Monday, September 05, 2011

Urban ride to... Montreal Botanical Gardens / Jardins Botanique


The "three sisters" aboriginal agricultural technique



We were looking for a Beech tree, here is the one we found although to be honest we were hoping for a much bigger example.



The chalet in the First Nations Garden




Poison Ivy: leaves of three: leave it be.


Leaves of four: Eat some more!



Lots of magnificent gardens and awesome plants.



A nice urban destination that is anything but urban is to visit the Montreal Botanical Gardens.

The bike ride to and there is your responsibility to figure out, but we have some advice: get your Access Montreal card and you can get free access to the outdoor gardens. The Access Montreal card also permits you to buy a year's pass for a very reasonable $21, which gives you access to everything except the autumn chinese lantern exhibition. This includes the greenhouses and their special activities and the insectarium.




Howick > Covey Hill > Franklin 70 km ride


Not too far away is the top of Covey Hill, which is easily visible from Mont Royal.



Closed-for-years bridge beside Georgetown Church near Howick is getting renovated for cyclists.



Georgetown church near Howick is beside Rt 138 is a good starting point for bike rides.




Ride south, ride west up Covey Hill, then ride home.



A nice 70 km ride through the beautiful Chateauguay Valley


A nice middle distance ride through the central Chateauguay valley including a climb up Covey hill.

We took a coworker who raced up the big Covey Hill climb and had fried legs later. Pacing IS important.

This ride is nice because the return half of the ride is downhill or with the wind (usually).

Bikely map website seems to be better so here is the ride map on bikely.




Gazette letters-to-the-editor: anti-bike rage


Click and read: there's actually a couple of letters on our side, believe it or not!

many angry letter writers (is there another kind?) filling the Gazette newspaper's letter section again today.

We will summarize: Cyclists needs to wear helmets/don't need to wear helmets, cyclists need to get off the sidewalks (this one is correct), cyclists need to get off the roads and onto bike paths only, and cyclists need to have a bicycle license, and cops need to enforce bike traffic laws.

Lastly, the foaming at the mouth furor seems to have removed the wrath directed towards jaywalkers from the letters section.

We encourage all the bike haters to get on a bike and see what it is like to ride among Montreal's crazy drivers and chaotic traffic. Because we are sure their perspective would change from a few hours spent on a bike seat.

As for people riding on busy sidewalks, get the hell off the sidewalk you maroons! What part of "side walk" do you not understand?

Sunday, September 04, 2011

My dad's bike... in 1935


In 1935 my dad rode this bike.



Looking through old family pictures we discovered a picture of my dad's bike in 1935, when my dad was about eight years old.

He moved on to cars, trucks, farm tractors and motorcycles a couple of years later.

Strange bike repairs



Never-before-seen headset bearing adjustment method.


This is one way to adjust a headset. It isn't the best way to adjust a headset. But for one or two people on our planet, this is the way they are going to do it.

It definitely looks like a good way to damage the family jewels.