Day 5: Breaking Out the Bike

The first thing everyone should know about riding their bike in Montgomery County: using the bike rack located on the front of RideOn buses is incredibly easy! 

Everyone I've spoken to about potentially maybe someday riding a bike to work has the same hesitation: "I'm not really sure how to work the bike rack."  That was my main hang up as well.  My fear was that I'll be standing at a crowded bus stop, waiting to get on a crowded bus, and won't be able to work the rack or make sure my bike is secure before other riders (or the driver) grow impatient with my silly attempt to get around on my silly bicycle.  I learned that it's really not a big deal.  Really.  It's easy.

This morning I left my apartment around 7:00 to ride the 4+ miles up the Sligo Creek Trail and down University Blvd to get to the Wheaton metro.  It was a beautiful ride: temperatures in low sixties, sunny, not crowded, and I had just put air in the tires.  There were some intense puddles due to the recent rain but nothing I couldn't go around.  (The only thing I couldn't go around was an enormous tree that fell down across the trail right before University.  That I had to climb over.)

I turned left at University Boulevard and had planned on cutting through the parking lot of the day care (or the church?  Not sure which it is) at Reedie Drive but the whole parking lot was flooded.  So I biked up the hill and made a left on Amherst, and began my search for the Route 48 bus shelter.  It wasn't anywhere on Georgia, and I finally remembered that across Georgia there was a bus depot.  (Now that I know how to get straight there, I won't need to leave so early next time.)  I navigated the lengthy, windy, handicapped ramp just in time to catch the 48. 

The moment had arrived.  "OK Chad, put up or shut up.  Don't mess up, these people want to leave."  All of my anxiety about using the rack really was for nothing:  there are directions printed on the rack!  First, you push up and pull down on the silver bar, and when it comes down it reveals the next set of directions - you put the front tire in the slot on the left, and the back tire falls in place.  Then you pull up on the spring-loaded black bar that you hook over your front tire.  Give the bike a jiggle to make sure it's secure, and you're good to go.

The best part of the morning is when I arrived in Rockville, a gentleman watching me take my bike off the rack stopped and asked "would you mind showing me how to do that?"  I acted like I had done it a million times, of course, but seriously, it's easy.  He was telling me that he paid $5 a day to park in the parking lot right over there, and I told him that was crazy if he liked to ride his bike and the only thing holding him back was worrying about how to use the rack.  He looked like he understood my demonstration of how to do it and I think he may actually consider riding his bike to work in the future.  My good deed for the day was done by 8:30AM!