Discolor Online

I did my first serious ride tonight. Christine suggested we get together after work for a ride and I was happy to join her. I love that all the buses in Seattle have bike racks on them. Unfortunately, they've also got a policy (an understandable policy, don't get me wrong) that doesn't allow bike riders to take their bikes on and off the buses in the downtown core, the "free ride area". Instead I took my bike down the hill to Martin Luther King Jr Way to catch that bus. I got to the intersection just as the bus was pulling away from my stop and had to wait the full 20-25 minutes for the next bus but still managed to get to Christine's in reasonable time. I was a little worried we might run out of light. I haven't done any evening riding yet so I don't have lights or reflectors on my bike at the moment and running too late would have been a problem. Thankfully, Christine has all the gear and was ready to blaze a trail if necessary.

We rode from her house, across the ship canal bridge, up to the University of Washington where we picked up the Burke Gilman Trail. We followed the trail through Wallingford, past Gas Works Park and into Fremont where we stopped for dinner and a beer at Hales Ales Pub, literally right off the trail. Plenty of other people were out on the trails and the ride was very pleasant, but it was also nice just to sit back and have a nice pint and chat with Christine. I had a great spinach, pears, and blue cheese salad (which had at least a cup of spiced nuts on it... I love nuts, but I must have left half a plateful behind) with grilled salmon and a pint of their Red Menace which was just perfect.

I was just starting to get cold when we left Hales, so I was glad to work up a bit of a sweat again on the bike on the ride back. I could already feel my ass hurting, though. I'm going to be sore tomorrow. There were two hills back to back at the very end of the ride that kicked my ass, though I made it up the first one pretty strong, the second was a longer incline and stamina has never been my strong suit. I could tell I was going to wreck myself if I tried to take that last hill on guts alone, so with trembling legs and my breath wheezing through my throat, I called in the towel and walked most of it and then rode a short while to the "end" (the bottom of the super steep hill Ray and Christine live on, which there was no way in hell I was even going to pretend to ride up) then walked the bike up to the house.

I've still got that happy, glowy feeling from the workout and I got to be outside on a beautiful evening, seeing parts of Seattle I don't normally get to. All in all, a very good idea. Really glad I did it, tempting as going downtown for happy hour might have seemed. Christine tells me that I biked almost 14 miles tonight. Yay me!