Electra Townie, May 2011

  

 

My old Trek 4900 mountain bike served me well since May of 2004. I peddled that bike in a hundred places around Seattle, on the Golden Gate Bridge in San Francisco, in the neon canyon of Las Vegas Boulevard, along the South Rim of the Grand Canyon, and on the shores of three oceans - the Pacific, the Gulf of Mexico, and the Atlantic. But the Trek was getting old, and the Electra Townie, with its "crank forward" geometry, seemed increasingly appealing...

 

The day I bought the old Trek 4900... back on May 13, 2004...

 

Saturday, April 30 Biscuits & gravy at Denny's... Bellevue / Overlake...

 

Sunday, May 1 Crossroads... Bellevue, WA... a sun break through the skylight!

 

Wednesday, May 4 and Thursday, May 5 Microsoft Commons... a couple of nice days in early May started putting me in the mood to be out on the bike... possibly a new bike... a notion aided by walking past the Eastside Ski & Sport store in the Commons every day...

  

Thursday, May 5 No more Kona Pipeline... a sure sign that Winter days have come and gone...

 

Saturday, May 7

Having been impressed a year back by the cruisers at the Bicycle Center on Front St. in Issaquah, I went there again on this day. The blue Mustang below was parked at my breakfast place in Issaquah, and I spotted Steve & JoAnn Green's Mobile RV Service truck as I approached Front St. The Bicycle Center didn't have the Electra Townie cruiser that I had been looking at in the Eastside Ski & Sport store in the Microsoft Commons, but it was a good visit none the less...

 

       

 

 

 

Sunday, May 8 and Tuesday, May 10 A possible substitute for Pipeline?

 

Thursday, May 12 I bought the Electra Townie Original 3i at Eastside Ski & Sport, in the Microsoft Commons...

  › 3-speed internal gearing.

  › "Crank forward" geometry (what Electra calls "Flat Foot Technology").

  › Very comfortable ride!

 

I also bought a Thule hitch-mount 2-bike platform carrier. I now had 2 bikes...

 

The old BVG hitch-mount bike rack... this rack performed well for 7 years...

 

Sunday, May 15 Brunch with Amy and David... David can rustle up a fine batch of biscuits & gravy!

 

Sunday, May 15 Another look...

 

Automatic Transfer Switch Failure, May 16, 2011

 

Wednesday, May 18 Rear rack and fenders (from Eastside Ski & Sport - at the Microsoft Commons) installed...

 

Tuesday, May 24 At Redmond Town Center... I first installed a similar looking front basket from Performance Bicycle but it was not well engineered and didn't work out. I picked up the pictured front basket at REI in Issaquah and it worked fine. Sister Jan teased me a bit about that basket, saying that she could imagine me sporting around town with a bottle of wine and a loaf of French bread in that basket. Whoa! Christie Walin also chimmed in with a remark that I will not elevate by repeating in this space. I have found that basket to be essential ranger gear. I don't recall why I took that picture at Victoria's Secret, but I'm sure I had a good reason at the time...

 

Saturday, May 28 1st Shot: the expanded rear rack that I improvised from a flat dish rack... 2nd Shot: The house in Eastgate where Ai-chan lived prior to her return to Toyama, Japan on June 30, 2010... 3rd Shot: At the Outback in Eastgate...

 

Tuesday, May 31 The month ended with an intense, near vertical rainbow... facing east from the Microsoft Commons, out over the 520, toward Lake Sammamish and the Cascade Mountains...

 

Click here to view an outing on the Electra that took place the following month (June 25, 2011)...