How to make a new trail

Whenever I try to take a picture of a trail, it doesn't look like a trail. It just looks like some rocks.

I haven't subscribed to a mountain bike magazine for awhile, but when I did, they would tell you once a year in some advice column to ride the trail you ride the most in the other direction. I suppose the only applies to loops. I never really did. I'm a boring nutmegger.

So, for the first time in my ten or so years of riding the West Hartford Reservoir, I rode it counterclockwise. It was crazy! It was a totally different trail. The lighting is different. The rocks are sharper. Curves are banked differently. There's more climbing (that may have just been in my head). That walk-a-bike section at the far southern part of the powerlines is not actually a walk-a-bike section; you can go down it.

Those mountain bike magazines are right. It's definitely a way to get out of the local trail doldrums.
Read more!

no subject

I didn't use one of these to move furniture. Would people have respected me more if I did?

I didn't get to ride much this weekend because Johanna and I are moving. In fact, I think the longest ride all weekend was either to the uhaul place to pick up the van or to my friend Jacob's house to play ping pong.


However, I just discovered this: http://mtbdee.blogspot.com/. It belongs to a mountain biker in Rhode Island named Brendan. Finding that was weird, but not that weird. He's into the Drop Kick Murphies and the Mighty Mighty Bosstones. I'm not into them. Cool blog, though. What was weird was the time a Brendan, with the same last name as me and the same age, was prank calling the Ned Lamont office I ran in West Hartford. That was totally bizarre. I thought he was going to try to kill me, but according to the police he just wanted an absentee ballot.

Here's that oft-viewed Street Films thing about moving by bike. Read more!

Three idignities in the last 24 (or so) hours

The first indignity is entirely my fault. I was hungry yesterday before I wanted to go mountain biking, so I decided to cook myself a quick meal. I started making tabbouleh, but realized it wouldn't be ready for a few hours. I had a really big craving for it, so much so that I didn't read the entire recipe. Making tabbouleh didn't satisfy my hunger, so I moved on to the left over couscous. I wasn't sure what to eat with it, but I knew that the jar of tamarind paste that's been sitting in my refrigerator for year was going to factor in. Day after day I've been questing to figure out what the hell you do with tamarind paste. I knew once, because I bought it. No wait. Johanna bought it for me. Anyway, I googled "tamarind paste couscous" and found a recipe for a real simple vegetable curry that goes on top of couscous. Since I had been thinking so hard about the tamarind paste, I decided to put on a heaping tablespoon. It looked pretty edible when I put it on the table, and it almost was. Clearly, tamarind paste is powerful stuff. I washed it down with a couple of miller lites and headed for the reservoir.

Needless to say, the 90 degree heat and that stuff sloshing around in my stomach made me feel bizarre and unable to correctly operate my bike.

I guess this is how they make biodiesel.

My second indignity was this morning. I was riding to through the Farmington Ave Asylum merge and starting to go down the hill. I watched this rumbling Rabbit coming off 84 west turning into my direction. He clearly wasn't paying attention, because he almost ran me off the road. Riding behind him, I noticed a bumper sticker that indicated that his car was fueled by vegetable oil. I guess it was really hard to see me through all that smugness.


The last indignity happened on the way home. I left work slightly early, so I decided to go ride across the river to East Hartford. Nothing much happening until I was about to get on the Charter Oak Bridge to get home. I hit a groundhog by the 5/15 entrance and crashed into the guardrail. I wasn't going that fast, so it wasn't that big of a deal, only a bruise on my butt and a cut on my finger. The upside was I learned the unique grunt made by a groundhog when you run one over with a bike. At first I was mad at the groundhog, because it ran at me and made my crash, but in retrospect, I see it had a tough decision to make. I startled it and it went to run away, but it only had two choices: risk getting hit by a bike or run on to the highway entrance and probably get hit by a car. I hope he's ok. Read more!

"Heeeeey…..White People?!??" Critical Mass June 2008

The sweet, light rain really cooled things off a bit before blue skies began appearing along with the sun. Mother Nature appears to be down with the ride, good lookin’ out! The beat crew met up after work by the river to trade flyers, brews and bullshit a bit. We arrived at the Carousel to 20 people milling about; chillin’, meetin’, greetin’, hydratin’ and wrenchin’.


There was a floor pump courtesy of Dave and a few bikes were getting tubes swapped out and hubs debated. Rick! Another flat dude!?!?!? Super cool to see everyone helping each other out and sharing beta. Caresse's hands are blurry fast when she's working on a bike! Dang! Breck seems to be trying to pump with Jedi mind tricks whilst Dave handles the valves! Also super cool to see a banana seat! I really should have taken more photos, but this ride was just too much fun.

A few more riders arrived. Brendan returned from the portapotty. And then my dream came true… Critical Mass left for Keney Park! Woo-haa! There are a lot of lights between Bushnell Park and getting’ onto Main Street and we worked out the kinks of dealing with traffic lights. We quickly forked left on to Albany Avenue.


Yep, we took The Avenue!



Most everyone cheered and yelled as much as we cheered and yelled. One 'round the way dude looked up in honest bewilderment and a smile, “heeeeyyy…White People?!??!” We took a right onto Woodland and left on Greenfield. I corked the Woodland/Greenfield intersection and had a great conversation with a family in a mini-van, waiting at the green light for the bicycles to pass through safely as a group. I thanked them for waiting and keeping people safe and talked about the ride. I invited them to come next month and they seemed interested in coming! Right on! I saw them two more times with the pops giving us the thumbs up out the window. They were following us! I had a great time talking to drivers all along the ride and most were receptive, patient and super nice. The drivers of the North End were much friendlier than the drivers we encountered on last month's ride into West Hartford!


The ride through Keney Park was a mix of roads and car-free greenway. We saw the skyline of Hartford overlooking lush grass meadows, passed through dense forest and pedaled alongside a golf course. This is a great park. I always love spending time here on a road bike or exploring trails on mountain bikes. We didn't pass the pond and fountain though...this time.

We exited onto Rt. 159 and pedaled south on North Main, Windsor Street, left over the railroad tracks and crossed Weston Street; entering into the mess of traffic due to Pearl Jam and some jack-ass drivers. We got onto the riverfront via Riverside Park and continued south along the river to the Colt Building and Colt Park. Ahhh...riding along the river is always a good idea!


We passed the remains of the Virgin Mary Shrine and returned to Bushnell Park on Wethersfield Avenue.

more funny photos after the jump from the afterparty that happened afterwards, Read More!



After regrouping at the park the group split a few ways. We had already lost a few people needin’ to get to the concert and a few chilled in the park for a bit. A group stayed in the park and went to the Bushnell Park Café and another to Kenney’s (Red Rock Tavern) a few minutes away on Cap Ave. There’s some serious mileage of iron patio fence there, perfect for bike locks. The always-friendly Donnie keeps the show runnin’ smoothly and really makes sure everyone’s always got a smile on their face.


Check the reflection of the view of the skyline from our patio seats!


Check it. The rule of three people in a photo = weird shit continues!


I have absolutely no idea what the hell I am doing. Hi Joey Barber! I owe you a bell!


Brendan is a triceritops! And i just realized i never spelllchecked this before posting.

We really stepped things up on this ride as far as corking and Joel enjoyed sweeping and ensuring no one was left behind. Many others stepped up too! Thanks to everyone for making it such a great ride.


Read more!

The 5 Boro Walk Your Bike Tour

The Beat was well rep’d this past weekend by a hardy group of current and former Hartford peoples converging in the rotten apple in what was prolly the most blogged event in the long, extinguished history of the Triple B. Woo-haa!

El Cinco Burros! There is far too much to think of organizing into a digestible meal of a post; so instead I shall cook up a stew free of high-fructose corn syrup and full of beer and pedaling…lots of pedaling. I suppose about now is a good time to explain that the 5 Boro Bike Tour is a 42mile car free ride with 30,000 of your closest friends though all five boroughs of NYC including riding on the FDR, the BQE, and crossing the Verrazzano Narrows Bridge. In case you can’t do the math, that’s over 60,000 bicycle wheels spinning and avoiding NYC potholes!

El Presidente de China has well educated y’all about the ride from the Beat to Dirty Water, so I’ll just curse him one last time for that one massive hill and mention again…shorter isn’t always better; like cock size for example. Otherwise, besides the evil hill, and Klan drive, the ride was pretty nice and scenic. Doing 30mph down a hill through the Waterbury ghetto is also worth a mention I reckon.


In this exciting photo one can barely see the bikes of Chill Will and El Prez de Cheeenay with all the action going on riding the train to Bridgeport. Though no accommodations for bikes, this train was all good. On the train from B-Port to NYC we had them in the middle doorway of the car which was a pain depending which door opened. The idea of spending a few days in the city with my bike and living out of my messenger bag made me as happy as the lack of Metro-North in Hartford pisses me off. Amtrack sucks. Go fuck yourself with your overpriced tickets!!!!

Upon arriving at Grand Central we were greeted by Shoupy, the Shoup Shoupsta! I am not sure if he rode there from Ann Arbor, but he very well might have. El Prez decided against the formal motorcade and instead bombed the crap outta Broadway; speeding through the traffic, checking cabs and leading us quickly and dodge-ily to the Brooklyn Bridge. We soon split, to meet up later; as I was going with Shoup to Park Slope to his friend Megan’s apartment, who was hooking us up with a spot to crash. Thanks again Megan, good lookin’ on the couch…very comfy! And puffin' on the rooftop was sweeeet!


Shoupy and I met up with el Prez much later in Bed-Stuy at a party with some of el Prez’s administration, lots of bikers, assorted hipsters, and three fireman with large iron tools suitable for hunting wild boar. We drank, talked and tried not to inhale burning particle board before retiring early as we were to assemble the Beat Crew at the base of the Brooklyn Bridge at 6:45AM the next morning. Shoupy and I arrived at 7:15AM the next morning! Our crew of about a dozen soon took off for lower Manhattan.


Lots of people. This was the first taste of the 5 Boro Walk Your Bike Tour. As the day progressed the sun burned away all the clouds…and a few faces too I imagine. The day turned out wonderful.





Real men wear leg warmers. Later, in a bizarre twist, Shoupy removed his shorts and finished the tour in bike shoes, leg warmers, a hand-carved wooden cod piece from Turkey and his tour vest. Sexy? Yes, of course! But somewhat disturbing to the elderly and those younger than them.


A media circus surrounded El Presidente de China through most of Queens and was quite a spectacular sight. I was harassed for my crate of bootlegged bananas that I was selling 3 for $10 or one for free.


Welcome to Brooklyn! Woo-haa! I had a freakin’ good time chillin’ here the night before as well as the ride through on the tour. The only sucky thing was walking my bike for 45minutes in a bicycle traffic jam on the Bronx-Queens Expressway where four lanes became one. This was where the ride officially became the 5 Boro Walk Your Bike Tour. The car traffic jam on the other side was moving more quickly! The trike next to me had a louder stereo system than the cars! It was total fuckin' bizzaro world!!!

Eventually we were able to pedal again and riding on the highway along the water with a cool breeze felt great. Crossing on the Verrazzano Narrows Bridge is always super cool. Guinness and grinders at the irish pub was even better.


Taking pictures of groups of three on a ferry always has funny results. See above!


And again if you need further proof!



Much, much later, after learning the 7:20 train didn’t exist and I’d be taking a 9:07train back to CT, I decided to scoot on down to the west-side to watch the sun set over Dirty Jersey on the Hudson. I soon found myself pedaling unexpectedly through Times Square. Sunset, libations and a chance to rest and relax on the riverfront was a wonderful way to finish my visit to NYC.

On the train ride back from Bridgeport to Dirty Water I had to again store my bike in the middle doorway of the car, but this time the conductor made everyone get out the end doors and never opened the middle doors. Thanks dude! Metro-North is pretty good. Amtrack, not so good.



Read more!

Burros

It looks I'm the first one who gets to write about the 5boro thing that was yesterday. Here goes:

On the whole, it was fun. I'd never been before, so riding on the highway was a new and cool experience. Seeing 30,000 people with bicycles is also a very cool experience. I suppose I didn't actually get to see all 30,000 on bicycles at one tonight, but I did see a lot. The funny thing about that is that it's not really Utopian. It was like Disney World meets a traffic jam on the BQE. Well, I suppose it makes perfect sense that's it's like a traffic jam on the BQE, because it was actually on the BQE where the biggest traffic jam was. The Disney World part is because there was a lot of people standing in line wearing funny clothes waiting to ride something. I think I over-explained that simile sufficiently.

Here's the BQE with no traffic jam and lots of people on it:

Here's Johanna waiting in line ten minutes later:

Here's the high point of Staten Island, Danny Blaine's Food and Spirits:

The food had to be retrieved from a deli across the street, but the beer was awesome and the bartender even gave me a free one.

In an effort to add content to the compendium of bridge pictures, here are two bridges from a ride I took at Case Mountain on Friday:

While riding over the Verazano Narrows Bridge, a guy in front of me fell, and I believe that he broke his collarbone. I hope that he's ok, it looked terrible.

Also, despite facilitating all the complex logistical details concerning Marisa riding with us, in the end, she didn't come.

Oh yeah, and I looked like either crap or a dork:

Read more!