Biking Bis - Bicycle Touring and More

Low 80s and sunny for Seattle Bike to Work Day

Gene Bisbee — Tue, 13 May 2008 12:08:00 -0700

This is amazing! The clouds will part and a warm sun will come shining through here in the Puget Sound region on Friday just in time for Bike to Work Day.

That's not just wishful thinking; that's what it says on Page B8, the weather page of the Seattle Times.

So you can't use the usual excuse of cold, rainy, dreary weather to beg off of commuting to work by bicycle that day.

Check out the Cascade Bicycle Club website if you need information about Friday's events. First, you'll need to know that it's not the Seattle Bike to Work Day here, it's Starbucks Bike to Work Day...

Ride a car-free Lake Washington Boulevard in Seattle

Gene Bisbee — Fri, 09 May 2008 09:11:00 -0700

Tomorrow marks the beginning of Bicycle Saturdays and Sundays on Lake Washington Boulevard in Seattle.

From about 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. on 10 weekend days this spring and summer, city crews will close off a four-mile section of Lake Washington Boulevard between Mount Baker Beach and Seward Park to vehicular traffic.

This makes for a flat, winding ride along a two-lane, lakeside road that is ideal for families. It's also a portion of road to throw in for a longer weekend ride. There's also a two-mile loop around Seward Park, which juts into Lake Washington...

Biking past coal industry landmarks; April ride stats

Gene Bisbee — Sat, 03 May 2008 10:41:00 -0700

Bicycling along the Cedar River Trail between Renton and Maple Valley, I often pass this old two-story building across the road that's home to a compost and landscape material business.

It's the biggest and most imposing structure in the suburbs that are sprawling into the rural area between the two towns, and I always thought that it was the former site of a school, or a county jail or something.

When I took the time to ask at the Renton History Museum a few weeks ago, I learned it's another remnant of the once-lucrative coal mining industry that drove commerce in the hills east of Seattle ...

Two Washington communities among 11 new Bicycle Friendly towns

Gene Bisbee — Thu, 01 May 2008 12:25:00 -0700

Update: May 2, 2008 -- Why were they chosen?

Two outstanding communities for bicycling on the Olympic Peninsula -- Bainbridge Island and Port Townsend -- have been named among the 11 new Bicycle Friendly communities by the League of American Bicyclists.

The others are Colorado Springs and Durango, Colorado, and Minneapolis, Minnesota (all silver level), and Arcata, California, Charlotte, North Carolina, Charlottesville, Virginia, Coeur d'Alene, Idaho, Oxford, Mississippi, and Sitka, Alaska (bronze).

Seattle cyclists are familiar with Bainbridge Island for hosting February's Chilly Hilly bike ride, above, when more than 4,000 bicycle riders take the ferry and jam up a 33-mile loop around the island.

Port Townsend, also a ferry stop on the Olympic Peninsula, is a destination for bike touring enthusiasts who enjoy stress-free rural roads. ...

It's May -- National Bike Month

Gene Bisbee — Thu, 01 May 2008 08:00:00 -0700

If you're a bicycle commuter, or would like to be, May is certainly your month.

Communities across the US are sponsoring bike-to-work activities in May to urge people out of their cars and onto their bikes. In many places that support evaporates quickly, but by then it's hoped that commuters have been inspired to ride their bikes regularly.

Many month-long bike commuter contests begin today. Other dates to remember are National Bike Week from May 12 - 16, and Bike to Work Day on May 16 (other dates in some locales). Check the League of American Bicyclists Bike Month Events page for local listings.

Seattle-based Cascade Bicycle Club is sponsoring events in May, featuring the month-long Group Health Commute Challenge, Vulcan Bike to Work Breakfast, May 7, and the Starbucks Bike-to-Work Day, 6-9 a.m., May 16, when 40 stations are set up around the Puget Sound to help bicyclists get to work ...

Preserving a western Washington railroad for a bike trail

Gene Bisbee — Wed, 30 Apr 2008 11:26:00 -0700

Trail supporters to meet Thursday in Kirkland

The Cascade Bicycle Club is rallying support to preserve a future abandoned rail bed as a main link for off-road bicycle travel through Renton, Newcastle, Bellevue, Redmond and Kirkland.

In a scheme that gets more complicated as time goes on, the Port of Seattle plans to buy the 42-mile Burlington Northern Santa Fe railroad right-of-way for future use as a commuter corridor with rail and a hike-bike trail. The devil is in the details, though, as the Port wants the rail line to have priority over the trail, while King County wants the uses "coequal."

Cascade warns that the Port's position leaves the possibility of a trail in doubt.

"However, the Port of Seattle and the King County Council’s latest plan would give the Port of Seattle veto authority over a future trail, and subordinates trail construction to any “transportation use” – which does not include bicycle commuters on a trail." ...

Re-discovering the old Coal Creek Hotel

Gene Bisbee — Sun, 20 Apr 2008 14:45:00 -0700

Bicycling through history

At least once a month, I test my conditioning by pedaling up to the top of Cougar Mountain. It's a 5-mile ride from my home, and my goal one day is to reach it in 25 minutes.

About three-quarters of the way up, across the entrance to the Cougar Mountain Regional Park, I pass an open field where there's an old, mossy concrete wall that has a tree growing out of it.

I was surprised to learn a few months ago that this is the ruins of a hotel built about 100 years ago in an area once heavily populated by workers in the coal mine industry...

20 miles and a view by bicycle

Gene Bisbee — Sat, 12 Apr 2008 22:25:00 -0700

Although our neighborhood is surrounded by suburban sprawl in every direction, I'm fortunate that there's still a low-traffic farm road that's great for bicycling not four miles away.

If I ride east for about 8 miles, then south for another 8, I'm presented with this panorama of the Green River valley just 20 miles from home. It comes at the top of a climb, and it's not hard to imagine that it's a rewarding scenic overlook 1,000 miles into a bike tour.

It's also not hard to imagine I'm a hobbit looking out over Fangorn Forest in Middle Earth. If you look closely, you can even see spots where the orks have been busy clear-cutting the timber. ...

Tulips missing from this year's Tulip Pedal bike ride

Gene Bisbee — Sun, 06 Apr 2008 10:20:00 -0700

A cold spring delayed the main tulip bloom for the 27th annual Tulip Pedal up in Skagit County on Saturday.

Even so, bicyclists found it convenient to pedal in bunches as a strong wind raked the course all day long.

Cyclists on the 40- and 20-mile routes reported seeing plenty of white and yellow daffodils in roadside fields, but blooming tulips were few and far between.

Now, if it's daffodils you like, check out the Daffodil Classic next Sunday in Orting. Sponsored by the Tacoma Wheelmen's Bicycle Club, it features loops of 40, 60 and 100 miles ...

Bicycling through history and March ride stats

Gene Bisbee — Tue, 01 Apr 2008 11:27:00 -0700

My decision to renew interest in some of my old bicycle routes by peeling back the history of my small slice of western Washington has led to some startling discoveries, at least to me.

Just the other day I decided to explore some side roads off a hill climb I often make up to Cougar Mountain. I stumbled across this old cabin, which turns out to be one of the oldest buildings still standing in King County.

It's called the Baima Cabin. It's an old coal company town house dating from about the 1880s. That's only about 30 years after the first white settlers showed up over in Seattle; ancient history in these parts...