Group Ride April 17, 2011 Toluca Lake/North Hollywood

 I was looking up rides on the Midnight Ridazz site and found one. It was in my neighborhood and wasn't to long of a route, was in the day and seemed like a good first group ride so, I decided to try it. It started in Toluca Lake and went through North Hollywood.

The page with the ride details.

I rode down to the starting location from my apartment around 9:45 to get there at the starting time of 10am. When I arrived I saw other people on bikes  already there. I signed a waiver form, got a name tag and was ready to go. I moved to the starting area in the street and waited with the others. I got into a conversation with a women named Nancy. She asked me how long I had been riding and told me about her club called Los Angeles Wheelman and the rides they do. I told her I had just started to ride again and that it was tough to get rides in with school and work keeping me busy. I would have looked into her club but since I am moving to a different state soon there wouldn't be any time to join. She was very nice and it looked like she was riding a cool touring bike.

Me signing the waiver form. I was looking up Erlands #.

The group waiting to go. I'm on the left talking to Nancy.

Joining the ride were Los Angeles City Councilman, Tom Labonge of the 4th district and weatherman for NBC 4 News, Fritz Coleman. It was really hot for being 10am on a Sunday and the councilman was running late! Some of the riders were not happy. Tom Labonge finally arrived and we headed out on the ride. We had 2 bicycle cops escort us, which was awesome since they stopped the car traffic and made it easier overall to get around.

Councilman finally arrives.He is the one in green.

We stopped at a fire station to say hello and got a photo taken with the fireman. The fireman handed out water and Gatorade to the group which was really nice of them. I already had a water bottle so I didn't take one. at one point during teh ride I saw someone riding with live birds on them. I'm amazed they didn't fly away!The ride ended back at the start by the farmers market. Then from there I rode back home. Overall it was a fun ride.

The leader of the ride (in white) at the end of the ride.

Note: I didn't bring my camera to this ride because I forgot. These pictures come from the online city news website. I think its awesome that I found some pics with me in them! Photos by Tiffany Kelly

Bike route: The route plus riding to and from my apartment made it a total of 10 miles according to my cyclocomputer. Not a lot but it was an easy ride and I'm still new.

Picture of route. I couldn't figure out how to get a direct link to it sorry!

Ciclavia! April 10, 2011

 "Ciclovías started in Bogotá, Colombia, over thirty years ago as a response to the congestion and pollution of city streets. Now they happen throughout Latin America and the United States, connecting communities and giving people a break from the stress of car traffic. The health benefits are immense. Ciclovías bring families outside of their homes to enjoy the streets, our largest public space."  -http://ciclavia.wordpress.com/

Ciclavia Route 

   Even before getting my bike I looked  for events/group rides etc that I could join. During my search I had discovered  an event called Ciclavia. 7.5 miles of closed off Los Angeles streets, open only to bicycles, pedestrians, and  roller skates/rollerblades. I could not miss this! I took the metro rail subway from the North Hollywood station to the Santa Monica/Vermont station and rode south to the Heliotrope and Melrose. There I met up with my good friend Erica. In my rush to leave my apartment I forgot to bring my water bottle so I went to the first convenient store/mart so that I could buy some water. As I paid for my water I chatted with  the owner of the small corner store. (We spoke in Spanish) She spoke about what a great day it was to ride bikes and to get out there and sweat. I agreed with her and told her it was nice not to have to deal with all the traffic cars make for a few hours. The place was packed with people but somehow Erica did manage to see another friend with his son at the event just as we were starting to ride the route.

Our rides (L) My bike (R) Erica's bike

It was so fun to ride on open streets without any cars. This was my first big group/crowd ride and it was an interesting learning experience as well. I managed to hurt my left foot when a dude in a recumbent decided that talking on his cell phone and just stopping in the middle of the road was okay. To try and avoid him I had to move to my left but there was another women there already so, to avoid ramming into her, I had to quickly put my foot down to stabilize myself. Problem with that is I use straps and the process of trying to get my foot out of the straps fast enough did some damage to my foot and it hurt like a bitch. This was the only sour note on an otherwise fantastic ride.

Recumbent jerk from earlier in the ride

Neither Erica or I had bike locks so we "valet parked" our bikes at a bike rack parking station run by the Los Angeles County Bicycle Coalition. They were set up in Little Tokyo so we were able to walk around and check out the stores and have some lunch.After we were done checking out Little Tokyo we started our ride back the way we came so that we could find a metro station and head home.

Little Tokyo bike valet.

More pictures from the ride can be found HERE

Some video footage of the route. (it's not possible for me to get footage as I ride)