In Which the Week Features Family Fun Rides

Me with grandson, ready for bike ride. Note he is not rudely gesturing, not only is it not that finger, he's pushing up his sunglasses.

What a week! Today was cool and partly cloudy, a rare day in summer in Iowa, a bit windy, but not too windy for some two-wheeled miles.

It was almost an ideal day for biking. In the morning, my wife, daughter and I rode to the Hiawatha Farmers Market. My toddler grandson rode on the Wee Ride seat on my bike. We shopped at the market, buying some cookies from the Sisters of Mercy and enjoying them at the park. I also found some peony roots for sale for $4, which is a pretty darn good price for a peony. The man said they are pink, and I’m hoping he’s right and that they bloom next spring.

After the morning ride, I met my sister for a long afternoon ride. We rode down to New Bo, where we had lunch at the NewBo City Market. It was Korean dumplings, and I could have skipped the soybeans in pods, but otherwise it was very nice.

Lunch in NewBo Market. If we take Jon and Nalena to lunch after RAGBRAI, this may be the place.

Even chickens have restrooms at NewBo.

My younger (not youngest) sister at NewBo, my biking compatriot on today's long ride.

NewBo Market, but it made me think of Jenny Lawson book.

After lunch, we did a loop around the Prairie Park Fishery and then headed down to Ely via the Cedar River and Hoover trails. Along the way, I noted that I hope to do at least one century ride (100 miles) in July before RAGBRAI. We plotted some possible routes, including a road trip to the Raccoon River Trail near Des Moines. We’ll see.

Circling Prairie Park Fishery on today's long ride.

Returning from Ely--have reached Cedar Rapids and Cedar River Trail. The kind of day it was.

Saw this large but young bird beside trail.

Nearing end of ride--view of Cedar Lake. What CR Biker post is complete without at least one image of Cedar Lake?

It was the end of a week of fantastic family bike rides. I made multiple rides with my youngest grandson in the Wee Ride seat—it’s a regular Wednesday thing with us to ride a trail for a while and then stop at a playground.

In addition, there was a “boys morning out” ride with that grandson and my oldest grandson—the older one on the Tag-A-Long while the 18-month-old rode in the seat. It’s nice to ride “the bus” with a couple of cute grandchildren—makes me more popular on the bike trails.

Besides the rides with the grandchildren, there was much other family fun this week. We took the kayaks out one day, and a daughter and her two sons rode down to Cedar Lake with me.

And on Father’s Day, three of my children, a son-in-law and my biking buddy sister all rode with me. That ride involved stops at both Lion Bridge Brewery and the Sag Wagon. It was pretty fantastic.

Ready to leave home on Father's Day adventure--two daughters, a son and son-in-law in photo. We rode over to my sister's house and the merry band was on it's way.

Two views of duck pond at Rockwell-Collins on C Avenue. Grandson loves to walk or ride there to check on duck family.

 

But, as they say on TV, wait, there’s more. That evening, a daughter, who has not been on a bike in more than a decade, decided to take the plunge and try an evening peddle with her mom, son and me (the son is the 18-month-old who rides on the Wee Ride). The ride went well, and we’ve been on a few more since, including the journey to the Hiawatha Farmers Market. Welcome to the world of biking, youngest daughter (and thank you, penultimate daughter for allowing your sister to borrow your bicycle).

June 25 rides, mapped. Fast and slow.

This week also marked my initiation in to the world of Map my Ride. I have a new cell phone with a plan that allows unlimited data usage, so it’s practical for me to download and use this ap. So far, my rides have fit into two categories—short, slow rides (usually means I am with a grandchild or two on the bus, Clarence), for longer, somewhat faster rides (Argent, the road bike, no passengers).

I wish I were getting more miles in—day times seem packed this summer. But I am getting rides in, and immensely enjoying the rides I am taking. It was a wonderful week for CR Biker—I hope your biking week was at least half as fantastic as mine was!

In Which Flowers Help Ease the Pain of Emptyness

Bike. Anonymous other biker passes by my bike, which has a rare flat tyre.

A flat tyre! On only the third ride!

The unnamed new bike cannot be ridden at the moment. On Father’s Day, my youngest son, wife and I went out at about 10:30 for a bicycle ride. A muggy, but nice and sunny, ride.

I could do whatever I wanted to do that day. What I wanted to do was ride my new bicycle.

We again used the Cedar River Trail, and again went south, because I stubbornly wanted to find the detour. If you read the previous post, you know that I wondered were the trail detour went after it took you east to Council Street, where it appears it wanted you to go back west.

The apparent answer was oddly comical. The detour leads back to Center Point Road. So it goes all the way a half mile east to Council and then doubles back so that it can have you cross 42nd Street at a corner with a “walk” light, which is commendable, I suppose. Except that there is also a walk light at Center Point Road. Why not just cross there—why the pointless ride east to Council Street to get a walk sign that was available way back there? Bikers wonder.

Anyway, I don’t know how far the detour goes along Center Point Road, because when we got to the New Pioneer Coop, we knew we could cross the street and head up a little side street to the trail. So we did. And right as we started to ride on that little side street, that’s when I noticed my back tyre was flat.

And the tyre was not a little flat. Not a “pump it up every few miles and keep going” flat, although we didn't have a frame pump with us anyway. I’m talking an empty void, totally hollow, flabby and useless, like a Donald Trump campaign speech.

So the son and the spouse headed back north to go get our van and rescue me, while I locked the crippled What Are We Going To Call It to a bench.

To pass the time, I photographed flowers. It doesn't seem like a particularly flowery time of year, but in a short stroll near the bench were the crippled bike was locked, I found quite a variety to photograph.

Milkweed in bloom, and vertical, too.
Why Blogger, why?

I was on a mission, of sorts. I wanted to find Milkweed, which is in bloom now, and I also wanted to take a cute photo of a baby Monarch Butterfly.

There is Milkweed along the Cedar River trail, but none near the bench were my bike rested. (MMU bike club, what should be done about that?) However, I spied a patch growing adjacent to a nearby parking lot, so part of my mission was fulfilled. Sadly, there were no caterpillar sightings, nor did I see a chrysalis, although I don’t know for sure if I would recognize one. (Then again, given the size of Monarch Caterpillars, the chrysalis should be pretty big).

Oh well. Better luck next time. And I don’t aspire to collect flat tyres (in case you’re wondering, I just like and use the British spelling on this blog because they invented the bike tyre and ought to be allowed to name it), but I guess practice changing tyres on my RAGBRAI bike may prove of value.

We were planning to go kayaking later anyway, and we did. And here are the other flowers or berries:

Flat Out Missing Daddy

My father has been gone for several years, and it was a day to remember him. And fix a flat, which is appropriate.

One of my enduring early memories of my dad was not only his love of biking—he owned what was in the early 1960s an exotic English bike but today would look like a common drop handle road 10-speed—but his frequent repair work on the bikes that we had for kid use.

Particularly, patching flats. I recall him with a bucket of water, a piece of chalk and a tube repair kit. He would find and repair the leak in the tube. The chalk and water were for finding difficult-to-detect leaks—he would feed the tube slowly through the bucket and mark with chalk any spot that bubbled. The water also helped check if the patch worked.

I’m 40 miles short on RAGBRAI training this week—have not ridden since Friday when I only put in one mile—sprang a leak. What with one thing an another (such as the fact I was unclear what size tube this bike needs and didn’t own a repair kit until a visit, late in the day Saturday, to Target) it was today before I patched my tube. Took a short ride to check it and it seems OK, but I’ll check it later when I hope to make up a few miles—probably only a few, since a daughter and some grandkids are coming over for a Father’s Day barbecue, so it will be a quick twilight ride.

I’m like my dad in some ways. One of my sisters noted that a photo of me in my gardening outfit on my other blog reminded her of dad.

On the other hand, I think he was better at using his hands—at patching leaks. I am a writer, neither an engineer nor the mechanic wanna be that some engineers are. And I barbecue, and otherwise cook, while his culinary output was limited to scrambled eggs and undrinkable instant coffee.

But, then again, we are pretty close. My coffee is not instant—but it is, in the best male Sheller tradition, virtually undrinkable.

Daddy, I’ll be thinking of you later on today if the patch holds and I can get some biking miles in. And if it’s doesn’t hold, I’ll be thinking of you even more, and wishing you were here with your chalk and your bucket.

Happy Father’s Day.