7 full weeks have past. By this time jumping on my bike is second nature. I am also feeling comfortable enough to seriously talk about selling the car.
I have formulated everything in my head that I need todo; get my stuff out, clean it out, fix the trim in the wheel wells, purchase replacement trim for the right side, etc.
Once I decide todo this I’ll set my price to move and get it over with. I figure another week or two before I pull that trigger.
Today was the most miles I’ve put on the brompton in a single day. It started off with a 9.5 mile bike ride to Timm’s house. This was a rolling hills ride, that gradually raised in elevation. I had not previously rode on hilly terrain and was impressed how well the bike performed. From here we drove to Roxborough in Philadelphia and worked on our project.
After this I headed to 30th street station from Roxborough. This was about 7 miles. Timm looked at me funny when I was getting my bike out. Said he’d drop me some place if required. Nope this is my transportation I said. It made me feel well when I made it downtown in just 25 minutes. No way a car could have gotten there that fast.
From 30th street I took the train to Doylestown. They were working on the tracks so we had to take a bus the last part. From there a short ride to my parents house, dinner with my parents and wife (she drove there), then we drove home bike folded up in the trunk.
In the old day we would have taken two cars to Philly so I could separate from Timm and drive north. Once we got to my parents we would again have two cars. This way I tied it all together with my own power and public transit, therefore reducing congestion. It wasn’t even difficult.
I didn’t actually need to use the car, Mary’s was sitting in the driveway, but I wanted to check it out.
Their reservation system was a little odd. I’d rather be able to pick a parking slot then see when it had available times. This made you search for a time, you had to keep putting in new times to find what you wanted. I’m sure I’ll find little tricks soon enough. Finding the car was pretty easy. The car opened right up when I held the card to the wind shield. It was clean and the trunk was plenty big enough for my brompton. The most difficult thing to get used to was holding the key card to the windshield to lock and unlock the car.
I returned the car locked it and road away. I need to see if there is a way to return the car early, I brought it back an hour early.
This will surely solve those few cases when we need or desire two cars.
My zip card arrived today. I’ll probably get a chance to try it out Sunday. If that works well it will seriously sway the decision to sell the car. KBB says the car is worth over $10k. That’s a lot of cargo bike.
I think this is a toss up. This morning I thought I found the ultimate excuse for helmet mounted, but I was wrong. With a helmet mounted light you can shine the light any place you need, including at cars backing out of driveways.
Also with helmet mounted you can use multiple bikes, without swapping the light back and forth. The one downside to helmet mounted is that I have a helmet cover I really like for cold or wet weather. Those two things are mutually exclusive. Therefore I think it’s helmet mounted in the warm months and bike mounted in the cold months.
I use a cygolite milion. It is bright enough to actuallly see the road, yet self contained so it is simple. The battery is rechargeable, and you plug the light into a standard mini USB to charge it. No extra charge brick. It comes with bike and helmet mounts. It is water proof to rain. I’d buy another.
