The weather gods have been kind to me today. No rain on the way in. Pouring down all day in prodigious quantities and then dry on the way back. I left work later than usual so cycled the more direct route through New Cross. At the end of Old Kent Road I managed to upset a bendy bus driver during a bit of lane filtering then thought sod it and hopped the next red to avoid him.
Then on the way through New Cross the traffic was an utter snarl up and very difficult to negotiate safely. To cap it all I was almost t-boned by a Range Rover turning right out of a junction. I slowed down when I saw the car, he stopped then as I was almost level with his bonnet he decided to pull out. I did a smart emergency stop, uttered a few choice expletives then pointed to my eyes before riding off. I felt a little shaky after that. Also, note to self. Always carry a spare set of batteries for the lights…
I have decided to try and cycle throughout the winter months. So far it has been okay. I’ve had two wet days and one cold day when I needed my bib longs for my knees and nether regions and fleece headband to keep my ears warm.
I’ve recently been upgrading my cycling wardrobe to make the cold, dark winter months more bearable. I’ve bought some Sealskinz gloves. These are supposed to be waterproof and breathable. I’ve tried them for a week now. They are not the warmest glove but they kept me dry during a downpour and are fairly breathable. We’ll wait and see how they cope when the mercury really starts to drop.
I have also bought a microfleece top to wear when I arrive at Waterloo station. The idea is that I take of my cycling jacket and then pop the fleece on over my baselayer. It is longer than the cycling jacket which has quite a snug fit. The length then saves me embarrassment on the train when wearing my Ronhill Bikester tights ;-).
I have also been researching some softshell jackets as my current Aldi £10 special does not really make the grade in terms of warmth and breathability. I’ve been looking at the Endura Fusion and the new Foska Tangent. They are both around £80. I already own some Foska kit so I may wait for a review of the Tangent before committing, by which time the winter will probably be over ;-).
Tante has come to visit for the weekend all the way from Denmark. It was great to see her again after almost a whole year! Jake was very excited when he woke on Saturday morning. In fact he was so excited that when Tante came downstairs he didn’t know how to cope with such excitement and ended up putting his head in his toy box while uttering great shrieks of delight :-).
Today we ventured out into the cold to visit Mudchute farm. We left the house quite early which was good because the cafe at the farm was not as busy. Jake enjoyed sharing my refrigerator cake with me which was yum! We are hoping to go to Ladywell Fields later as Lise hasn’t seen it in its improved form. Jake went to bed about an hour ago so I’m hoping he will wake around 3.30pm although I very much doubt it.
Errm. It didn’t happen. Jake eventually had to be roused at 4.30pm. Oh the life of a toddler!
I’ve been using the pannier for around 3 months now. On the bike it’s great and very stable. It is well made, looks good and is a good size for my needs. In the first week though, two of the reflective stickers came off.
In use
My primary usage of the bag is to ride to the station and then walk to my office. The walk takes roughly 15 minutes. I carry a change of clothes, lunch, laptop, bike tools, puncture kit, towel, phone, keys, lights, pump, water bottle, gloves, light jacket and a waterproof jacket. This combination fills the bag to capacity.
Enhancements
1. The shoulder strap is woefully inadequate. After walking for more than a few minutes with a fully laden bag it is very uncomfortable. I now use a padded strap from my crumpler bag which is perfect
2. The laptop sleeve should be moved to the back of the bag, next to the stiff backing. Putting it at the front puts a strain on the laptop chassis when the front pocket has more than a few items in it and makes the bag prone to falling over
3. The laptop sleeve should be an inch larger. It is quite a squeeze to fit a 17 inch laptop sideways and stretches the front pocket making it unusable for all but the smallest items
4. The laptop sleeve should have some kind of thin padding for protection
5. The bag has plenty of space but I find that it needs some kind of organizing. I don’t use the pockets on the side of the laptop sleeve because once the laptop is in there it is difficult to access them. What I would really like is a small semi-rigid compartment where you could put lights, pump, water bottle etc. which would be separate from the main compartment. I envisage something like a camera bag where you can alter the compartment size by using velcro strips. In fact Crumpler have something called a bunion which turns a normal bag into a camera bag via a special insert. This kind of thing would be great.
6. I find that when fully loaded or nearing capacity the bag is difficult to close because the straps are too short and cannot be extended. This is especially evident when using the laptop insert.
7. The protection flap that covers the hooks should be thicker. I find I can only walk with the bag comfortably if I place a couple of newspapers in the flap :-).
Of all the ‘commuting’ bags I have looked at, this is the best in terms of space and looks. Keep up the good work!
I thought an update is in order. The last time I did this exercise was June 23rd. The total needed to be recouped was £470.
In the interim months I have saved :
Jul 2008 – £40
Aug 2008 – £40
Sep 2008 – £40
Latest amount £470 – (£40 * 3) = £350
Since then I have bought :
Carradice Bike Bureau Pannier – £50
Cateye Strada Cycle Computer – £20
Muc-Off Chain Doc Chain Cleaner With 400ml Aerosol – £20
Continental Quality Road Inner Tube – £3
Endura Mighty Short Finger Gloves – £14
Trekking bars – £15
Bar foam – £5
This comes to £127
So now the total is £223 which will be paid off(if I don’t buy anything else) in November 2009, so yes the cost of cycling is still scary. Also this assumes I will be cycling throughout the winter months…
I haven’t written much about Jake’s development for a while. His speech continues to improve daily. He is learning new words and how to say things. At the moment if he doesn’t want to do something he will often use the abbreviation “no, not” instead of “I don’t want to…” which is quite amusing. Yesterday we were in Hilly Fields and I asked him how many dogs he could see. He correctly counted 5 dogs. That’s a first!
We checked his height against the marker on his bedroom wall and he has shot up a good 30cm from the last measurement at 2 years 4 weeks.
We have just come back from a nice long weekend in Tallinn. For those who don’t know, Tallinn is the capital of Estonia and sits on the coast of the Baltic Sea bordering Latvia and Russia. Our hotel was just outside the Old Town, about ten minutes walk. From our room on the 23rd floor we were afforded excellent views of the bay. It was a shame that the view of the Old Town was disrupted by a large mirrored office block :-(.
After checking in to our hotel on Friday night we opened up some beers from the mini bar and had an early night while watching a little TV. I had just flown back from Ottawa that morning so my body clock was all over the place. For the record Tallinn is 2 hours ahead of the UK so I was coping with 7 hours of jet lag!
The next day we had a look around the Old Town which was full of wonderfully preserved gothic buildings. The Old Town was partially enclosed by the remains of the old fortified wall and topped by Toompea castle. We had our lunch/brunch in the town square and then sauntered up the hill to check out the views from the castle. I took a few photos but the sky was a disappointingly overcast which resulted in ‘blow out’ skies in the majority of my landscape photos.
Out next port of call was the Museum of Occupation which had a small but fascinating display of emphemera collected during the German and Soviet occupations. We paid a little extra for the audio tour which made sense of the many little nick-nacks which were presented behind their glass cases. Down in the basement there were several statues and heads of Lenin and other communist primaries. The decision to place these artifacts next to the toilets was quite deliberate I imagine. We spent the rest of hte day wandering around the various nooks and crannies of Tallinn and retired in the evening tired but happy. We decided to have our dinner in the hotel because we couldn’t be bothered to go out again. We both had delicious steaks. Amy washed hers down with Strawberry Daiquiris while I had a few glasses of Saku Kuld, the local beer.
World War II Memorial
On Sunday we went for a long walk along Piritu beach. Our original plan was to walk to the TV tower. On the way we came across the desolate World War II memorial to fallen Russian soliders. It was a typically brutal Soviet piece of architecture and rather depressing. A little farther along we came across three large crosses and the names of the many German soliders who fell during 1940-41. We found out later that this Soviet memorial was built on the graves of German soldiers. So this was obvisouly an attempt to once again recognise the dead German soldiers who fell during the second Soviet occupation. After all the walking we were dog tired and with the TV tower still at least an hours walk away we decided to head back.
At the hotel we rested and then booked into the Hotel Spa for a romantic couples full-body massage. We were led into a room and were left to get undressed. We were provided with little pairs of pants which, quite frankly, looked ridiculous. The massage was lovely(once I had sufficiently relaxed) and lasted an hour. To start with I was covered by a thin sheet. The masseuse uncovered one side from the shoulder to my toes and then poured hot oil on the skin. The massage then began. When she had finished one side she put some hot towels on my oiled skin and then covered me up with the sheet again which she prepared some more oil. The next stage was to uncover and massage the other side of my body. When my back, legs and shoulders had been pummeled sufficiently, I was asked to turn onto my back(no I didn’t embarrass myself) and then had a towel placed on my face. So it carried on in this fashion and finished with an amazing face and head massage. Very nice and very relaxing although my back was aching a little afterwards.
It was a lovely morning for a cycle ride to Waterloo. Quite crisp but with bright sunshine and a deep blue sky. It almost made the OKR bearable. I am still enjoying the butterfly bars and don’t regret changing over. I’ve yet to see another cyclist with the same handlebars. I’ve been scouring the racks but nada, nothing.
I have been fishing out my winter gear on an incremental basis. For the last two days I’ve been wearing my Ronhill Bikesters which do a good job of keeping the legs warm. I’ve been wearing my winter jacket as well but look a little like the ‘man in back’ so today I wore my red Cognos fleece.I wonder if you can purchase cycling specific fleeces? I feel another wiggle purchase coming on…
It was the Sky Sports Freewheel last Sunday. We had been holed up in our house suffering from colds but we decided it would be good to get out of the house to ‘clear the cobwebs’. Which is just what we did!.
This year the powers that be decided to remove the Peckham Rye hub. Luckily the Freewheel website had a number of led rides listed. Our nearest one was starting at Sydenham and coming through Ladywell Fields at 9:15.
I spent the previous day getting the bikes ready. I installed a new Strada Bicycle Computer and washed and oiled the bikes. I also fitted the Carradice pannier to Amy’s bike. I was to be carrying Jake in his baby seat.
We arrived at the entrance to Ladywell Fields at the prescribed time. Already there were 20-30 people waiting. Most age ranges were in attendance. Children, toddlers, youngsters and people of a ‘mature’ age’. We set off for Greenwich soon after the marshall arrived. We followed LCN 21 through Cornmill Gardens and then through Brookmill Park. After that it all went a bit wafty, meandering through estates and quiet roads until we emerged on the Thames Path at Cutty Sark Gardens.
There were a few hundred people waiting here. We has a little rest and after 5-10 minutes set off. We rejoined the Thames path and headed for Rotherhithe. On Jamaica Road a mad old lady was raving that she couldn’t cross the road. Heh heh heh! The beast that is the peloton cannot be stopped by mere red lights :-).
In no time at all we were cheerily cycling across Tower Bridge while car drivers on the other side looked on in a bemused fashion. This is where the traffic free route started. The weather was fantastic for the ride. Slight breeze and sun!
This year it wasn’t possible to queue to get your photo taken. Instead they had set up photo towers at various points around the course. It was down to luck really as to whether you managed to get your photo taken. I’ve looked on the Freewheel website and alas cannot find ours :-(.
At St. James Park we had our little picnic. This was a lesson learnt from last year when the organizers ran out of free sandwiches and we had to resport to buying our lunch at the exorbitantly prices concession in the park. Afterwards to decided to head back and finish the route. I must say the feeling of cruising past Buckingham Palace amongst like-minded cyclists was great, and not a car in sight anywhere!
All in all an excellent day. In total we did 27 miles. Part of this was an extended ride down to the O2 after the event at which point we ran out of steam and got the ferry back to Greewich ;-).
I bought some trekking/butterfly/multi bars online last week. Yesterday they arrived. These bars are favoured on the continent and by touring cyclists. I bought them because they offer lots of hand positions and will make my commute more comfortable. Last night I fitted them. It was a simple procedure. I unclamped the old hybrid bar, took off the grips, loosened the brakes and then slid them off.
Configuring the new bar was a little problematic. First of all which way round does it go? This was solved by a quick search on google. I collected a variety of trekking bar photos and compared them. Once I had the bar clamped into place the correct way round I was not sure what angle to place them at and whether I should lower the stem or not. This problem was more or less solved by the fact that the brake cables would foul the stem when I tried to lower the angle of the bar. So I positioned it so that that brakes and gear levers were at an acceptable angle. I then got on the bike and positioned my hands to make some minor adjustments before tightening the bolts on the bar clamp and the brakes.
This morning I took my customised steed onto the road. The bar itself is not great quality. I think it must be steel as it flexes in use but is light as a feather. The front end feels a lot more twitchy now. I don’t know whether it was my imagination(or a tailwind) but I seemed to ride much faster :-).
The bar is very comfortable. When resting on the back bar the position is more upright than the old hybrid bars and when I want to get a little more aerodynamic I can reach for the front bars. Care must be taken as the brakes aren’t easily to hand in this position ;-). Powering up hills is made easier by placing the hands on the sides where the bar acts like normal bar ends. In this position this bar REALLY flexes which was a little off putting, although the steel is probably soaking up some of the road vibration. All in all I’m glad I’ve switched but in hindsight some aluminium 6061 bars would have been preferable.
