Showing posts with label Biking. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Biking. Show all posts

Tuesday, July 15, 2008

Tri Training, Knitting & One Less Car On The Road

In an effort to get in some triathlon training where ever I can, and to keep up with my goal of using my car less, I decided to ride my bike up to the Fiber Gallery after work to pick up my new sock book. I figured it'd be about 3 miles each way. Easy-peasy, right? Well, as you savvy Seattle knitters know, the Fiber Gallery is on Phinney Ridge. That's ridge as in big fat freakin' steep hill.

Not to be deterred, but rather challenged, I figured, why not. So I rode from my place up Fremont Ave to the zoo, then cut across to the main drag along Phinney Ridge. At about 39th and Fremont, I'm sucking wind big time. Muscles in my legs (and ass) were aching that I didn't know ever existed. So, having no shame what-so-ever, I got off and walked my bike up and even steeper part of the road. Now the thing about this road is, it's not as crazy steep as many hills in Seattle, it's a slight incline that just goes on and on (OK, maybe it's 2.1 miles, but it seemed like eternity.)
About halfway up the hill, I did get back on and power through. It was worth it. It was a beautiful afternoon and Jessica was working and greeted me with a smile. She didn't even mind that I was totally sweaty, panting, and slightly ditzy. I even couldn't remember if I needed a skein of Manos or Malibrego for a scarf I want to make.


Here's a view of Puget Sound and the Olympic Mountains! You don't always see that when you're whizzing by in a car!

Wednesday, June 04, 2008

BAT/KAT project & NYC trip

I saw this on Rebecca's blog* and it is so funny because we just decided to start doing something like this. Claudia is starting the BAT/KAT project: "Bicycling as Transportation/Knitters Alternatively Transporting Project. The goal of which is to substitute at least one bicycling/walking/alternatively transporting trip for one car trip every week."



Just on Saturday, Rebecca and I rode to University Village to run some errands. We figured it took about the same amount of time to ride there as it does to drive and deal with all the traffic. It was a fabulous ride, we did our shopping, loaded our goodies in our backpacks and headed home. The funny thing was, as we were walking around, and it was obvious we had biked to the stores, sales people kept commenting about how great it was that we rode our bikes here. It was funny. It was the best sales service I've had there in a long time!


*She has some semi-cute biking pics of us on her blog if you need a little laugh. We had a little fun at the bike shop while they installed my new bike seat.

In other news, two knitting projects are packed and ready for tomorrow's trip to NYC! It'll be a fun quick visit with the hubby's family! I've already downloaded the map to get to Purl in SOHO and Purl Patchwork! Pics and adventure stories in a few days! I'm also hoping the mold will magically clear up while I'm gone.