unplugged – Mat’s editing pal Ross made a 3-hour video from the massive content documenting his ride across America. This one has no commentary or music, just ambient sounds. Watching this I am a bit amazed that I rode across the continent at the ripe young age of 62. Mat also produced three new, shorter videos. One was about overhauling his bike. Another about his plans to ride mostly off-road from Land’s End to John O’Groats, the length of Great Britain. The third was about how he and Ross did a day tour riding the perimeter of the Isle of Wight.

Washington Nationals – The Nats went into a tailspin transforming from a promising team to one of the worst teams in the National League. They have a legitimate, emerging superstar in James Wood, and a couple of good starting pitchers who I pray won’t have arm problems. Where have you gone, Tony Two-Bags?

Trikes – I’ve watched countless videos on the various aspects of trikes, So many decisions: folding or not, will a rear rack impede the fold. drum or disc brakes, direct or indirect steering, three small wheels or two small ones up front and a big one in back. How would I carry stuff? Where does the water go? How will I transport it? Is the seat adjustable? Should I get one with an electric assist? It’ll probably come down to which one I like to ride the most.

Medical Merri-Go-Round

I noticed an odd looking spot near my left elbow last week. I am paranoid about getting skin cancer from my thousands of hours outdoors so I went to a dermatologist for a skin screening. It was a nothing burger. I’m of Irish and English ancestry so I burn easily. Nobody (that I know of) in my family has had skin cancer. Weird.

I continue to deal with pain in my right arm that resulted from my topple over crash on the Streetmachine that I test rode last month. Somedays I feel only mild discomfort. Other days my arm is screaming at me. I thought about going for physical therapy or I could just save myself the hassle, frustration, and expense and let time do its thing.

Little Nellie Born Again (Again)

I bought my Bike Friday New World Tourist, the bike I call Little Nellie, about 18 years ago. It was a fun bike to ride but it was tough on my back. I bought a shorter stem which helped a lot. As my body aged, the bike became less and less comfortable.

A couple of years ago I had all but given up on riding it. Nearly every day I saw a local man riding a green Bike Friday on the Mount Vernon Trail. He seemed perfectly contented with his. I noticed he had different handlebars. Mine are drop bars; his were flat bars.

In an effort to revive Little Nellie, I bought some flat bars. It made a remarkable difference in ride quality. For a while, that is. As my back aged, even the new bars were not enough to keep aches at bay. Over the last year or so, I rode Little Nellie for only about three percent of my miles. Basically, it was just taking up space.

I thought about selling the bike but there is not much of a market for Bike Fridays these days. Bike Fridays are designed to pack into a checkable suitcase to avoid oversize baggage charges. Now a days, many airlines treat bike boxes as a regular piece of luggage. Bike Friday also fold but there are better folding bikes like Dahons, Terns, and Bromptons.

Little Nellie before I changed the stem and lowered the seat.

I decided to try one more thing before giving up. I pulled the old, longer stem out of storage and put it on the bike. After doing this I compared the seat height to the seat height on my two other non-recumbent bikes. The Bike Friday’s seat was one-half to one-full inch higher. I lowered the seat a half inch.

I took the newly configured Little Nellie out for a 30-mile test ride. It rode great and didn’t make my back ache. The next day I rode it 15 miles to Friday Coffee Club. And back. Same result. On Saturday I did a 40-mile ride to and from the National Cathedral in DC. The Cathedral is the highest point in DC so this climb put Little Nellie to the test. No problem.

I woke up rather stiff this morning but still rode Little Nellie to Nationals Park for a ballgame. This was another 30 miler. No problem.

One thing I like about the Bike Friday is that its small wheels make it easy to maneuver in traffic. It turns and accelerates much better than a conventional bike. The small wheels also make the gearing lower which made the ride up to the Cathedral much less of a slog than usual. (I have often wondered why Green Gear, the makers of Bike Fridays, doesn’t make a non-folding version.)

So, long story short, I’ll be holding on to Little Nellie for a while longer. Until my back catches up to it again.

While all these shenanigans were going on, Little Nellie broke 26,000 miles.

I Really Need to Get It in Gear

I’m about a month away from the start of the Natchez Trace tour. By now I had hoped to have done a 50 mile ride in preparation. Then I caught my wife’s cold. Let’s just say it has not been a productive week on the wheel. Despite feeling lousy, I managed to do six 30-mile rides. One day when my cold was at it’s peak, I managed an hour and a half on Big Nellie in the basement.

To assuage my feelings of anxiety, I have been dealing with a number of annoying odd jobs, which someone on the interwebs called problitos. These are the things that you know you ought to do but the day never comes to actually do them. In the last month or so I’ve placed magnets on the doors of some kitchen cabinets to hold them closed (with only modest success), re-attached a piece of wood trim that fell off the top on one of the cabinets, tracked down and installed some florescent bulbs for a couple of under cabinet lights, turned on the water to the outside of the house, did 10 days of laundry (the result of waiting for a plumber to deal with a clogged drain), did our taxes, and found a yard service for the summer. I also downloaded the maps for the tour.

All that’s left is to go shopping for stuff for the tour. I need just a few items: a mess kit for eating in camp, a power pack for charging my phone and lights, a bigger camp pillow, and a handlebar mount for my cell phone. I was going to buy most of this today but REI is having a sale in a week so I decided to wait. I could order this stuff online but REI and Dick’s Sporting Goods (where I’ll get the mess kit) are about 15 miles away. Perfect for a rest day ride.

The last several days were cool and windy. Today, I rode 13 miles into a gale. I suppose that’s good prep for the tour but it wasn’t much fun. Until I turned around. On the way home I stopped and bought a book to tide me over until April.

I hope to ride 60-ish miles tomorrow, 70 on Tuesday, and maybe another 70 later in the week. The distances sound like a lot but as I alluded to above I ride about 30 miles a day with relative ease. The plan is to ride 30 miles. Eat lunch. Ride home.

Still, I continue to have pre-tour anxiety. My brain bounces between feeling confident in my level of experience (this will be my 14th tour) and my ridiculous mileage base (10,000 miles per year for seven straight years has to count for something) and feeling old (I’m 69 1/2) and fat (so many cookies, so little time). The daily mileages on the tour may seem daunting but I won’t be carrying half the crap that I do on my unsupported tours. That has to count for something.

I know that last two days of this year’s ride will be hilly. To get myself mentally prepared I took a look at the elevation profiles from my tours of the last two years. They look somewhat similar to this year’s tour but with one big difference: the scale. In 2023 I rode across the White and Green Mountains of New England. Admittedly the daily mileages were lower but dang were those climbs nasty! The Kancamagus Pass in New Hampshire alone was orders of magnitude harder than anything the Trace will throw at me. And I did that one in the rain.

Middlebury Gap in Vermont was nearly as bad. I did walk the last 200 yards of Middlebury Gap when I was unable to hold a straight line of travel. I think the gradient near the top was 12 percent. Oof.

I just need to keep in mind that when I’m bike touring I’ve got all day. No hurries. No worries. To paraphrase Steven Wright, everything is biking distance is you have the time.

With enough snacks, all things are possible.

Update on the hand and the tour

Carpal Tunnel Update

I have been testing my surgically repaired hand and all seems to be going well. A couple of days ago I managed to do my bird dog stretches with my hand flat on the floor. The incision on my wrist is healed and there is very little in the way of numbness in my fingers. I don’t know if it is related but the persistent nerve pain in my cervical spine seems to be gone as well.

The Mule Is Back

After weeks of below-average temperatures and riding in the basement, I’ve managed to get outside for some riding. The Mule has returned from its winter physical and all is well with the bike. Switching bikes always involves a couple of days of aches and pains but I am adjusting. After my first ride two days ago, my upper back was unhappy but that seems to have resolved. Somehow my left butt cheek is very sore probably because I am not used to the big Catalyst pedals on the bike. I have been having all kinds of leg cramps which are responding to an extra post-ride banana. Life is good.

I was so eager to get back on the bike that I overdid it a bit. My first ride was a 40-miler including a decent hill across the river in Maryland. Yesterday I did a 35-mile loop that included a roller coaster trail along I-66 in Arlington. I was feeling quite fat and sucking wind, especially on the last one steep hill. Oof. So despite temperatures (finally!) cresting 60 degrees, I took it easy today, riding a flat 30 miles. I felt fresh at the end. It didn’t hurt that I was wearing shorts. (Something about long pants just seems to make riding harder.) In any case, I need to up my longest ride distance quite a bit, because the Natchez Trace tour just through me a couple of curveballs.

Tour Changes

As I posted recently, the tour itinerary began in Nashville where participants would meet up and be shuttled to Natchez, nine-hours by van to the south. My plan was to drive to Nashville on April 5 and drive home on April 15 after the tour.

Today, I received the official tour package from Adventure Cycling. It included several surprises. First, the tour participants are gathering in Jackson, Mississippi. Instead of a ten-hour drive to the start in Nashville, I face a 15-hour trek to Jackson. So I’ll be leaving on the 4th and stopping halfway. After the tour, a shuttle back to Jackson is offered for an additional $75. Under the old itinerary, the shuttle was included in the tour fee. (I’m not happy. ) The new itinerary includes a whopper of a day, 91 miles. Mercifully, there is only 2,800 feet of climbing on that day. The first day is a shuttle from Jackson to Natchez and 12 miles of riding to a hotel (included in the tour price). On Day 3 there’s a hotel in Jackson, the same one where we will meet on Day 0. Somehow the overall mileage increased by 30 miles. No rest for the weary.

Whenever I start worrying about my ability to handle these miles, my wife reminds me that I’m going to be carrying about 25 or 30 fewer pounds of gear on this trip compared to my usual self-contained tours. (I will need to carry rain gear and basic tools and repair stuff but no camping gear, off-bike clothing, and such.)

DateStartFinishMiles
Day 0Jackson0
Day 1April 7JacksonNatchez12
Day 2April 8NatchezHermanville60
Day 3April 9HermanvilleJackson49
Day 4April 10JacksonFrench Camp83
Day 5April 11French CampShannon72
Day 6April 12ShannonTishomongo55
Day 7April 13TishomongoHohenwald91
Day 8April 14HohenwaldNashville67
Day 9April 15NashvilleJackson0
Total489

I looked into alternatives to driving but I hate boxing the bike and schlepping it to and from airports. And then there’s the fun possibility of losing or breaking the bike in transit. Flights from DC to Jackson are all one-stops out of BWI which is an hour from my house. So with boxing the bike, driving to BWI, waiting an hour or so to board and five plus hours on the plane, I’d be eating up a day of my time anyway. I checked Amtrak; it doesn’t go from DC to Jackson. So car it is.

I am actually looking forward to the riding part of this tour. The before and after not so much.

My Year on the Wheel – 2024

This was my seventh straight year of riding more than 10,000 miles, 10,394 to be more or less exact. I put more miles on two of my bikes than I did on my 2009 Honda Accord (it’s going to last forever).

The big event as usual was my bike tour but this year was the first time since 2003 that I quit early. In that year my rear tire blew out, my gears and brakes stopped working, I was sick as a dog, and it was raining. You don’t have to be a genius to know that the bike gods are not on your side. So it was in 2024 when I found myself struggling to ride up even the most moderate of hills. The final straw was a ride of less than 30 miles into Charlottesville. I felt like I was dragging both brakes the whole way. I decided to take the train home and let my body recover.

A week later I lit out from home on a bee line back to Charlottesville. It worked out okay except for nasty traffic on a narrow two-lane road just north of town. I persisted and, the next day, was back on my original route, the eastern third of the TransAmerica Trail. There were some good days after that. I hiked the Blue Ridge tunnel, stayed overnight at the Cookie Lady’s house in Afton, Virginia, rode a short, but spectacular stretch of the Blue Ridge Parkway, and had a fabulous ride on the roads to Damascus, Virginia.

The rest of the ride was not so great. I rode past several hypdermic needles on the road outside Lexington, survived a scary thunderstorm, felt lousy when I was pedaling up hills, pushed my bike up several mountains, and was attacked by dogs over and over again. By the time I reached Hazard Kentucky, I was totally stressed out mentally and physically. When the caretaker of a bike shelter 50 miles west told me to buy bear spray, I rented a car and drove home.

The rest of the year featured my usual array of local rides: three one-way rides from the western end of the Washington and Old Dominion Trail to home, several rides on Maryland’s eastern shore, and three rides in Virginia hunt country. I also did five event rides including my 16th 50-States Ride in DC.

As usual, The Mule won the prize for most mileage: 3,912 in all. Despite nearly getting rid of the Tank in March, I ended up riding it 3,795 miles, thanks to some smart wrenching and advice from the good folks at Bikes at Vienna. Little Nellie saw very little use, if you can call 839 miles slacking. Big Nellie racked up 1,847 miles, albeit 583 miles connected to a resistance trainer in the basement during reading season.

The end of year odometer readings.

Updates on the Pedal Off, Phantom Bike Problems, and Nerve Pain

Pedals

I put the MKS lambda pedals on my CrossCheck. After some fiddling with my saddle position, I rode them for a week and liked them a lot. I especially like not having to deal with toe clips while wearing my winter footwear. The only downside is that my feet can slide off of them on bumpy surfaces.

My Pedaling Innovation Catalyst pedals went on my Specialized Sequoia. To start, I did saddle adjustments similar to the ones I did on the CrossCheck. I liked the pedals but they seemed to be underwhelming relative to the rave reviews I’d been seeing online. I re-read the instructions from the manufacturer and started over. I returned my saddle to the pre-Catalyst position and lowered it about one centimeter. On my first test ride, after 15 miles the magic started to happen. After 30 I was very, very pleased but thought that maybe the improvement was all in my head. My second ride was in cold (34 degree) weather. I normally ride slower to conserve body heat but I was riding noticeably faster. I kept checking the wind, thinking I had a tailwind. No. There was no pressure on the undersides of my feet and my feet felt like they were locked to the pedals. I had only intended to ride 20 miles but I ended up riding 33 and could have gone much farther. They performed exactly as advertised.

Conclusion: I am in like with the Lambdas but in love with the Catalysts. I think sometime this spring I’ll move the Lambdas to my Bike Friday. Then I’ll decide whether to buy Lambdas with pins (called Gammas or Kings or Monarchs depending on who is selling them) or another pair of Catalysts.

Phantom Bike Problems

About a month ago I had a flat on my CrossCheck. I couldn’t find anything wrong with the tube or tire so I assumed it was a valve issue. I changed the tube and all is well.

A week ago I had a flat on my Sequoia. (I’m not loving this trend!) Once again I meticulously searched for a cause and found nothing. I put the tube back in the tire and all is well. Go figure.

A few days ago the bike computer on the Sequoia started to fail. The computer itself was sound but it was not receiving a signal from the sensor on the fork. I fiddled with the sensor and it started working again. The next day the same thing happened. No signal. It being a discontinued model, I decided to buy a new computer. Like the old computer this one allows me to input my mileage and will record up to 99,999 miles. Of course, between the time I ordered the new computer and the time it arrived my old computer started working fine again.

Nerve Pain

Last month I went to a hand surgeon for relief of trigger finger on the middle finger of my right hand. He gave me a cortisone shot that, after about three weeks, seems to have solved the problem. A further examination led him to conclude that I have carpal tunnel syndrome (CTS) and likely a pinched nerve in my neck. He sent me to a neurologist for an electromyography (EMG) test. I had the test today.

I had an EMG once before for leg and back pain. It was extremely painful and its results were inconclusive. As you might imagine I was dreading today’s test but it turned out to be about as painful as a series of static electricity shocks. No big deal. The results were that I have mild CTS in my left hand and moderate CTS in my right. The neurologist said she didn’t have any findings about my neck. (Since it is obvious to me that I have a nerve impingement in my cervical spine, I find this conclusion to be dubious.) In any case, I go back to the hand surgeon in three weeks to discuss next steps. Since I can (obviously) type and do just about anything else without pain, I am not opting for surgery. Moreover, I found that the saddle adjustments to my CrossCheck and Sequoia, along with the deep tissue massage I had last month, have coincided with reduced neck pain. I have come to the profound medical conclusion that I am old.

Weather Gone Bung – November 2024

The month began with more rainless days. The streak continued for over 35 days. There were wildfires in Prospect Park in Brooklyn. At the very end of the month, the weather switched to wintery. Brrr. Climate change will be the death of us.

The election results shocked me. I can’t believe that Harris didn’t even win the popular vote against the most flawed opponent in history. As I recall Biden won by only tens of thousands of votes in the swing states. In a tight race, misogyny and racism exceeds incompetence and corruption. The next four years are going to be painful. As for me, I am turning off the TV and skipping the alarmist articles in the newspaper about what is going to happen. Worry is like carrying an umbrella on a sunny day.

Bicycling

The quest for 10,000 miles carries on. I hit 9,000 miles on November 7 and finished the 865-mile month with 9,623 miles.

I did two event rides. The 60-mile Cider Ride featured a posse of six. We had good time and the pizza and beer afterwards were delicious. The Ride for Your Life was a more somber affair. The ride was 8 miles from Bethesda to the Lincoln Memorial. The event raises awareness about traffic violence in the U.S. Getting to the start was a 21-mile ride in itself, making for a 43.5 mile day.

My back woes were really getting to be unbearable in October. I went to a wedding and the pain was tough to take. I also had neuropathy (pain and tingling in my right hand and arm) that seemed to worsen by the day. After riding my recumbent upon my return, I could barely stand up. I had been researching platform pedals for a while when I kept hearing that when using them you need to move the saddle forward. So, on a whim, I moved the saddle on the CrossCheck forward a few millimeters. My comfort on and off the bike was immediately improved.

I bought some MKS Lambda platform pedals and put them on the Tank. It was the first time in 40 years that I had ridden without toe clips and straps. I found I needed to raise the saddle a tad but the resulting position served me well. Even better, the pedals work great with my overboots and with my hiking boots.

Unfortunately my neuropathy returned. Earlier in the year I developed trigger finger on the middle finger of my right hand. (The finger will randomly lock in a crooked posture like a claw. Eek.) A hand surgeon gave me a shot of cortisone. Time will tell if sets me right. He also tested me for carpal tunnel syndrome. I passed! So I have a medical BOGO and, as a bonus, a pinched nerve in my neck.

A couple of week later I went for a deep tissue massage. It was pretty painful but the therapist concurred with the surgeon about the pinched nerve. She pulled me this way and that. She pressed one knotted muscle after another. I hurt all over. But two days later I felt much improved.

Reading

The Island at the Center of the World by Russell Shorto tells the mostly overlooked story of New Netherland with a focus on New Amsterdam. My wife gave it to me for my birthday and I thought it was going to be a snoozer but it turned out to be very interesting. (I am from Albany, New York which plays a role in the story so I have a heightened personal interest.) New Amsterdam, like “old” Amsterdam was a mixture of melting pot and wild, wild west. The town was an outpost of the Dutch West India Company which specialized in privateering, raiding non-Dutch vessels and stealing their goods. New Amsterdam was on the threshold of becoming a sort of proto-US when the Brits showed up with their warships and took over. God save the king and all that nonsense.

The Hunter by Tana French. This grand thriller is a sequel to French’s The Searcher. Cal Hooper is a retired Chicago cop living in rural northwestern Ireland. He’s an outsider and a distrusted guarda (cop) to the locals who make living in a small town something out of a Sartre play. A couple of grifters come to town in search of gold. Crosses and double crosses, plot twists and turns, and that’s all before the murder. And then the Dublin police show up. Eek.

Watching

Endurance is a National Geographic documentary about the 2022 search for the wreck of Ernest Shackleton’s ship at the bottom of the sea near Antarctica. The film interweaves the story of the Endurance expedition of 1914 to 1917 and the search for the wreckage nearly 10,000 feet below sea level in 2022. I’d already read two books on the Endurance so I knew the story of the expedition but I found the documentary interesting nonetheless.

Mat Ryder’s Great Divide Mountain Bike ride – After watching the video series of his ride across the US by road, I decided to check out his ride from Banff, Alberta to Antelope Wells, New Mexico along the Great Divide Mountain Bike Route last year. Steep climbs, scary descents, wildlife (grizzly bears, elk, bison, rattlesnakes, llamas, free range cattle, hawks, vultures, and more), rain, impassable mud, hurricane- remnant winds, blistering sun, high altitude, and more. There was also amazing scenery, appalling meals, and incredibly friendly people. He crossed the routes of my 2018, 2019, and 2022 tours in several places. This video series comes in roughly half hour installments (beginning here) or in one edited three-hour movie.

Beatles ’64. This is a documentary that trots out film and interviews about the Beatles first trip to the U.S. There’s nothing new to be seen, of course. I watched it while I was doing laundry. The performances benefited from new techniques that clean up the sound and isolate the band from the screaming crowds. It’s interesting to hear parts of their first U. S. concert in a boxing ring at the Washington Colosseum, now home to an REI store. I was one of the 70+million viewers who saw them on Ed Sullivan and didn’t “get” them. They were very different from what I was used to. I was a little too young and wasn’t into music yet.

Riding 2023

When I was recovering from pulmonary embolisms in early 2018, my friend Katie B. sent me a t-shirt that said “Never Underestimate an Old Man with a Bicycle.” This year, during which I turned 68, proved her right.

I rode 11,532 miles this year, my second most ever. As usual, I put the most mileage, 4,630, on The Mule, my touring bike. The other three bikes shared the rest of the burden nearly evenly. This was quite a surprise because I had all but stopped riding Little Nellie, my small-wheeled folding travel bike. Riding it even for just a handful of miles just killed my back. So, as a last resort before selling it, I switched the bike from drop bars to more upright H-bars. The improvement was incredible. I ended up riding 2,155 miles on it.

The conversion and a ton of other work including new hand-made wheels for The Mule and Little Nellie were done by the folks at Bikes at Vienna. I give my special thanks to Daniel, Tim, and Beth for keeping me rolling all year.

The year featured my 11th long-distance tour. I rode a 2,653-mile loop from DC to Bar Harbor to Erie, PA and back home. I did a bit of walking here and there but I did myself proud for the most part. There was one memorable hill in downstate New York. I took one look at the beast and I dismounted and started walking. It was laughably steep. I made it through an intense hour-long thunder storm in Ontario and a code purple air quality day in Erie, PA without harm. Oddly, the hardest part of the whole trip was pushing my loaded bike up and down the detour of the Paw Paw Tunnel on the C&O Canal. I used Warmshowers more on this trip than ever before. I had many great hosts but special recognition goes to Katie and Tom Huntington in Newcastle, Maine who put up with me for two nights, one going up the coast, the other down.

My longest mileage month was June, 1,702 miles, all of which was on tour. The shortest months were February and December at 730 and 749 miles, respectively.

I rode the 50 States and Cider Rides with a splendid group of folks. Special thanks to Michael, Chris, Monica, Sara, and Domitille who rode both with me. I also did the Great Pumpkin Ride solo (and picked up my umpteenth long-sleeve technical shirt in the process). I ended the event year by participating in the Ride for Your Life, which raised awareness about the scourge of traffic violence in the DC area. Kevin, Jacob, Bryan, Lili, Annette, and Nina joined the 50 States posse. Katja, Timothee, Miguel, and Lisa rode with us on the Cider Ride. Annette, Shira, Leslie, Jeanne, and Monica did the Ride for Your Life Event.

Six years over 10,000 miles. Dang.

After over two decades of membership, I upped my game and became a lifetime member of the Adventure Cycling Association. If I had known I’d have been bike touring for so many years, I would have saved myself a bunch of annual membership dues and become I lifetime member long ago. My loss is Adventure Cycling’s gain.

And as always, here’s where my bike odometers stood at the end of the year. Total mileage on all four is 176,944.

End of Year Odometer Readings: Clockwise from top left: Big Nellie, Little Nellie, The Mule, The Tank.

December 2023

Riding

This was a month to back off a bit. I managed to ride 749 miles or about 24 miles per day, less than half of my daily mileage on my summer tour. The cold weather makes riding my normal 30 miles feel like an ordeal. My outdoor rides ranged from 30 to 32 miles. I rode 110 miles on Big Nellie indoors. Most of the outdoor miles were on The Tank, my Surly CrossCheck. I did ride The Mule a couple of days but Little Nellie took the month off.

I reached 11,000 miles for the year on December 9.

Riding The Tank has been a struggle this year. It seems slow and heavy and hard on my legs. Once I reached 28,000 miles on its odometer on December 22, I put it away for a few days. In addition to my dissatisfaction with the ride quality of this bike, I had been experiencing a marked increase in back pain accompanied by worrisome neck, shoulder, and arm aches. A two-mile stroll (with cane) through Georgetown last week left me with even more pain. And, despite doing all kinds of physical therapy exercises for months, my back was stooped like never before. I seemed destined to return to the dreaded medical merry-go-round.

On a whim, I compared the saddle height on The Tank to that on The Mule, my touring bike that fits like a glove. The Tank’s saddle was more than a half inch higher. I must have raised the saddle earlier in the year. Why? I have no idea.

Anyway, I lowered the seat by a half inch or so and went for a spin. Bingo. Suddenly the bike fit me nearly perfectly. My mechanics were much better; my speed jumped by ten percent or so with less effort. The handlebars were still a little higher than on The Mule so I paid a visit to my local bike store where I bought some thin, 2.5-millimeter, spacers. I used them to drop my bars 5 millimeters. Dang. Locked and loaded. I finished the year with three 30-mile rides. My back feels much better and my neck, shoulder, and arm pain are nearly gone. Thank god I didn’t go to the doctor. It would have been a total waste of time.

Watching

Minari – A Korean family buys a farm in Arkansas. Nominated for all sorts of awards. Korean cast was outstanding including a little boy played by Alan Kim. They overshadowed a stellar performance by Will Patton as a religious nut who is the family’s farmhand.

Top Gun – Maverick. Another movie we skipped a few years ago. I’m not a big Tom Cruise fan but he’s far better in this than in the earlier movie. The plot is predictable but the editing and sound and visuals make for a fine action movie.

Interstellar. A Christopher Nolan film I missed when it was released nine years ago. Matthew McConaughey at his best. The rest of the cast, other than McKenzie Foy as his daughter and Michael Caine as an aging scientist, left me a bit flat. The story is filled with sci fi bafflegab and impossibilities but it was still very entertaining.

Yogi Berra – It Ain’t Over. A documentary about Yankee catcher Yogi Berra. One of the most highly decorated athletes of the century. He was short and funny looking. And he was famously a malaprop machine. History treated him like a clown, but he was anything but. He earned more professional championship rings than any athlete in the 20th century, including Bill Russell. (Russ has nine NBA championships, two NCAA championships, and a gold medal. Don’t at me.) And virtually everyone who appears on screen says he was a phenomenally decent human being.

Everything, Everywhere, All at Once. This movie took tons of awards including the Academy Award for Best Performance with a Butt Plug. Also, people with hot dog fingers, a sword fight with dildos, an all powerful everything bagel, and sentient rocks. How many hallucinogens did the filmmakers take when writing and directing this thing?

Air. The story of how Nike, a running shoe company, signed Michael Jordan. It’s funny. Interesting. Great cast. Matt Damon is the new Tom Hanks. Viola Davis rocks. Jason Bateman is terrific. Ben Affleck is quite good as the head of Nike. And he directed.

Nyad. A very entertaining movie about a self absorbed jerk who swims from Cuba to Key West at the tender age of 64. As good as Annette Benning was as Diana Nyad, Jodie Foster was even better as her coach and friend. I am not a big fan of either actress but I’d be shocked if they don’t both get nominated for Academy Awards.

Big Adam Bikes – This is an Instagram daily journal of a young man who rode the TransAm this year. It’s funny and brings back a lot of memories. Adam Bigelow doesn’t leave out the tedium, the bad weather, and the dogs. And the headwinds – forget about that nonsense about getting tailies going west to east. You get a pretty good idea of what it’s like to ride from the Oregon coast to Yorktown.

The Crown – We watched the final six episodes over the course of three nights. How odd that of all the characters in the story, Camilla Parker-Bowles came across best. In the end, the Queen is humanized although I have to say of the four women who played Elizabeth over 68 episodes, I found Imelda Staunton the least appealing. (There’s a new actress who plays the not yet queen as a young woman. She looks remarkably like a young Claire Foy.)

Death on the Nile – I’m not a big Agatha Christie fan and this movie did nothing to change my mind. An impressive cast but not one memorable performance. Dull. If you’re going to watch a Kenneth Branagh film there are many others worth your time.

The Big Dig – This nine-hour podcast covers the biggest urban traffic project in US history. The Big Dig involved burying the Central Artery, an elevated highway built in the late 1940s. The highway design predated the interstate highway system. It was characterized by narrow lanes and more miles of on and off ramps than roadway miles. To get on the thing you had to drive like a maniac which may explain why Boston drivers are such Massholes. The Central Artery was a daily nightmare for drivers and it ruined the city, separating the North End and South Boston from the rest of the city. The Big Dig also included building a new tunnel to Logan Airport, a much needed addition. In the first episode I learned how an inner loop highway that cut through Cambridge, Jamaica Plain, and Roxbury was on the drawing boards. A grassroots effort stopped the project, but not before acres of Roxbury were levelled. (I drove a cab in Boston in the mid-seventies and always wondered why there were so many empty lots in Roxbury. Now I know why.) The same sort of thing happened in DC where I-66 would have cut the city in half if not for local opposition. The Big Dig took over 20 years to design and build and cost billions more than planned. Although the podcast doesn’t mention it, the Big Dig was not unlike another big dig, the Panama Canal, in terms of its complexity, cost, political intrigue, and length of time to completion.

Reading

The Path between the Seas. David McCullough’s award-winning account of the building of the Panama Canal. As with many of his tomes, the amount of information in this one boggles the mind. Not only was the canal an engineering feat that rivalled Project Apollo, the effort also included the early use of electricity for industrial purposes and pathbreaking epidemiological work. It cost over $300 million and tens of thousands of lives, mostly those of unskilled black workers from the West Indies.

A Truck Full of Money by Tracy Kidder. This is the story of Paul English, a working class kid in Boston who eventually made $120 million (hence the title) from the online travel company he founded called Kayak.com. The book oddly dovetails with two other Kidder books: Mountains beyond Mountains and Rough Sleepers and seems like a fitting companion to Kidder’s The Soul of a New Machine.

Mornings on Horseback. After reading about Theodore Roosevelt’s involvement with the Panama Canal in the book above, I decided to read this biographical book, again by David McCullough, about TR’s upbringing. (The book ends well before he becomes president.) A chapter of the book deals with his three years of on and off adventures in North Dakota and eastern Montana. I rode through this area on my 2018 bike trip and was curious about his times there.

On the Street by Bill Cunningham. Cunningham was a fashion photographer of sorts for the New York Times and other publications. He chronicled the art of fashion, mostly as it appeared on the streets of New York and Paris over four decades from the 1970s to the 2000s. I often have wondered who wears those weird outfits you see in fashion magazines. The answer is New Yorkers and Parisians. Cunningham traveled the city on his beat up three-speed bicycle. His photos of people walking to work in Manhattan after a big snow storm brought back oh so many miserable winter days in Boston. The book made me all the more appreciative of amateur photographers Joe Flood and Mary Gersema, two friends of mine who have an fine eye for life in DC.

The Mystery Guest by Nita Prose. This whodunit is the follow up to Prose’s The Maid. Molly the maid solves another murder in the hotel where she works. Molly’s a bid of an odd duck but she’s a good egg and has an eye and an ear for detail. After two months of nonfiction, this novel was a fun read to end the year on.