The Gazelle Champion Mondial only needs new grips to be completely gorgeous. Tuesday, I hope. Tuesday.

I know about steel wool, yet I continue to doubt it. I have seen the transformations now, many times, but I can’t seem to hold onto this knowledge in the face of filthy-bike reality.

Don’t get me wrong, The Gazelle Champion Mondial was never really filthy. Dusty, rusty (in a few spots) and a bit neglected, but not filthy. Still, I was as unprepared as ever for the transformation.

I got it back from Gregg’s yesterday, without the new pedals (they called me to say it was done, not realizing that I was still waiting for the pedals to arrive. I wasn’t about to leave it there, so home it came to await the pedal-ing here). Today, with the sun shining brightly, I thought… I’ll go for a ride. But before I go, I’ll just test that stand-over height on the new bike… yeah, it’s big, but how does it ride? I’ll just test that out in the cul-de-saq… yeah, it’s nice, but the saddle needs to come way down… maybe I’ll roll the bars up… no, roll ‘em back down… can the stem come up a bit? Okay… boy, I should clean this thing up.

So much for the ride.

Here are some “before” shots:

So… three hours later, with many Windex wipes, some 000 steel wool and Mother’s Mag for the aluminum, we have this…

Yes, that’s a bottle cage, and yes, I realize the seat is crooked.

Those formerly-rusty Mafac Racers!

Simplex derailleur, with its PINK wheel. Crazy talk!

The Dura Ace cranks are super sexy, aren’t they? Swoon.

The gleam! My eyes! The goggles, they do nothing! (It’s a Simpsons reference).

Lovely dynamo, gorgeous brakes, shiny headset! I love the fork lug details.

Glamour Shots…

So gorgeous! I’ve ordered some “vintage” red-rubber grips from Amazon, which should look amazing. My initial thoughts on the size are that the standover is high, but eh… with the saddle where it is, my legs fit the bike perfectly, and since it’s low but not jammed down into the seat cluster or anything, I think I’m okay. I’d like a shorter stem, and possibly one that can be raised even more, like a Nitto Technomic with a shorter reach, maybe 90? Otherwise, we’re good to go once the pedals come in. I’m going to ride it as is for a while and get a better feel for what it needs. The ride is very smooth and silky. Hurrah!

So much so, that I now have two rides backed up in my queue! The first was about a week ago, along the Cedar River Trail on The Gazelle Trimsport (must qualify which Gazelle I speak of now! Yea!). The trail is so damned familiar at this point that I really was riding mostly on autopilot, just out there pumping my legs and enjoying the sunshine.

Just before I snapped this picture, two young men in a golf cart drove up next to me inside the fence. My first thought was: they cannot actually be that interested in my old bike. I was right! They were hoping I would throw their golf ball back in. Given the height of the fence, this proved impossible, but I did manage to roll it at them. Hadn’t had that happen before!

The river is absolutely gorgeous this time of year, as is, frankly, The Gazelle Trimsport. So glittery and shiny!

About twelve miles into my ride, I realized I really, really needed to pee. There are bathrooms on this trail, but they’re all at the 2-3 mile mark, and let’s admit it: on a 20-mile loop, I wasn’t really very close to them in terms of the sheer number of minutes it would take to bike those next six miles. This essentially constituted an emergency. But never fear! I am an experienced nature-pee-er! I have camped for days in remote areas, so I know from peeing in the woods, my friend.

The Cedar River Trail has a sweet little trail offshoot that follows the river for a ways at about the point where I decided it was time to christen the local flora. I wandered down it for quite some time with The Gazelle Trimsport, working to get us far from view. I wasn’t so concerned about someone spotting me as I found relief as I was about someone seeing my unattended bike! At any rate, I eventually felt we were out of sight enough to leave The Gazelle Trimsport there basking in the sunshine and continue on alone. I certainly left the bike in a very scenic spot.

I really like peeing in the woods, actually. Should I admit this? But it’s true. If one doesn’t have to do… well, MORE than pee, it’s a very pleasant experience. Sort of freeing.

You can tell I was raised by hippies.

Anyway, we soldiered on, and I logged twenty miles on that miserable damned seat. Must make a furry seat cover soon!

A few days later, I spent a lovely day out with my son. It’s nearing his birthday, and since he had the day off from school for one of those horrid professional development days I used to loathe so much, I decided to do his birthday early.

First, we headed over to REI to get him his present: a new bike. He’s grown so much in the last couple years that his old 20″ bike no longer fit him. The interesting thing I discovered about the small jump to a 24″ kid’s bike is that while there is little real difference between the two sizes, both the selection and the price change wildly in the larger size. There really weren’t many bikes to choose from, and what there was fell into three categories: utter, complete Walmart-quality garbage I wouldn’t waste $150 on that even if the store did assemble it, would probably require an immediate tune-up at the bike shop to be even vaguely bearable; extremely beat up and grossly overpriced used Specialized stuff on Craigslist, posted by parents desperate to recoup some of the $500 they shelled out last year; and very expensive new Specialized stuff at bike shops, around $350-$500. None of this appealed to me. I finally settled on what felt like an expensive (but was actually somewhere in the low-middle range) bike from REI. The benefits of buying the bike there were that I could return it if necessary, they assemble and tune the bikes when you buy them, and then they offer you a free touch-up tune up within the first six months. This made the just under $300 price tag more reasonable, though barely. Let’s just say this one better last us more than 2 years. Like, at least 2.5 years, you know?

Still, he loves it. It’s a Diamondback, with the usual extraneous 21-gears. The big difference I can see between it and the $200 bikes My Great Guy bought The Girls is that the components and finishes on this bike are nicer: better brands, with nicely thought-out graphics and cool touches like the black rims. Otherwise, the frame quality is no different. I would have gladly spent something in that range, but the bikes for girls in this size are myriad: for boys, not so much. After all, I don’t care about the components on his bike. But in the end, he loves riding, so he’ll make good use of it.

We headed over to the Burke Gilman Trail for our ride, and did about seven miles, which is a lot for him. He has a “new” camera that he bought used from Amazon with his yard-work money, and busied himself taking lots of photos of his bike, and the other interesting things on the trail.

It was a bucolic spring day, with buttercups and sunshine and a warm breeze in between a few short sprinkles of rain. We had a great ride, and firmly established that he can now kick my butt in terms of speed, but I still own him on stamina. That kid is crazy fast on that new bike!

I snapped one shot of The Raleigh alone, and honestly, I think it looks like one of those bizarrely detailed architectural mock-up drawings. Seriously not real.

When one has a long, sunny ride to anticipate, an interesting trail is in order. So I headed back to the Foothills Trail, starting this time in Orting rather than Puyallup. My goal was about twenty miles, and that was what I ended up riding. The truth is, two hours on The Raleigh or The Gazelle, pedaling steadily, feels like I’m doing more work than any ride on the old Panasonic (Bicycle of the Gods) did. I may not be racing along the path at twenty-five miles an hour, but I’m out there, and I’m working reasonably hard.

Mount Rainier was lurking, glowering testily over the trail. I kept picturing the old mountain crabbily grousing about the development around it, thinking seriously about the possibility of lahars or even just a few threatening puffs of ash…

This was an early-morning ride, for me anyway, starting at 9:30. The sunlight was strong, but low in the sky, making for dramatic shadows and a glittering river.

This side path would be quite rideable, if The Raleigh had nobbly tires. Unfortunately, it does not, and even a bit of gravel is treacherous. I suspect this is just my impression, not necessarily the truth, but I’ve slipped and slid often enough in the past to be wary. It certainly was pretty!

I spent most of this ride day-dreaming and telling myself stories in my head, which is something I’ve done for most of my life. I had always assumed everyone did this, but once I started teaching, I realized that few of my students narrated their lives. This makes me curious about the brains of others: what do other people think about while riding? How do they pass the time when they’re stuck somewhere with only their brains for company? I’ve asked other people, but I still don’t know exactly.

It reminds me of a moment in Northern Exposure, when Joel Fleishman asks his secretary, the stoic Marilyn, what she daydreams about while she’s sitting at the front desk. I’m paraphrasing, as I couldn’t find a clip of this:

Marilyn: You don’t want to know.

Joel: Yes, I do!

Marilyn: Colors.

Joel: Colors? That’s it? What about colors?

Marilyn: Just… colors.

I remember laughing so hard at Joel’s confusion. I’d feel the same way!

Speaking of colors…

How about these?

Or this?

One of the best things about the Foothills Trail is how rural it is, once one gets past Orting. I love the farms and green fields.

I turned around shortly after South Prairie, which is a cute little town. I considered going further, but my butt was in serious protest mode. The Raleigh’s Brooks is still not perfect. Or my butt isn’t… take your pick. Either way, after an hour in the saddle, I realized another hour was going to be enough.

This milepost has nothing to do with anything, as I was riding from the other end of the trail and I had started ten miles in, but I liked how efficiently mileposty it was. It reminded me of this:

The spirit stone from the path in Spirited Away. 

I really am lucky to live somewhere that cares about creating paths like these. I’m often grateful for the quality of life here in Rainytown, Rainland. We have a certain… liberal bent, combined with a healthy respect for individual rights, that I like. Stuff like this trail is just the icing on the cake, really.

The Raleigh takes a break to learn about Riparian areas.

And of course, it’s always a fun ride when there’s an emu.

He looks so fussy, like the world has just perennially pissed him off. No Rainitopia for him! Maybe he’s related to the mountain.

The lovely lady who gave me my Gazelle Trimsport told me a few days after I picked it up that she had another Gazelle for me, if I was interested. “It’s a touring bike,” she noted. I was a bit reluctant, given that I can’t use drop bars, but she just laughed and told me to come check it out.

When I saw it, I realized why she had laughed: it has upright bars! At the time, her husband was out of town, and she didn’t know the combo for the lock they were using to lock the bike up. So the new Gazelle stayed there, for the next few months while our lives overwhelmed our ability to meet up again.

Until this Friday! She treated me to a wonderful lunch, and then gave me the new Gazelle. It’s a 1976 or 1977 Gazelle Champion Mondial G-8 Herren in gold. You can see the details, and read them if you speak Dutch, here: http://jvs.webklik.nl/page/gazelle. Click on the 1976 catalog.

The bike doesn’t need much. The mechanic at Gregg’s Cycles in Bellevue (not my normal shop, but immediately after picking the bike up I went to the local JiffyLube, and since I had time and Gregg’s was only a block or two away…) turned out to be very practical in his approach, with no hard-sell. I expected to regrease the bearings, but he said they didn’t need it as far as he could tell, as the cranks rolled smoothly in the bottom bracket. He ended up suggesting a new chain and new brake pads. He even thought the tires would be good for quite some time, as they had no serious signs of dry rot or cracking. It wasn’t that he didn’t think the bike needed work in the long run, but as he put it: “There’s getting it rideable, then there’s restoration. Right now, you just need to get it rideable.”

The only thing I changed, besides what he suggested, is that I ordered new MKS Sylvan pedals for it. I can’t use toe cages, as the nerve damage in my legs means my reaction time is too slow when I stop. I’ll keep the originals, of course!

The bike has a very good condition Brooks that will only need a bit of Proofride to make it happy. It does have some rust on the components, but I can clean that off. The grips are cheap mountain bike grips, so those will have to be replaced eventually, but as I will probably want bar-end shifters if I keep it, I left them on.

The components include a Simplex derailleur and shifters, Mafac (Mavic?) brake calipers and uh… other stuff. You can read about them, within reason, on the brochure linked above. Assuming the bottle dynamo and wiring are operable, it should have a working head and taillight. The rack is similar to a Pletscher, and there are full fenders. The bike is a ten speed. The upright bars were part of the original package, and are aluminum. It’s not super-light, but it’s definitely lighter than my other bikes. The tubing is Reynolds 531, I believe.

The biggest issue right now is the stand-over height. My kind benefactor is a good inch or two taller than me. On the Trimsport, this doesn’t matter since it’s a step-through, but on this bike it will matter. When I picked the bike up, I stood over it wearing 1.5 inch heels, and the tires were flat. Let’s just say I was aware the top tube was there… so we’ll see. I can deal with the top tube if the bike is comfortable for me in other ways. The bars are rolled way down right now, so I’ll probably roll them up and will definitely have to lower the seat. Then we’ll see!

It should be finished toward the end of the week, as Gregg’s was out of the MKS pedals, so they had to be ordered.

If it’s way too big, I could theoretically switch out the bars with the Shogun, and perhaps the new bike would then fit My Handsome Man, as the Shogun would definitely fit me with different bars. But for now, given the quality and condition of this bike, I’m selfishly hoping it can be mine, all mine!

Meanwhile, I have not one, but TWO rides to write up as well! Fun times here at rideblog, definitely.

Of course, right now I don’t even know if it will fit me!

1976 or ’77 Gazelle Champion Mondial G-8.

Don’t laugh: it does. Or at least, the world of tiny, bitey things hates me. Don’t believe me? I’ve nearly died, twice, from bug bites/stings. And no, I’m not allergic to bees. First, about five years ago I was bitten by a spider, probably a black widow (yes, I said a black widow. We do have them in Washington), and went into anaphylactic shock. Second, a bite on a hiking trip in a remote area of the California coast resulted in blood poisoning (sepsis) that caused a bright red line an inch wide to run from the bite site on my chest nearly 10 inches toward my heart. Only IV antibiotics kept me from dying. No kidding. So, I know from bad bugs.

There I was, on a lovely Tuesday afternoon, pulling weeds in my garden, when something stung me right through my glove. My finger swelled up like a sausage after a few moments of excruciating pain, and my naturopath pronounced it “probably a hornet. As long as you can keep from getting an infection… again… you’ll be okay.” So no more gardening for a few days (this photo is from about 10 minutes after the sting, before the real swelling began. The top bump is my writing callus — I do a lot of writing by hand — and the middle one is the sting).

What to do instead? I know! I’ll go for a bike ride! Aside from getting hit in the face by a fly (you should have seen the other guy), it was a bug-free ride.

Because the weather was very briefly great, I headed out for the Soos Creek Trail. I love this short ride. It’s a bit hilly and beautiful, running along the right of way for enormous electrical powerlines. If one just ignores them, the views are stunning.

Best of all, it’s spring, so the skunk cabbages are in full bloom!

Now, I realize that many of you have never had the pleasure of cycling along a path that is liberally lined with skunk cabbages. It’s a truly unique experience. You see, skunk cabbages… stink. Like skunks, sort of. In fact, what they really remind me of is the smell of those 70′s “cigarettes” my dad thought I didn’t know he was smoking. Yes, they smell like super-strong 70′s weed.

Hey, they’re totally legal now! At least in Washington. Everywhere else, just a few skunk cabbages can land you in the pokey, kids, so just say no! Not even once.

After passing through the mucky Path of Skunk, I emerged into the more open, drier valley in the middle of the trail. I love this stretch. On a clear day, Rainier is visible in the distance, though today the mountain was moodily shrouded in a few drifting clouds (probably contemplating a lahar).

The way the path twists here is so much fun to ride, and the sweet sound of the red wing blackbirds and wrens singing in the reeds is wonderful.

On the other side of the valley, the trail passes through a lightly forested area with small streams. Wild bleeding hearts take over for the skunk cabbages (thank heaven). I like to stop here and rest in the shade for a moment, enjoying the trees. Wait… what are those things in the background?!

The leaves aren’t out yet in the maples, but given the temperature, I didn’t mind the extra sun in the patches where I got it. It was just warm enough to bike without a jacket.

Either end of this trail is marked by short, steep hills. The southern end’s hill is far steeper than the one toward the northern end. I almost didn’t bother to try this one this time. I have yet to make it all the way up without stopping and walking, and today was no exception. Every time, I think I’m going to make it, but then I reach the false summit and realize I’m going to have to ride up a second, equally steep section, and I poop out.

Funny how there’s no way to make a photo really convey how steep a hill actually feels. This looks like nothing, but really, it’s so steep that I needed a Sherpa to lay guide ropes, I swear.

At the end of the trail, I met a nice lady out to train for the running portion of a triathlon  who, it turns out, knows my neighbor (who runs ultra-marathons and Iron Man-type things). We had a nice chat about exercise and bikes and running. Then it was time to turn around, and head back the way I’d come. Soos Creek is only 6 miles long, though it does connect to another trail, the Lake Youngs Trail. That one is soft-surface, which The Raleigh prissily objects to (so uncomfortable on those Schwalbe’s), so we’ve never tried it.

The sun was fully out by the time I hit the valley again, probably for the last time until July.

When I reached the final hill on my return, I grit my teeth and took it by the throat like a vicious, enraged hornet faced with a Cotton Gardening Glove of Death. It’s even steeper than the southern end, but it’s much shorter, so power up it I did. Then The Raleigh and I stopped to take our favorite congratulatory picture by the Hill at the End of the World Sign. We weren’t stopping so we could pant furiously and regain our ability to breathe, honestly!

If we were panting, just a little, it was only due to the excessive amount of skunk cabbage gas we’d inhaled, officer, I swear!

And version number two!

Nothing bike related, but just designed to make everyone feel a bit happier.

Actually, spring break happened for many of my tutoring students this week, so I had a day off after most of them cancelled. What to do with so much glorious, unadulterated time? Why, ride one of the local trails I can’t usually be bothered to drive to, of course!

Now, there is no conceivable reason not to drive out to the Foothills Trail. It is no further from my house than the Sammamish River Trail, or the Burke Gilman Trail. But the truth is: it’s in the wrong direction. All of my life seems to involve driving north, or west, or east, but never south. Since there’s nothing remotely relevant to my child or to my job down in the Great Southern Wilds of Washington, I have a hard time justifying a twenty minute commute to the trail head. Yes, I realize this is stupid, as the Burke Gilman is at least an hour’s drive from my house, due to the hideous nature of Seattle traffic, and the Sammamish River Trail is not one jot geographically closer than Foothills is. It’s funny how the brain works, isn’t it?

But with a whole day off, no justification was really needed. I just wanted to ride somewhere I hadn’t ridden much before. I have only been out to this trail twice. The first time was almost exactly a year ago, and I rode the second half of it. I made an attempt to ride the first half at some point, but was cut short by rain. So on the scale of newness, the Foothills Trail was about an eight. I could live with that.

This time I drove only as far as the most northern trail head, which is in Puyallup, right next to a bulb farm. This is a good time of year to visit a bulb farm, as you might imagine, though the sky was a bit too overcast for truly spectacular photography:

The Foothills Trail runs from Puyallup through Orting and into Buckley, eventually extending all the way to Carbonado. If these names mean nothing to you, it’s okay. They mean next to nothing to many Washingtonians, too. Aside from Puyallup, which is known for its yearly fair (the best in the state, I think), the others are pretty small towns.

I grew up not far from Buckley and Carbonado, and they were even more rural Back in the Day, Kids, When I Rode My Bike Uphill Both Ways to Get Candy, Which We Called “Candeh,” and Which Cost a Quarter, the Same Amount as a Game of Ms Pacman. I have no real desire to live in such a rural, isolated area anymore. I have no illusions about the political and social bent of most of my state’s small town residents. Living in the Legalized Abortion/Pot/Gay Marriage/Euthanasia Belt has ruined me for small town life. For now, I like to ride in rural areas and just enjoy the scenery. Country living resembles other people’s dogs for me: I like them, but I’m always glad they’re not mine to deal with at the end of the day.

I meant to get a picture of the Lahar warnings along the trail, but forgot. Lahars are Giant Volcanic Mudslides of Death that move at hundreds of miles per hour and are as high as four-story buildings. How does one acquire a Lahar warning, you may ask? One starts by being close to this:

And what does one do if one hears a Lahar warning siren? Besides kiss one’s ass goodbye, you mean? According to the signs, one hightails it to somewhere at least 50 feet off the valley floor. Take a good look at how wide that valley is, and imagine trying to outrun a giant wall of boiling mud travelling faster than a car. Riiiight. I particularly liked the exhortation to “assist other trail users as best you can.” Translation: YOU’RE ON YOUR OWN, PEOPLE. RUN FOR THE HILLS!

Fortunately, Mt. Rainier did not actually erupt while I was there, so I didn’t have to abandon my Slow Biking cause this time.

The first portion of the ride was mainly through flat farmland, still lying mostly fallow from the winter. As I approached Orting, whose town planners have apparently decided to fill the possible Lahar path with as many boxy suburban developments as is physically possible, things became less rural and more industrial.

The sign starts off so promisingly, doesn’t it? It reads like this to me: MCMILLIN PARK!!! (of industry).

The trail makes its way through those endless cookie-cutter treeless suburbs until one reaches the town of Orting, which, frankly, doesn’t seem to justify the massive number of households it has acquired. It still has a fairly laid-back, small-town atmosphere.

Orting has an annual Daffodil Festival, which explains the daffodil patterns in the crosswalks, or at least I think it does…

From there, the trail follows the Carbon River. It’s wider and flatter than my more familiar river companions, with nice wide sand/rock bars in the middle. One could raft it, I suppose. There were two folks in full rafting gear sitting in the middle of one sandbar, not a raft in sight. I was a bit worried for them, but as hundreds of people were passing and they weren’t signalling any of us, I figured that they must just be waiting for their “ride.” Which is weird, really.

Speaking of weird, people out in the country keep odd animals. First, I rode by a small field with four large mules. I realize that mules are useful animals in many contexts, but this farm was tiny, sandwiched in between the road, the trail and two other properties. What are those people doing with those mules? Why are there four of them? How much Borax does that family use in a year?

I had this poster on my wall as a child. Why? I don’t know. But I now find mules somewhat disturbing. Coincidence?

A bit further on someone had an emu. Now, I understand why one might have an ostrich. I have even eaten ostrich, and it tastes, not surprisingly, like gamey chicken. But an emu? Why? What could possibly be the long-term appeal of an enormous, face-kicking dinosaur throw-back?

It was at that point, deeply into my philosophical musings on the nature of the modern farm animal, that I decided my two-hour excursion was stretching me thin. I turned around, anticipating a long journey back to my car. Turns out the Foothills Trail is an uphill grade most of the way to Orting, and there was also a headwind. I made it back in just over an hour.

Which is not to say this was a fast ride, as it was really about 20 miles total, so I was clearly toodling along rather slowly, even for me. That distance would normally take me just over two hours total on The Raleigh, which is not The Gazelle, and can obtain speeds over ten mph with only a little effort. I guess I’m still too out of shape to go fast.

The Raleigh may be faster than The Gazelle (that should be its slogan!), but it’s still not up for this:

I kept vacillating between the amusing mental image of The Raleigh on those jumps, and the tempting image of my son trying out his soon-to-be-new-birthday-bike on them in a month or so. Think I’ll go with the latter.

And yes, I bought him a new bike just two summers ago, but he’s grown about 150,000 inches since then.

Finally, it wouldn’t be a small-town rideblog entry without one of these: