Vacation of the mind

This post should have been coming to you from Naples, Italy. Or perhaps London, England.

Since Princess of Pavement and I got together, we’ve slavishly pursued our mutual love for travel, including three trips to Europe.

Our first trip to Paris together, 2007.

Eighteen months later, we started our next Euro adventure in Florence.

In 2010, we made a chilly, but heartwarming journey to Belgium and Berlin.

We’d started doing research for our fourth, checking airfares and researching vacation apartments, when circumstances intervened. We pulled back our desires, perhaps another visit to San Francisco to catch the first two stages of the Tour of California. But in the end, we made the responsible decision to paint our condo instead.

Of course, in anticipation of our journeys, we’d already booked the time off from our employers.

So here we are, vacationing at home.

But when life hands you lemons, you’ve got to get busy making lemonade. We’ve been doing some hikes, visiting parks and trails where we’d never been before.

Hiking the Lynn Creek headwaters trail.

And I’ve been trying some new cycling routes.

One of them is even a designated cycling route, which I usually avoid because more often than not they’re a ghetto for inexperienced and unpredictable cyclists. But this one, through Strathcona, East Vancouver and north Burnaby, is well-established and a popular conduit for roadies looking to avoid heavy traffic en route to their country rides.

A spring interlude in Strathcona.

Another is Zero Avenue, skirting the US border.

Of course, when riding so close to the US border, you have to take precautions that nobody has planted explosives in the soles of your cycling shoes.

This rolling country road has become a popular cycling route since speed bumps were constructed at every intersection to discourage speeding cars. Now there’s barely any traffic, and the rolling hills all the way into the Fraser Valley are a good workout. Especially when there’s a cold beverage awaiting on a seaside patio at the end of the day.

The reward for a rolling day on the bike.

The pause that refuels

The snack stop is a key component of any good ride.

Sometimes it’s nothing more than a pause at a scenic vista to enjoy an energy bar and some water. Sometimes it’s a sweet treat and coffee at a favorite café. Sometimes it’s a full-on lunch on an outdoor patio.

It’s a well-earned break; after all four or five hours in the saddle can burn 2-3,000 calories.

Cyclists in Vancouver now have a destination pit stop they can call their own, the Musette Café. In the middle of the busy downtown, it’s a bit of a roadie-geek refuge.

The Musette Café isn’t easy to find; it’s located in a back lane amidst a car dealership lot (ironically enough).

The walls are decorated with displays of the colourful cloth feed bags used by pro teams, vintage jerseys suspended on towel racks, a mishmash of signage from various Euro races, all lorded over by a beautiful classic Bianchi hanging on a set of deer antlers. Display cabinets are filled with other cycling paraphaneliia like Tour de France figurines, trophies, water bottles. Magazines like Rouleur are available for reading. The cash drawer is even mounted on a set of curved handlebars.

The Musette Café is roadie geek heaven.

Wood wheel blocks on the floor inside the front door accommodate  riders who want to bring their bikes inside, but there’s also a hanging rack with heavy chain locks outside, as well as benches if it’s just too nice a day to snack inside.

While I can’t vouch for the coffee because I don’t drink the stuff, all the warm beverages are served in pretty celeste cups from Parallel, the café’s bean supplier. There’s also a selection of Italian sodas and nectars, and water is always on tap.

Finally, a place to call our own!

I haven’t yet tried the panini sandwiches, but I’ve heard compliments. The banana bread is tasty. There’s also muffins, pastries, cookies and homemade raw energy bars. In other words, everything a cyclist needs to fuel the second half of a ride.

Riding routes have been adjusted to include a stop at The Musette.

With the latest Euro races always playing on the two flat screen televisions and the cycling chitchat ongoing, it’s little wonder many roadies, including some of the pros who happen to be in the area, have adjusted their ride routes accordingly to include the Musette for their snack break.

A new pelotini

I’ve never been one for group rides.

My road rides tend to be solo outings, or perhaps with one or two newly minted riding buddies. No pressure to learn the group dynamics. No testosterone-fueled pace to maintain when all you want to do is stretch the legs and enjoy the sunshine..

But when a long-dormant discussion about riding routes from New West on a cycling forum I frequent was resurrected by a post announcing a new weekly group ride from the waterfront, I was intrigued. It might be a way to learn some new routes, meet some new roadies. There was a vague promise of snacks and camaraderie. And if things got too competitive for my taste, I’d just go back to my old solo routine.

I missed the inaugural Fraser River Fuggitivi as our road hockey season wound down.

Finding new routes, and new riding friends, is what group riding is all about.

The second week promised a climber’s route of about 60 kms. This past week was a flat burn out to YVR and back that introduced me to a new destination.

So far the group is more pelotini than peloton, but everyone is of a similar age and mind, just riding for the fun and fitness of it. No sprints to the next stop sign. No en masse blowing of traffic signs. And a snack break at a coffee shop somewhere along the route.

Chaos theory

“Hey Big Ring, we thought you were dead?”

“Hey Big Ring, did you fall off your bike?”

“Hey Big Ring, did the Camosunberg eat you for lunch?”

Everywhere I go, these are the questions and comments I’m getting. Yeah, yeah, the Big Ring has been quiet since those epic seven ascents of the Camosunberg. That’s because we’ve been busy.

Instead of traveling to exotic Euro locales this year, we decided to throw our disposable shekels at getting the condo painted. Since then, it’s been three weeks of chaos. Breaking the condo down, taking things off shelves and putting them into boxes, moving furniture, storing pictures. It’s like moving without going anywhere.

Living in a loft is cool and funky and oh so stylin, but getting paint to those 17 foot ceilings and walls is better left to people who know what they’re doing, or who have more confidence on ladders than I do.

Painting is as painful as moving, but without going anywhere.

So Princess of Pavement disappeared for the duration, and I made myself scarce, hitting the road on the Lapierre at every opportunity.

The spring weather has been decidedly dismal; full tights and four layers at the beginning of May just isn’t right. But at least we finally had some dry days. That allowed for an early-season crack at the first Tour de Cinque Ponts, some fine lunch stops at Mix Bakery and a bit of a new twist, a weekly group ride! More on that in another post.

Mix Bakery is a favorite lunch stop…

for it’s oh-so-tasty tuna waldorf sandwich.

Giebelhaus gets his first taste of the Tour de Cinque Ponts.

When in doubt…

I’m sure every cyclist has felt that nagging sensation in their belly as they head for a ride that maybe it’s not such a good idea, that maybe this would be the day they get right-hooked at an intersection, or run into the shoulder by a passing cement truck or worse.

Especially when you’re riding in a busy urban environment, you want to be at the top of your game, alert, quick to react. And when that little kernel of doubt nibbles at your confidence, sometimes it’s best to give in, and not tempt fate.

Not that I’m particularly superstitious, but when my Friday ride day falls on the 13th, that little voice of extra caution can be a little louder, a little more emphatic. But with the sun shining, and the roads dry, sloth is not an option.

When the sun, and blossoms, are out, a ride is a must.

The spring weather has been slow coming this year. And when we have had really nice days, more often than not they haven’t fallen on ride days.

So I really had no choice but to stifle that whisper of silly superstitious doubt, attack it in fact. First turn of the pedals and it was gone.

Shake, rattle and roll

The Camosun Hill isn’t particularly steep. Nor is it very long. But it is some of the crappiest pavement in one of Vancouver’s best neighborhoods. Some of the potholes are more like bunkers.

False spring

Spring?

We don’t need no freaking’ Spring. At least, that’s what the weather gods seem to be saying.

It’s April, practically August, and the weather outside is frightful. Even when it is nice, it can turn on a dime, making any sort of plans for long rides a bit of a crapshoot.

That’s what happened on Friday, when “Le petit tour de trios ponts” turned from a pleasant, but chilled, jaunt to a battle of survival against hypothermia. Fortunately for my riding buddy and I, the latter happened at the end of the ride when we were home and cooled out – literally – at Granville Island.

We could sense trouble was afoot when we crossed the Lions Gate Bridge as the rain clouds roiled and a squall rolled over East Van in the distance. It was an icy wind that propelled us over the span. By the time we thundered through the Stan, another squall was bearing down across English Bay and the temperature was dropping.

“We’re gonna get pelted just as we cross the Burrard Bridge,” I prophesized to RDM.

A few drops did ding us as we hit the home stretch, but the clouds really opened as we clipclopped to Granville Island to meet our wives for lunch. And it was cold, as in those-raindrops-could-turn-to-flakes-any-moment cold. They did become hail for a stretch.

Imminent hypothermia.

The lousy weather is making for a slow start to the cycling season. Friday’s sun – before the cloudbursts kicked in – brought out a lot of riders, whole pelotons of them at times. Let’s hope everyone found a warm dry spot to wait out the storm.