Cycling: Learning The New Bike

Yesterday, I took the long way home with the new bike for the first time. I used the route through Moore Park ravine, which runs about 21km. The weather was great, and the bike ran really nicely.

HP Velotechnik advertises the Street Machine Gte as "a bike with a view". Without handlebars in front of you, the only thing you see when riding are your legs and the pedal cranks (and, in my case, the GPS). It feels rather different from other bikes with conventional steering.

The Belt Line Trail, roughly where my old bike got its flat


The bridge from the Belt Line Trail to Mt. Pleasant Cemetery.


Exceeding the speed limit in Mt. Pleasant.


Funky time exposure at speed!


Going down Moore Park Ravine.

Sometimes it's hard to believe I'm in a huge city when I'm riding these paths.

After I got home, I attached the trailer hitch to the bike, and went off to pick Cobalt up from daycare using our Croozer Dog doggy trailer for the first time. Lori was stuck with work stuff, so it fell to me to rescue the pup.

The trailer works very well -- it rides smoothly, it's very light, and Cobalt doesn't seem to mind it at all. Unfortunately, I don't have any photos of her in it: it was awkward enough taking the above photos with the camera pointing forward at a largely empty path!

Today, I got another great ride in: the Don Valley, 27.5km from Dundas up to Lawrence and back. So far, I've put 85.6km on the new bike, so I should break 100km tomorrow.