Extra Special Sunday Parkways

Experimenting with changing things up a bit, including how I take pictures on my commutes. Here I am playing around with taking pictures while riding and holding the camera for different perspectives. This one, of course, taken holding the camera at a low angle to include the front tire. I definitely need to keep practicing on getting the right aim point down. I do like the motion expressed by the tire, though.

Unlike most days these past couple of weeks, my ride in was quite peaceful and quiet, since we just had a spell of showers and my ride actually started at the tail end with a few drizzle drips. Temp-wise, it was still comfortably warm, so I actually had to stop and take off the rain gear. I'm sure once I figure out the perfect warm and wet clothing set up we will be back to colder temps - so it goes, I suppose.

I think I have finally got both pairs of shoes' cleats adjusted so the pedalling feels the best, what a chore. I was able to find a set of new old stock (NOS) Dura Ace rear cogs so I could finally extra fine-tune the gearing on both bikes (both have uniglide cogs). So, both now have nice 2 tooth steps for consistent shifting (SUB=11-13-15-17-19-21-23; Radac=12-14-16-18-20-22-24). What's cool is Evan's bike also runs a uniglide set of cogs so I can fine-tune his, when he is ready, which for now he is happy with his current set up.

I continue to try and do different home-ward routes, so I do not get overly bored with riding the same route day-in and day-out, that feels good. On one day after stopping at my pharmacist's, I explored one of Evan's routes to high school next year. It was quite pleasant and was actually pretty straightforward, very few jogs and mostly neighborhood streets. At least I feel better about that route for him.

Last week was no riding, since I was off from work and felt compelled to mostly just relax with my son, did catch up on other non-riding things.

Yesterday, one of our warmer days of this, so far, short cooler summer, I rode the Sunday Parkways NW Portland. They had a new route this year, much longer than last year's inaugural one. Most of the route was great, though the Naito Parkway bikes on one side, cars on the other was confusing and there was little traffic control by either volunteers or the Portland Police. This seemed to create odd intersection traffic since the lights were still going, pedestrians were trying to cross, cars trying to get to their side and the Naito traffic seemed to ignore most of the signals and pedestrians.

Overall, it was fun. We had super weather and riding with out a lot of traffic to deal with was such a treat. Part of the route included part of my standard commute, so I have a pretty good comparison. The best part was I finally got to meet someone I have only known on a cycling forum I am a member of. We spent some initial time visiting and chatting it up, then rode about half the route together as we continued to chat. I am sure we will ride together, again. Who knows, maybe we will get to see more of the Portland area members of the forum, which is hosted by a local cycling business.