Weather here is only 63 Fahrenheit ( 17 C), so a bit too cold to go out riding still.
A few pics from the first few rides of 2017.great eye for taking photos.
I always enjoy your postings but is there any one true fact in that last paragraph?
they promised me a life-size statue and the one they made was barely nine feet tall
I always enjoy your postings but is there any one true fact in that last paragraph?
I wonder which of these two really is the steepest hill in West CorkThere's two ways to answer your question, Andre.
Quotethey promised me a life-size statue and the one they made was barely nine feet tall
That's surely a tall one, Andre?
any help getting up these hills would be greatly appreciated
i have some crackin cycle route i do but theres a lot of hills to cover,
talking to Dan the other night he sent me a link to a motor that attaches to BB connect a roller to wheel very near job if i could afford it i'd buy it because im having big problems with my back especially when the going gets tough ,any help getting up these hills would be greatly appreciated ;)
...going to pitch it tomorrow weather permitting...This will require photographs, of course!
not much of a ride, not quite ten miles: https://ridewithgps.com/routes/18708470
I am doing lots of leg raises and other exercises to strengthen the muscles around the knee and I can now ride 15 km every second day without discomfort.
Next target is 25km.
I am doing lots of leg raises and other exercises to strengthen the muscles around the knee and I can now ride 15 km every second day without discomfort.
Next target is 25km.
The thing isn't specifically how far you go. That's arbitrary. The thing is to go just the tiniest fraction further than is really comfortable, so that you get full benefit of the exercise but don't do yourself any harm.
Rinse and repeat.
Today it was the studded tires whose limits were tested, or at least my ability to ride on them. The Weber River Parkway http://www.weberpathways.org/projects-2/weber-river-parkway/ is plowed and mostly quite clear in Riverdale where I live, but head further into Ogden... I crossed Parker Drive and all of a sudden it was soft snow over ice. I turned back and was going to get onto Parker Drive but a guy walking a couple dogs said the trail was plowed again just over that little hill. So with my confidence boosted I got back on the trail. Ha! Yeah a plow had been through at some point, so it was only two inches of soft snow over an inch of ice, but still... I had one full off, a full body dive into the snow alongside the trail. Along a few stretches I could ride pretty well, other stretches I'd be putting a foot down every third or fourth pedal stroke, and then I just walked a good part of it. Even walking was tricky, especially with the bike to push. Very slippery with enough snow to make pushing the bike a struggle.
Ah and where the trail goes under the railroad tracks north of 31st St. wow, it was like a foot of water with big chunks of six inch thick ice floating around! I could keep one foot on a pedal and use the other foot to negotiate the ice, while using my arms to hold on to the top of the wall enclosing the trail. OK, I will be skipping this trail for the next few months!
https://ridewithgps.com/routes/18816740
A few pics from the first few rides of 2017.
A few pics from the first few rides of 2017.
I like your photos rualexander, especially the second one http://thorncyclesforum.co.uk/index.php?action=dlattach;topic=12169.0;attach=13386 I really like that, where was it taken?
That winter photo is really something. I remember the boat house from when I cycled along the loch. Is the Youth Hostel still there? It had a lovely smell of beeswax and loads of antique wood in it.Loch Ard youth hostel is long gone, must be twenty years since it closed. The building is still there, private house now I think.
Janet
I stopped a few miles outside Nairn on a small back road to catch my breath and take in the views.
I was stood at a T junction when around the corner came a silver Range Rover at quite a nippy speed and it slowed down near me to take the bend.
The driver was a strikingly good looking lady with an unusual hair style.
Our eyes met for a second before she drove off the way I had come.
I thought nothing more of it ( honest) until this evening when the social media are full of speculation about the new Dr. Who.
It was the actress Imelda Swindon. 😀
Her Wikipedia info says that she lives near Nairn with her partner.
Well, a kind of claim to fame. Never know who you'll bump into on a Thorn.
skyscrapers on the beach thats mad.
Starting my Spring tour today.
Dan, those are amazing skies, turquoise one moment, phtalo blue or purple clouds the next moment.Thank you, Andre. Typical unsettled springtime storm-skies here in Oregon farm country.
Time for a visit to Scotland Andre, we've probably had good/fine days this year adding up to 75% which for the first five months is exeptional, forecast for scorchio all summer. I would not be supprised if here on the west coast Scottish Highlands (known for miraculous amounts of inclement weather of all sorts) we will end up with at least 70% fair/fine by years end...
Anybody doing the Great Notts bike ride on the 25th June? on their Thorn
Yesterday as we returned from our ride my companion noted that my shirt had lots of midges on it. They're a curse this time of the year if you converse while riding. He didn't have any on him. I suspect he's a secret gin drinker...
great photos lads what a wonderful planet we live on
Yesterday as we returned from our ride my companion noted that my shirt had lots of midges on it. They're a curse this time of the year if you converse while riding. He didn't have any on him. I suspect he's a secret gin drinker...
I could tell you exactly why, if you'd like to know? ;-)
Yesterday as we returned from our ride my companion noted that my shirt had lots of midges on it. They're a curse this time of the year if you converse while riding. He didn't have any on him. I suspect he's a secret gin drinker...
I could tell you exactly why, if you'd like to know? ;-)
Go on then.
Yesterday as we returned from our ride my companion noted that my shirt had lots of midges on it. They're a curse this time of the year if you converse while riding. He didn't have any on him. I suspect he's a secret gin drinker...
I could tell you exactly why, if you'd like to know? ;-)
Go on then.
^^^ Iain gets my vote for best brief tour summary for the year to date.
Best,
Dan.
^^^ Iain gets my vote for best brief tour summary for the year to date.
Went on a 3 month bimble around Brittany this Spring. I was working a bit here and there using the Workaway site where you get food and a roof for 4 or 5 hours work a day. Nice way to reduce your overheads while emersing yourself in the culture :
https://1drv.ms/a/s!AiJ8NWjLeHiQl14oxv3I4IQS24ft
Sounds like the real thing.;D ;D ;D your an awful man.
Over here French fries are "chips" and authentically served on newspaper (probably illegal under the EU, which tells you how long it is since I had any).
Your Manhattan pals remind me.... Back in the day, when I was a political exile, after I got shot in South America (not for politics, for my team winning too often at polo, a bad loser put a price on my head), I lived in Australia because that's where the first plane out went. Friends from London came to stay and I took them out for a local delicacy, a bowl of pea soup with an Australian-type meat pie floating in it. One of my guest reminded me that as students we shared a corpse called Horace, and that he had to do my dissections and slides and suchlike for me because I'd pass out from the smell any time I entered the abattoire. When I then informed them that locally the dish was known as a "floater" even those who had tasted a (small) mouthful pushed their plates away. Just as well I had a reservation for a decent restaurant...
Said Floater, or something very similar was being served in the Sydney Opera House bar last night. I was passing, as one does... :)
he rides a Thorn raven it was me who put him onto thorn bikes he bough one for the wife as well but she never used it (needs Killing)
anto
Yes Jackie it's just gathering dust pity, but nothing stranger than women thats the truth ;)
btw i think i'd rather stand than ride one of those brompton yokes imaging if it had a rohloff my god what is cycling coming too.
anto.
How long did it take?Id, for this ride I started at 05:00 and returned at 23:00 so was gone about 17 hours, mostly because of the slow going in the forest/mountains due to the grades and the road surfaces; the paved portions went pretty quickly. The average overall works out to 9.7mph/15.6km. Riding average is a little higher but but not much 'cos I didn't stop often or long.
From your past posts I assume you do little riding in the winter due to weather conditions, how do you keep up your fitness through the winter?A few years ago, I added daily 5mi/8km walks to stay in shape, especially in winter. I have developed osteopenia (thinning bones) secondary to celiac sprue disease (gluten intolerance) and partly, I am told, because cycling is not considered a weight-bearing exercise. I enjoy hiking and when it snows, I take out the cross-country skis.
I've got a Brompton & find it quite useful. I have the six speed version with the low gearing option. That's low enough to get up some good hills. I don't know the actual gear-inches, maybe upper 20s just guessing by feel. For sure you can't carry a huge load and the steering is mighty twitchy.
This years's tour was a local ride up to Hadrian's Wall and back down through the Yorkshire Dales. Here are shots over looking the Eden valley and Swaledale.
Our run down towards the Ayrshire coast yesterday, Isle of Arran in the distance.
At over 5000km in the last 3 months taking in plenty of Volcanoes and warm beaches for all you sun starved Europeans.
I've not met a single cyclist in all that time either!
weather was dire showers and more showers
a circle of standing stones and a few drops of your blood where the thorns on the gorse caught you
that exhibit had more than sincerity to recommend it -- it was authentic
By golly, Geo, that's a lonely landscape. A few years of shepherding there will make a man of any milksop.
What happened to Piet Mondrian after he emigrated to North America?
So, pretty much on time, not too bad then ;DThose were the scheduled times. We were half an hour late arriving. Not at all bad considering.
Obligatory bicycle reference included above twice.
People like that, I take the view that he isn't surly because he's alone, but that he is alone because he's surly.
(Obligatory bicycle reference included above twice.)
Whitworth, very common until after the war
When I got home, rats, one of the nuts that holds the saddle frame to the spring on my Brooks Flyer was gone!I believe that is a 9/32in nut...available as a spare from Brooks here:
One would have thought--silly me--that Brooks would have used BSC (British Standard Cycle) threads... Maybe they thought that Whitworth had a poetic ring?
Cycling is almost a spiritual journey at times.