Bismarck

When mentioning that I was going to Bismarck to a coworker, I made an obscure Biz Markie reference. My coworker said "who?" and I immediately felt old. If you're anywhere over 30, you should know that "oh baby you, you got what I need" song at least. Right?

Anyways, Bismarck is a cool town! It's not flat like the rest of North Dakota, and there's a lot of history in them there hills. Here's some pictures from my after class adventures.

My hotel was located fairly close to the Missouri River, so I took my trusty Cross Check with me to do some exploring. I found some singletrack, some paved multi-use path, some gravel doubletrack, and some historical crushed rock trails as well. I was able to go on back to back 20+ mile rides with barely 2 miles per day of actual road, something that is almost unheard of in nearly every other city I've ridden in. The crazy mix of trails, beaches, riverside paths, and hillside history wasn't boring in the least. Being able to see some artifacts from Lewis & Clark's adventures, old Native American villages, and old bridges was pretty cool. I was fortunate that the weather was amazing (first time riding in a t-shirt and shorts in nearly 7 months!) and I had plenty of time to go cruise around the city. The second day I took the fenders off since the puddles had cleared up, and I wasn't in the mood for the rattling sounds they make on gravel!

The big building in the first picture is the capitol building. It's the tallest building in the state too. Being a California boy, this capitol building is pathetic! I spent so many hours walking around the grounds of the capitol in Sacramento, that the capitol in Bismarck was very "meh". Still cool to see though, just to satisfy the nerdy explorer side of me at least.

Family Cycling

Spring has sprung! People everywhere. Riding Bikes. Jogging. Walking Dogs. Pushing Strollers. The reclusive natives that hid from winter are coming out to play. With that, so does my family. While I may have been the only crazy one to ride all through the winter (which apparently is the toughest in the nation according to weather.com!), we've all made it out to embrace spring. First up was making sure my oldest son's 24" Trek Mountain bike still fit, and with the seatpost all the way up, it does. This will be his last year on it before we go to 26" wheels. This was necessary to make room in the budget for the "missing" bike, my wife's.

We sold her walmart Schwinn before we moved here, and have been looking for a suitable replacement for a while now. With the iBert baby seat in mind, we had to find a bike with a long enough top tube to make the ibert comfortable to use. We looked at the local shops and nothing really "spoke" to her. But at the Community Bike Workshop, the lonely 74 Fuji Dynamic 10 Mixte did. We both liked this bike when we first saw it months ago, and it was still sitting there so we had to try it. The ibert fits perfectly, and the cost of the bike was 1/3 of what we would have spent at a "real" bike shop. Even with the upgrades planned it'll still be cheaper and it's the perfect bike for her.

So now that we're all bicycle equipped again we've been riding as a family. To breakfast. To lunch. To the store. To explore. I love it. My wife has completely fallen in love with riding again. The weight loss goals that my wife and I set are pretty aggressive, so riding as much as possible will certainly help us achieve our goals. Riding isn't all about the goals though, we're having fun. Discovering new routes and paths, seeing new things, and sharing the love of cycling as a family.

Trukin'

Finally fitted some 26x2.35 Schwalbe Big Apple tires to the Xtracycle. I've been fascinated by these tires for years now, and I finally caught them at a "too good to refuse" price, so I figured I should jump on the chance to finally get some. The roads here are pretty rough and I've had to true these wheels twice in the past 6 months. The high volume of the Big Apples made such a huge difference in ride comfort and quality, in fact much more of a difference than I was expecting. I'd say after today's 22 mile ride, I'm completely satisfied with these tires. They roll plenty fast, do great on gravel, and they are comfy! Sure they are heavy, but on a 45lb bike it doesn't really matter, and their weight wasn't really noticed.

With the impending flood, the "easy" route to Fargo wasn't available so I had to go way out of my way to get to that side of town, but it's a fun route. Gravel roads, county road shoulders, and wide paved paths were just some of the stuff I rode on today. I didn't even notice the long mileage as it was a nice day. I had to take off my coat, hat and liner gloves a few miles in. This is where its nice to use the Xtracycle as a weekend cruiser, it can hold all that stuff without worry.

After a cruise around Fargo I headed back east and met my wife and kids for lunch at Ruby Tuesday for a nice lunch of Blackened Tilapia and Diet Coke. Once done with our meal, I headed home only to have the sun retreat behind the clouds, warranting the need for my extra layers again. The temperature was in the high 30s and slightly windy, yet I saw dozens of pedestrians and one other cyclist today. Its nice to see others taking advantage of a perfectly good Saturday.

Back in Business

After being sick, and only getting one commuting day in last week, I was able to get out on a 10-12 mile (my bike odometer needs batteries) ride on the Xtracycle today. I went up to the FM Community Bike Workshop to volunteer for a little while, then look for a new donor frame for said Xtracycle. I've been thinking a bigger frame to get me a more upright riding position would help, without needing the giant stack of spacers and riser stem I have on there already. It looks silly, no matter how functional it is currently.

The weather was nice though, high 20s with lots of sunshine felt warm, and the streets were mostly clear. But the best part....I saw other people on bikes! Other people walking! Kids in strollers! It was the first sign I've seen that indeed, spring is here. It's time to work on setting more goals and solidifying plans for summer adventures. So far my rough list is as follows:

1) Get Xtracycle "dialed". New tires, new saddle, and find a way to get a more upright riding position.
2) Ride a Metric Century (100km or 62miles) to Fort Abercrombie Historical Site
3) Ride to Detroit Lakes for lunch at Zorbaz, then ride home. Full century, 100miles
4) Do a mini tour of the Paul Bunyan trail in Central Minnesota.
5) S24O (Sub-24 hour Overnighter) bikepacking trip in town with my sons.

Pretty easy list so far, I sure hope time and weather will cooperate to make them achievable.

Down for the count

I've been sick with a cold since Tuesday. I should have seen it coming since my oldest son has been sick. Sometime around noon on Tuesday it hit me all at once and I felt miserable. That's the crappy part about bike commuting, getting sick. For one, riding home from work when you're sick enough to leave work, isn't fun. It was wet, icy, and windy, and I was on the Xtracycle. It was slow going but I slogged through it with the goal of a hot shower and a warm bed. The next worst part is time off the bike. It's been 5 whole days without riding, and while I today I might actually feel up to riding...it's windy outside, and only the truly insane cyclists lust for wind riding :) The weather looks downright unfriendly for Monday and Tuesday, but hopefully there will be fresh snow to go ride around in when it's all said and done, and hopefully my family and I will all have recovered from this nasty cold by then.

Let it thaw, let it thaw, let it thaw.

So this week begins the "warm up" that should kick off the spring thaw (flood?). I will miss the snow, although I'm sure it'll make a couple brief appearances throughout the spring. With the latest thaw there are tons of slushy puddles, so I'm back on my Xtracycle since it has fenders to keep me somewhat clean. Yesterday I went on a 9 mile ride through the streets on the Pugsley and got covered in brown slush. My white bike is now half brown, and I had to wash my coat and pants when I got home! So unless it's dry snow or bare roads, the Pugsley is staying parked. The Xtracycle is much faster anyway, even though it's a bigger target for wind, with it's sail-like rear end. I'll take that penalty though because it's just so fun to ride. It's due for some new tires and a new snapdeck, but I should be able to get by for a couple more months at least. I've settled on getting Schwalbe Big Apple tires in the 26x2.35 size for the extra ride comfort and reflective sidewall. Hopefully I can catch them on sale before I truly need them.

I'm jinxing myself to say that I survived my first winter in Fargo, but that's what I did. Bear Grylls style survival, by getting into the mess and fighting through it. Although I didn't need to eat an eyeball or drink my own pee, I'm quite proud of myself for braving the frozen outdoors as much as I have.

$0.00 per gallon

When I started this blog is was mainly about my bike rides and starting to commute by bike. Since I've moved to Minnesota, and landed a job so close to home, being a bike commuter has become much easier. Nearly every day I take the long way for the added mileage, a whopping 5 mile round trip! If I took the easy route it would only be 3 miles round trip. When the weather gets nicer I may look for ways to extend it even further.

The biggest adjustment from Phoenix to here is this white stuff that falls from the sky. The locals call it snow, and well I love it. So much in fact that it doesn't stop me from riding to work. I was lucky enough to find a custom built Surly Pugsley at a local shop (I had full intentions of buying a frame and building it up "my way", but this was one was cheaper and nicer!). This thing is built for snow, sand, and anywhere it damn well pleases. There's only been a couple places this winter where I had to walk beside it, but I think those times could have been avoided now that I have more snow experience under my belt. Today was the first time I walked it because I wanted to. Yesterday's wind left some deep drifts that were pock-marked with footsteps. Add on last night's 2-3" of fluffy snow and those deep holes are invisible. It's only a 150 foot stretch or so, and instead of getting frustrated with the annoying thump thump thump of hitting those holes, I just walked it. But before that stretch of path, I had to guess where I was, as I couldn't really tell where the path was, or where the icy patches beneath the snow were. The rest of the ride was nice and enjoyable, since the temps were in the high 20s and the snow coming down felt good on my face. My coworkers were surprised that I had ridden to work, you'd think that they'd know me better by now. I've only missed a handful of days this year, and it takes much more than a couple inches to stop me.

As of tomorrow's ride, I'll be at 250 miles for the year. Not bad considering that 95% of those miles are on snow. I'm well on my way to my goal of 1500 miles for the year.