In Which May Brings Bike Maintenance, Warm Rides

 

April 15--Riding The Fancy Beast on mountain bike trail by Boyson Trail. Turkey in the woods.

April 15--Ready to leave campus on the Mountain Bike. Flag from RAGBRAI last year (no, I didn't ride a mountain bike on RAGBRAI, this is just where the RABRAI flag ended up).

April 13--Took my wife's bike, my grandson's bike and my bike to Lowe Park for a ride. Grandson just recently learned to ride sans training wheels.

April 10--First bike commute to work without a jacket this season. Don't need jacket in summer-like heat now!

It was cool today, May 28, a break from a long string of warm days we've had, and there were a few sprinkles, which came as a bit of surprise to me since I went into the office today to deal with some end-of-year paperwork and I rode a bicycle because I thought the forecast was for a dry day,. However, the sky looked dicey, so I chose to use my mountain bike (my most all-weather bicycle), and I’m glad I did.

I got a bit sprinkled on—but only slightly damp, not really wet. It was maybe not quite as good as I wanted, but still good. Which has been the theme of my recent biking experiences.

For example, I’ve had the tandem bike out several times. My grandchildren keep growing, and some of them have gotten too tall to be comfortable on the Tag-A-Long seat. The tandem bike (needs a name, my other bikes have names already—it’s a 1970s era Schwinn, by decades my oldest two-wheeled steed, a deep red. Ideas?) solves the problem.

The first weekend of May, two grandsons, brothers, were staying for the weekend. I suggested to the older one, 12 going on 13, that we could go for a ride. He agreed. It was a fine afternoon, and we headed up to the Lindale Trail, first going west to Council Street, then doubling back to head through Marion on the Grant Wood Trail.

May 4--Tandem bike ride with my grandson, resting at east end of Grant Wood Trail. The trail has since been opened up.

It had not been my plan to ride that far, but the grandson was encouraging, and we just kept pedaling, ending up at the construction barrier at the east end of the trail. We hopped off to chat and take a short break, and then headed back west towards home. Our original plan was to circle Waldo’s Rock Park on the way home, but it was getting later, we were tired and so we headed straight home.

Turns out, the whole ride as 20.85 miles, which is quite a distance on that heavy old bike, although I divide the grandkid’s into “extra engines” or “luggage” on the tandem, and this day, the grandson was mostly a spare engine, which helped.

I took the 11-year-old on a shorter ride the next day—all in all, good use of the as-yet unnamed tandem.

May 3--Morning on the loading dock at Warde Hall, the building where my office is, ready to take bike inside and park by my office.

About a week later, I was with a different grandson, a 6-year-old. He’s just now getting too tall for the Tag-a-Long, and I I had to lower the rear seat on the tandem so he could reach the pedals, but that wasn’t hard to do. We set off, riding on the Boyson Trail. It was going to be a fairly short ride—this grandson is always willing to ride, but always lobbying for a ride to end soon, too.

Anyway, we were heading to the little hill that leads up from the Boyson Trail to the Lindale Trail. The old tandem only has a rear derailleur, controlled by one of those big lever controls (remember Schwinn bikes of the 1970s?). Maybe I shifted a bit too quickly or pressed the lever too hard—whatever the reason, the rear chain jumped off it’s front cog (in the middle of the bike, this tandem has two chains, front and rear) and jammed.

At least the chain didn’t break. I tried to pop it back into place, with no luck other than getting my hands super duper greasy. With the chain jammed, we could only walk the bike. Well, it was a bit of a walk, about two miles, to home from this place—but a walk-able distance. I called my wife, informed her and my daughter what had happened, and then the grandson and I started the march home.

About halfway there, we met my wife and daughter. My wife took over walking the bike, which I think was meant to be a favor, and I appreciate the thought, but honestly it made walking more difficult for me—I have aging knees that sometimes get sore, and my left knee was acting up. The bike, in effect, was a walker, something that could take some of my weight and ease the stress on the knee—without it, walking was slower and more painful. That last mile was a reminder of why, with my aging body, rolling across the planet is often much more pleasant than marching across its surface.

Coupled with the crippled tandem chain, my road bike had a flat back tyre at the end of April.

Luckily, I have Clarence and The Fancy Beast (my hybrid and my road bikes). So, as the school year heated up (the end of spring semester is always those most frantic, busy time of year), I could continue to roll.

The weather shifted. Our long-term drought has slowly abated, and May turned out to be a much wetter month than previous ones—good news for plants. In the past month, the world has shifted from an early spring of green grass and flowers but bare trees to a full regalia of shade. Many days have been summer warm, too.

May 20--Starting off on ride home, pausing to enjoy Iris in bloom behind Warde Hall.

April 20--Bike on trail behind Linn-Mar High School.

April 28--Clouds over Lindale Trail. Been dodging rain the last month or so.

April 27--Windy, but pleasant day for a bike ride, on Grand Wood Trail east of Marion.

I waited until the semester ended, but last week finally tackled some bicycle maintenance. I have a spare tube for the road bike, so changing it was not a big deal.

The tandem chain project turned out to be more of a chore. Try as I might, with a screwdriver and a pair of pliers, I could not get the chain out. Partly, I was blocked by the chain cover, so I had to remove it. That was tricky and time consuming—only three bolts to remove, but they were not easy to reach.

Still, eventually, I worked the cover off and then, with better access the chain, I eventually (30 minutes or so, which is a very long time for your correspondent who does not naturally use tools) managed the chain extraction. Putting the chain cover back on proved even more problematic than taking it off, but again, I eventually was able to accomplish that task.

May 20--Getting ready to change tube on flat tyre on Argent.

Chain stuck on old red tandem. Help me, hive mind, what should this bike be named? Gemini? The Bus? Ying and Yang? Duo?

May 22--One more minor bike maintenance task--adding string of little lights my wife bought for now ride-able road bike Argent.

So it goes. I didn’t realize, until I checked, that I have not checked in on this blog in more than a month. April and May were both decent biking months, although with my recent health scare, I have not yet resumed long bike rides.

Still, summer is just starting and those longer rides are coming. And, in shorter distances, I have continued to ride. NPR recently had a story about the health benefits of bicycling, and I’m glad to do it for those, although mostly I do it because I enjoy doing it—alone on my newly repaired road bike or with a family member on the tandem.

I’ve gone from cool-weather biking to more summer norms—sunblock and bug repellent now being regular parts of my cycling routine. It has been a good April and May, and I hope you’re all enjoying rolling in your piece of the planet, too! Year-to-date as of May 28, 1,064.92. I rode 220.33 miles in April and in May so far, I have 197.28 miles.

May 20--Barrier at east end of Grant Wood Trail is down, rode a bit on new limestone trail. Didn't go far--it had rained recently. I'll be back on mountain bike on a dryer day to see the rest.

May 22--Bike ride to enjoy flowers at Lowe Park gardens. Bee there.