I woke up at dawn, on the ground in a sleeping bag, the warm down surrounding me like a fluffy cloud, the trees reaching for the sky above, the first rays of sun glinting through the branches. The evening before had seen the thrill of flying through the darkness on a bike, the peacefulness of …
I recently came across the following as a draft of a post that I originally wrote 3 years ago, when biking with any regularity was new to me, and I was a total rookie on two wheels. To someone who had ridden geared bikes all her life, the concept of a singlespeed was a little odd. …
Back in August, I went on a road trip to Colorado. On my way home, I stopped to see the largest sand dunes in North America, at Great Sand Dunes National Park. Ok, so it wasn't exactly 100% completely on my way, but it wasn't far enough out of my way to resist a stop to …
Greenwood Furnace State Park is 7 miles from our house. The park offers a network of trails which were originally designed for cross-country skiing (though most of them seem terrible for that activity), but have more lately fallen victim to neglect, as skiers are few and far between and there was never much of a push …
We fell in love riding bikes on frigid, snowy mornings in the middle of winter. We dated for a few months before I moved into his camper with him---no electricity, no running water, and only enough space for a duffel bag of belongings. I went to Japan for a summer and we kept our still-new relationship …
Wednesday's weather couldn't have been more perfect. Sunny, 70 degrees, in November? I'll take it! I couldn't have asked for a better day to ride for 8 hours. We set off on the tandem to ride 100 miles. When we mapped it at the end, apparently it was only 97 miles, but we also did …
In three weeks, Evan and I plan to ride our tandem from our house to his parents house for Thanksgiving. It's about 200 miles away. We are going to do it in one shot. It's a tradition for him, riding down for the holidays. For the past couple of years I've been envious, but this is …
Evan bought me a new bike. Ok, actually it's an old bike, but it's new to me. It's a Schwinn High Sierra from the 80s that he picked up for $50 from some guy who walked into the shop looking to sell. While it's not going to set any speed records or take me down …
Why ride a bike when you can carry it? Sometimes while exploring we find trails we can't ride. But we keep going, because that's what exploration is about. I'm becoming a lot more adept at carrying my bike. I figured out a new technique today---grab the chainstay instead of the top tube. My arm is …
Evan and I have Wednesdays off together now. This means long bike rides. We finally got another set of hubs for the Powderkeg tandem. Hopefully, the new Chris Kings will solve the issues we've been having with the rear hub getting torn apart by the amount of force that we put on that bike. We've gone through …
helena kotala 