A couple years ago I joined Barry, Kara, Adam & Chach to do the Chilly Hilly – a 33 mile bike ride around Bainbridge Island. This year I am not taking part in the cycle-fest; however, Brian, Barry & Adam are! Brian is new to the Chilly Hilly and he wondered aloud about making the 33 mile hilly climb.

I told him not to worry too much because he might be like as lucky as me and get a flat tire on mile 22. Chaya and I had the pace car pick us up and take us to the finish line. We tried to convince the pace car drivers to drop us off right next to the finish line so we could at least look like we finished….they thought that was a strange request and dumped us  in the middle of all the sweaty riders that completed the entire 33 miles.

That was a bit embarrassing.

I was on a morning ride up to my parent’s house from Padilla Bay, and couldn’t quit staring at the view of Mt. Baker. I stopped and took a picture near a blueberry field.

I have red hair, but I also have skin that gets kissed by the sun.

It is more of an orange kiss, rather than a browning of the skin.

Valentine’s Day is coming – wouldn’t a kiss from Mr. Sun be nice?

Yesterday I got to stand in the sun for a moment and my skin danced with joy.

I miss the sun.

Photo of my leg with Debbie’s, a fellow redhead.

Her skin does not allow for any kisses from the sun.

Sad.

December was a cold, but really nice, month for riding.  I was able to log in 7 different rides.  Not bad, since I took a couple weeks off of work for the holidays (I needed time for all the merry making). December also brought about a new low temperature stat to keep track of.  I committed to the idea after passing a bank’s electronic sign that said it was 18 degrees out.  That sign actually started two ideas in my head:

1. Keep track of low and high temperatures ridden in.

2. Grow out the beard.  My face was getting really cold.

I’m not nearly as committed to the beard idea for the length of the challenge, but I’m going to give it a try in January.

The December Stats

Driving 41.4 miles

Riding 92

New Low Temperature: 18 degrees F

I’m starting to create a little bit of space between the riding and driving miles which is good, because I have a feeling I’m going to need it when the summer winds start blowing at Jetty Island.  I think January will be even better, because the PBA (sporting a nice new website) hooked me up with one of the new ORCA cards.  This means I can ride the bus all over Snohomish county.  Very cool indeed.  I used it today to hitch a ride to the YMCA pool.  No car necessary.

Full Challenge Stats

Driving 370.1

Riding 420.7

Low Temperature: 18 degrees F

September, October, and November Logs

The alarm went off far too early this morning, but we found ourselves bundled and out the door by 5:45. We’re usually silent the first few hundred yards of the walk, letting the rain wash the sleep from our eyes.

Eventually the silence turns into sporadic conversation about our day, the Tubby Torpedo, the weather, our dreams, or whatever else seems suitable during the dark, wet morning stroll. It is very rare that we see another person out walking their dog, every so often we see an old lady and her ancient pup, but for the most part the streets and trails are our own.

We say we do it for Sydney – that she needs the movement – and this is true; however, I secretly enjoy spending the time with Barry while the world is still slumbering.

I awoke this morning to falling flakes outside the window and remembered the blankets of snow that covered the ground last year. This year the snow seems much more timid and less likely to take over our lives ~ canceling events and forcing us to stay inside sipping on hot chocolate warming our toes by the fire. Instead the snow seems to have arrived with a greeting and a reminder of the season, dusting the plants rather than attempting to take them out completely.

If snow is on the ground, I much prefer it to take over and change the view of the world. I appreciate the flakes trying to cover the ground, but I’m looking for snow that falls in such heaps that my tongue insists I head outside and turn my face upwards to catch a few flakes. I’ll still celebrate this snowfall, but my fingers are crossed for some bigger flakes.

November is dark, cold, and wet. I seem to forget that every year. However, thanks largely to cutting back on car trips, I was able to log more miles on the bike than in the car.  Barely.  I made just 10 solo driving trips for the month.  All but 3 of those trips were part of my work commute to the train.  Last month I said I was going to try and cut some of the drives to the train out of my life by riding to the train station.  Well, that happened exactly once.  It seems like the whole month was one big down pour after another.  Just not appealing.

November Totals:

Biking Total: 62 miles
Driving Total: 56.75 miles

Which brings my entire challenge totals to:

Biking Total: 332 miles

Driving Total: 328.7 miles

September and October Logs

I won’t ride my bike through puddles

That’s the rule I try to adhere to when bike commuting.  Basically, if it’s raining enough that there is a chance of puddles on the road it’s not a good day to ride for a couple of reasons.

1. I will get wet and riding in the rain is sometimes miserable.

2. Wet and dark weather makes for poor visibility and slick roads.

Yes, rain will get me wet and the ride can turn a bit miserable, but  I can deal with slightly miserable.  In fact, I think part of me secretly likes miserable.  It makes me feel like I’m doing something a little out of the ordinary.  The bigger issue is the lack of visibility. Reduced visibility for me and other drivers combined with slick roads makes for some potentially dangerous situations.  All of this means the riding opportunities during the fall and winter months will be harder to come by, but very enjoyable when they do come about.

In between rain storms October presented some amazing days to ride.  I stopped and took some documentation pictures near Green Lake on one of the sunny days just to remind myself that the sun does make an appearance from time to time around here.

Alright, so after laying out my excuses for the month, here are the results:

Car miles – 177.2. A big chunk were from a round trip from Anacortes to Alger.

Bike miles -  139. Not quite as high as I would have liked.

Conclusion:

The winter months are going to prove challenging.  Combining September’s total and this month’s has me pretty much even between car and bike miles for the ytd challenge.  In November,  I think I’m going to try mixing in some short bike rides to the train instead of driving.

One of my goals for my 29th year is to ride more miles on my bike than I drive by myself in one of our cars.

I started tracking any car trip I take by myself on a piece of paper and logging my biking miles with dailymile.com.  I hope to build a widget into the HBadventure sidebar to display this race data a little more prominently.  Until that happens, I’ll just have to post periodic updates.  For the month of September I came out ahead on biking miles with a score of 131 miles ridden and 95 miles driven.

I was way out in front of the miles driven until I accidentally left my cell phone in Adam’s car after a day of surfing, and had to drive to Renton to pick it up again.  I guess these are the  challenges I’ll face in the next year, but I’m feeling confident I can pull it off after this first month’s tally.   Of course, the cold, dark, and wet season is starting to approach.  My hope is that my biking gear will keep me cruising right along through it.

Hannah said I could do whatever I wanted on my birthday. I’m pretty sure she wasn’t thinking I’d tell her that I really wanted to go find a lake to go swimming in, but that’s what I really wanted to do.

When I was younger Brian and I used to officially end the summer with a swim on Cain Lake on my birthday. We pretty much spent our whole summer break on that lake each year, and my mom reminded me of our little tradition the other day. I decided it was a great tradition to bring back.

When I got home from work Hannah, Sydney and I hit up Martha Lake for a little dock jumping and water splashing.

It reminded me that I need to do more stuff like this in my last year of twentyness.