When I started this blog I called it a blog for the exercise challenged. Do I still think I am exercise challenged? Yes!

Have I lost weight? No!  Have I exercised more in the past 9 months than I did in the past 9 years? Yes!

Well, that’s something people.  At least I am rolling forward.  And I’ve met another goal I had coming into this: I’ve learned how to blog!  I’ll be starting a new blog with a writing theme soon.

For now I leave you one final pink gift captured today.

Thanks for coming along for the ride!

Kami

Some of the sights along the route have changed.  The octopus is no longer on the mailbox.  The fire hydrants have been freed of vegetation.

This is the one that looked like this before:

There are “for sale” signs where there weren’t before, and there are always those seasonal changes — berries and blooms that come and go, ever transforming the landscape.

But have I changed, or do I remain like the gnome, unchanging in an evolving world?

The change in me isn’t as dramatic as I’d have liked it to be, but yes, I’ve changed.  The main thing I changed was my exercise habit, even though  I did not manage to ride my bike every day.  Life happens.  I found that biking was not something I could do in sickness and in health, for better or for worse, til death…

But I did find that I could commit to attempting to ride every day.  And on the weeks where I couldn’t manage daily rides, I usually rode several times.  This is much more exercise than I was getting before I started the blog.  That’s a good thing.

My hope is to keep it up even after the days of blogging about the experience are over. Do I think I can do this? Yes!

I have to remind myself of benefits like this frequently because I am more of a city person.  Today I was reminded of how lucky I am to live in such a beautiful place as I pedaled down a street that curved along the marsh.  A whooting owl provided music for the ride and for some reason I marveled that I live in a place where kayaks are common lawn ornaments.

Just 15 miles away on Hunting Island the severe beauty of nature is even more obvious.  I love to bike there and I took the picture above this spring. Can you tell what it is?

Go forth, enjoy nature, and ride.

One of the best things about starting this journey is that I’ve gotten my exercised challenged husband to start riding with me.  He comes along about 25% of the time, and he came along tonight.  It was unusually cool.  The green leaves seemed greener than usual.  The darkening sky bluer. We had to dodge a tiny little bird that was taking a sand bath in the road. (Yes, there is sand in the road down here.  There is sand everywhere.)

The weather was so perfect that we took the longer of our two standard routes. And I have nothing extremely interesting to report!  I’m just here to say I did it!  And you should too.

The things that I like about biking personally have little to do with type of biking featured in this event.  It’s exciting, for one thing!  Standing in the curb where tens of bikers fly by at over 30 mph is a dizzying sensation. You can even feel the wind churned up from their energy, which is energizing in itself. 

As I mentioned in the early days of this blog I consider myself exercise-challenged.  I am thankful to athletes like those competing in yesterday’s event for inspiring the rest of us.  Ride on!

These tires sure are skinny compared to those on the Hot Pink Bike!

Men wait at the starting line.

Racing down Bay Street.

Too fast to catch... on film.

Blowing by.

So now the Hot Pink Bike Route seems appropriately named — not for the color of the bike, but for the route itself.  There is pink everywhere!  Sadly, these photos don’t capture the real beauty but the route these days has been pretty amazing.

Once again I am reminded of the benefits of outdoor exercise.  I’m sure everything was equally beautiful last spring, but I didn’t notice.  As I pedal through the neighborhood these days I feel amazingly lucky.

Ride! Look! Enjoy!

Two weeks ago I could barely breathe, much less bike. It was miserable!  Then we packed up and headed 20 miles down the road to stay in a cabin at Hunting Island with friends.  Hunting Island is farther south and very windy.  By the time we arrived most of the pollen had blown away.  So even though I wasn’t able to post last week we did enjoy some very nice bike rides across shady palm-laden trails.

By the time we returned to town the worst of the pollen was gone! So yesterday I was able to take the usual route… and breathe while doing it.  Yippee!

View from a biking field trip at Hunting Island.

But while Revisionland has kept me from blogging, it has not kept me from biking.  The fresh air was good for me. Last night I didn’t get around to it until dusk.  A gimpy-legged raccoon scuttled across my path.  Crows mobbed a great horned owl who had come out on a limb a bit earlier than usual. And now, like all days after I ride, I have these great images. Images that some day might help me escape Revisionland…

On the way way to our destination we passed trees that bloomed against antebellum backgrounds.

...and boats being swarmed by gulls...

Finally we reached our destination!

We parked our bikes in front of a broad swing and sat to enjoy our shaved ice on the most beautiful day so far.

But clouds rolled in and suddenly eating shaved ice on a swing facing the sea (and its breeze) became a very cold thing to do. So we sought shelter at a friendly store.

So… riding toward a shaved ice stand and seeking shelter in a candy store may not be the best way to get into shape.  But in our defense, someone did walk into the store and say, “It has dropped ten degrees in the last ten minutes.”  And it was a very nice afternoon with a daughter who loved both of the desinations.

That’s her shaved ice hanging from the handlebar, by the way.  It was too cold to eat!  And it didn’t spill on the ride home. 

Hopefully the small successes really do count for something.

Anyway, I thought I could apply this principle to The Hot Pink Bike Route.  So every day that I rode last week I looked for patches of road where there wasn’t too much traffic and there weren’t too many driveways.  Then I sprinted. In the short-term, I can tell you that this technique definitely increases heart rate.  And it isn’t too hard either!  We’ll see where it takes me in the long run.

It is still quite chilly here, so I’ve been riding in the mid afternoon — something I avoid in the warmer months.  But with the sun overhead I was able to get some cool pics of the shadows my wheel was making.

Onward I roll….