How was your commute ... today, yesterday, last week ...

[bychosis]

Wet weather has abated. Set off on a delayed start extended commute, it was nearly cold this morning. What a change! The route I chose was a new one for a morning commute, the reverse of a long way home from last year and predominantly quiet roads and bike paths. Shame it was just shy of the target 30km, I will need to find a little extension for it.

[jasonc]

TW - you suck. those photos are awesome. am very jealous.

[ab012]

Commute was not wet - brilliant!

(cold though especially compared to the 37 we had last weekend..)

[Summernight]

Do you have to give it german bike signals so it understands you?

Nice photos.

Brutal headwind on the way home last night. Would have been nice for the people heading West. Not so the East.

I'm going to send a message to the City of Yarra praising them for their change to the Elizabeth/Albert and Hoddle Street intersection. I've already seen a change in rider behaviour (more claiming of the lane after the intersection instead of hugging the parked car door zone- YAY!) and I haven't had any aggro in that area from cars in the two days it has been in place. Admittedly it has only been two days, but cars are now staying out of the left lane more and not wanting to rush ahead to get to the next queue.

Had to tell a few peds at the corner of Elizabeth Street and Collins Street to stop and look before they darted out on to the road on a red this morning. One older guy did the usual saunter across from one tram superstop to the other and tried to cut the corner from one crossing to the other, both on red lights. He got a wake up call with my shout.

[RedlandSteve]

A beautiful and glorious SEQld morning! It was certainly a great commute to work considering the damp weather of late. This encounter amused me a lot.

Unfortunately, front facing camera ran out of battery.

[TonyMax]

Not much fun coming in this morning but the wind is from the south now, should make for a quick trip home .

[Overspeed]

beautiful blue skies and not too hot

[Lizzy]

Warm one heading home yesterday evening. Super hectic dolphins vs seagulls snacktime near the Scout hall. Must have been some tasty stuff on offer, entertaining viewing, couldn't get pics due to the sun.

Collected some airborne metallic debris of some kind on the Narrows bridge - it bounced off my shoe and then pinged through my frame & spokes, about made me jump out of my skin. Happened too fast to see what it was, where (or which car window) it came from or where it went, otherwise I would have got off and tried to work out who to give a serve to. Hmph.

Looks like the bump getting on/off the PSP southside of Karrinyup Rd has been smoothed over, which is nice.

[DavidS]

The afternoon wind is brutal this week. I ride South East along the beach on the way home and it has been very tough going every day. Just wish it would stop and give me a break.

DS

[herzog]

Back on the bike commuting to work this week, after a month off the bike (travelling). Probably the longest I've been off the bike in years, and after the first couple of rides back, your backside sure tells you!

Saw a guy this morning wearing "Strava" emblazoned spandex from head to toe. And predictably, he was riding like a stravapest. A perfect cycling cliche.

Other than that, nothing eventful so far, other than some heavy crosswinds the last couple of days in Sydney. And a little bit of rain earlier in the week

[FiveDaysAWeek]

A bit of a chill in the air this morning, not enough to add any layers but ominous all the same. Brain must have been in neutral though, started the trip and noticed how breezy it was around the head. Puzzled about it for perhaps thirty meters, wondering if the helmet wasn't on properly. Helmet.... what helmet?

Quick U-turn, home to find it on the table in plain view, and back on the road five minutes later, wondering if there's anything else I'd missed.

[bychosis]

Dragged myself out of the house this morning, somewhat later than I wanted to (again) I had planned on taking the longer route and decided despite being late I would do it anyway. The weathe was predicted to be strong SW winds, but when I checked before leaving it was relatively calm, another reason to continue with the longer ride. Was a pleasant pedal, cool, scenic for a fair part of it, and no lunatic drivers to note, although there was one MGIF that probably could have waited but didn't cause me to brake just coast for a bit. Got too work much later than I would have liked, but that's just the way it is. happy Friday.

[Summernight]

I went to a function last night that involved tasting 24 different flavours of ice-cream... Never really had ice-cream and cheese and crackers as a dinner before, but it was certainly interesting (and some of them were really yummy). I rolled out of the shop, walked (waddled? ) back to the office (giving a wide, wide berth to bad smells like cigarette smoke or greasy foods that easily set me off), managed to get back to the office with only a few seedy moments, psyched myself up for the ride home and then hopped on the bike and rode home at about 10PM.

The riding part was fine, even with a 4WD driver who believed he owned Collins Street and honked because I was claiming the lane (but he also loudly and longly honked the taxi who was in front of him that was legitimately slowing down and moving over to park so this driver was just an all-around Richard-head and not bicycle specific). I was fine when rolling with the wind blowing through my nose and mouth, but when I was almost home I had to stop at a set of traffic lights and the really seedy feeling came back. Got home and had a little 'moment', but once that was out I was good as gold again and could have gone a few more ice-cream rounds. (Please don't talk about ice-cream for the next few days. )

This morning was another lovely morning. Still feeling not 100% from last night's pig-out fest, but the morning run helped.

There was what looked to be a nasty accident on Albert Street heading out of the city. No idea what that was. Cars involved, tow trucks, lots of police in attendance.

And I got a response from my letter of praise to the City of Yarra - turns out the City of Melbourne is looking to extend the 'copenhagen' bicycle lane all the way to Hoddle Street! Great news!

Dumb Cyclist of the Year Award goes to the lady on Collins Street at Elizabeth Street who decided to ignore the fact that me, as the cyclist in front of her, had stopped well behind a garbage truck that was taking over both lanes with a clear left turn indicator. This lady had no thought for the continuation of her own life as she overtook both me and this truck on the left as the light turned green and the truck started turning left. Luckily for her the truck driver was ridiculously cautious and saw her doing her suicidal move so stopped for a fraction of a second to let her through.

So bloody stupid. If that lady cyclist had nine lives she just lost one.

DON'T GO ON THE LEFT OF A BIG LEFT-TURNING TRUCK THAT IS TAKING OVER TWO LANES. There is a reason they are doing that and that gap you think is there quickly disappears when the truck starts turning.

[jasonc]

doing a group ride on the way to work this morning. about 1.5kms from the end of the group ride, my mate in front of me punctures. I asked if he needs a hand, he didn't. get to the meeting place. i get a phone call. need help. me and a mate hop in his car (with my saddle bag and his bidon tool bottle) and off we go. i give him my co2 dispenser and it fails.
thankfully i always carry a (not-so) mini pump. and he was away again.

[fat and old]

Good ride in...I only coughed half the distance. Forgot to turn on the stupid Garmin....oh well.

[Overspeed]

rode past my first major traffic jam this morning... gotta say, it felt good lol

[TailWind]

TW - you suck. those photos are awesome. am very jealous.

Commuting in a snowy landscape is cool (Ha!) for sure, hope the novelty doesn't wear off too quickly, there's a few cold months still ahead...

Do you have to give it german bike signals so it understands you?

Well, I tell the bike to go faster in English and German, but it's not listening to me in either language!
As far as instructions to the bike go, I need to remember that the brake levers are connected the other way around - right is the rear brake, left is the front .

I left for work an hour later this morning due to some government admin stuff, and straight into a mini blizzard. Heavy snow and winds around 40 km/h.
I could barely see with the snow coating my face and eyes, and the front of all of me was coated in a thick blanket of snow.
The bike paths also started disappearing, which made for an interesting ride.
I took the photo below at pretty much the same spot where I took the previous few photos that showed the cleared path:


Happy Weekend!

[warthog1]

Struggled out of bed this morning and checked the temp on my phone. 11.4 c. Cotton undershirt, armwarmers and fingerless gloves worked out OK for the temp. Still creeping a bit after the alpine classic, but at least there was no headwind.
My tyres are down to what feels like about 60 psi (25c) and I've left them like it for the last few rides. Not bad

[singlespeedscott]

11.4 degrees. I wish it was that cool here. I'm so over summer. It's 34 degrees at my place and 64% humidity today. Blah.

[warthog1]

Yeah fair point.
In winter though it'll be -2c here and you'll be enjoying 20c or something

[singlespeedscott]

Too true. I keep telling my wife we need two houses. One in SEQ for the winter and a summer abode in northern Tassie

[PatNZ]

Had an empty coke zero can thrown at me from some kind of plumbing van when I was in the bike lane.

Other than that it was a good commute. Hasn't rained yet this year.

[warthog1]

Too true. I keep telling my wife we need two houses. One in SEQ for the winter and a summer abode in northern Tassie

Great idea
We looked at Tassie a few years ago, Hobart has the 3rd lowest annual rainfall of any Aus capital city I think. Very hard to gain employment in my industry there though.

[warthog1]

Knuckle heads doing burnouts in a carpark I ride through this morning. Had to wait for them to stop, 30 sec, before I could proceed through all that expensive smoke
XR6 turbo with the full doof doof and blow off valve on the turbo. Couldn't see if fluffy dice on the rear view mirror are still the go through all that smoke. I suspect not .
Peed me off a bit but at least he slowed and gave me plenty of room as he passed me up a hill before he let rip. I was also a young bloke with not too much sense once I guess.

[singlespeedscott]

We've all been there I dare say