The good old days

Fantastic stories.

I remember my first crome BMX. I must of been 9 or 10 at the time and it
had no brakes. I was also living in Tasmania at the time, and it's hard to
find a flat spot in Tassie. I had the best time of my life riding down
grass hills and dirt roads on that single speed that got the speed wobbles
fairly easily. Looking back now I remember a few quite-close calls that
leave me wondering how I made it through but I loved every minute of it.

Flash back to now and here I am sweating it down the freeway to work, oh for
the fresh air again.....

"DaveB" <[email hidden]> wrote in message
news:[email hidden]...

Quoted message said:

I'm sick of stories of road rage, accidents, doom and gloom, flood
pestilence and famine, broken axles (oh that was me). How about some
cyclign stories from the good old days. I'll kick it off.

First road trip
I headed off on my first road trip when I was about 9 years old.
Yarrawonga to Tungamah, 26kms along country roads on a single speed
dragster (my little brother had a 3 speed, man was I jealous). And yes,
I did have my parents permission. Halfway there I got a flat tyre but
had no spare, no repair kit, not even a pump. Luckily one of the local
farmers came past and offered to help. Into the back of his ute went the
bike and down the road to his farm where he patched the tyre, pumped it
up again, then dropped me off again on the main road. Off I headed with
no more problems. Even if someone did offer to help these days, would
you get into the car with them?

Music before MP3
Alright the early 80's might not qualify as good old days, but back then
I was a teenager with a trusty BSA 10 speed and too much energy for my
own good. But I would never head out on a ride without music. And for
me, music involved a ghetto blaster (remember them huh huh), 3 ocky
straps to attach it to the rack, and a handlebar bag with at least 10
tapes to listen to (at least 4 of them had to be Midnight Oil), and a
spare set of 8 batteries. Off I'd go and not small trips. I'd do a 70km
circuit over Kinglake with this load. On the climb up to Kinglake I'd
see other cyclists up ahead turning around to see what the hell was
coming. And I must have been fit because I used to catch and overtake
people with this load. MP3 players, bah humbug!

DaveB

I had a Dragster when I was a boy. SOME [censored] IN A CAR RAN OVER IT!

Oh, sorry.

--
Alan Erskine
We can get people to the Moon in five years,
not the fifteen GWB proposes.
Give NASA a real challenge
[email hidden]

Alan Erskine said:

I had a Dragster when I was a boy. SOME [censored] IN A CAR RAN OVER IT!

Oh, sorry.

These are supposed to be happy stories for a Friday afternoon.
Depressing shildhood stories can start another thread.

DaveB

I remember when I could go for a ride without arm warmers, leg warmers,
frozen fingers, numb toes, with the sun in my face, the wind at my back and
the birds singing.

Bring back a bit of summer please :-)

Bow

"atacca" <[email hidden]> wrote in message
news:[email hidden]...

Quoted message said:

Fantastic stories.

I remember my first crome BMX. I must of been 9 or 10 at the time and it
had no brakes. I was also living in Tasmania at the time, and it's hard

to

Quoted message said:

find a flat spot in Tassie. I had the best time of my life riding down
grass hills and dirt roads on that single speed that got the speed wobbles
fairly easily. Looking back now I remember a few quite-close calls that
leave me wondering how I made it through but I loved every minute of it.

Flash back to now and here I am sweating it down the freeway to work, oh

for

Quoted message said:

the fresh air again.....

"DaveB" <[email hidden]> wrote in message
news:[email hidden]...

Quoted message said:

I'm sick of stories of road rage, accidents, doom and gloom, flood
pestilence and famine, broken axles (oh that was me). How about some
cyclign stories from the good old days. I'll kick it off.

First road trip
I headed off on my first road trip when I was about 9 years old.
Yarrawonga to Tungamah, 26kms along country roads on a single speed
dragster (my little brother had a 3 speed, man was I jealous). And yes,
I did have my parents permission. Halfway there I got a flat tyre but
had no spare, no repair kit, not even a pump. Luckily one of the local
farmers came past and offered to help. Into the back of his ute went the
bike and down the road to his farm where he patched the tyre, pumped it
up again, then dropped me off again on the main road. Off I headed with
no more problems. Even if someone did offer to help these days, would
you get into the car with them?

Music before MP3
Alright the early 80's might not qualify as good old days, but back then
I was a teenager with a trusty BSA 10 speed and too much energy for my
own good. But I would never head out on a ride without music. And for
me, music involved a ghetto blaster (remember them huh huh), 3 ocky
straps to attach it to the rack, and a handlebar bag with at least 10
tapes to listen to (at least 4 of them had to be Midnight Oil), and a
spare set of 8 batteries. Off I'd go and not small trips. I'd do a 70km
circuit over Kinglake with this load. On the climb up to Kinglake I'd
see other cyclists up ahead turning around to see what the hell was
coming. And I must have been fit because I used to catch and overtake
people with this load. MP3 players, bah humbug!

DaveB

quote='DaveB'Alan Erskine said:

I had a Dragster when I was a boy. SOME [censored] IN A CAR RAN OVER IT!

Oh, sorry.

These are supposed to be happy stories for a Friday afternoon.
Depressing shildhood stories can start another thread.

DaveB[/QUOTE]
my first 'real' bike ride was '89ish. I had just bought a cool (for then) mtb at bikehouse off a cool guy (turned out to be damian grundy National mtb coach now) who had won it in the TdTassie.
Having just lost a close mate (opening car door, Chapel St. Driver got 2 years Jail. sorry...) and work was [censored] me (it was my first job and the concept of no long holidays was rather hard to grasp), the need to get away was beckoning...

Decided i would use my 4 weeks leave wisely and ride around Tassie.
Went to Paddy Pallin and bought a compact sleeping bag, oneman tent and one of them bluesleepingmats, rack and panniers and started looking at maps.

Arrived the next Friday at work with a fully laden bike with above mentioned gear and tranjia(?) and collapsible flyrod and a 2nd set of clothes, answered lots of stupid qu's re WTF i was getting myself in for (luckily i had no idea!) and bided my time until 'hometime' and then rode from Richmond down to Station Pier and rode onto the 'Abel Tasman'. After suffering an appalling meal, and the even more appalling cabaret act in the main bar I retired as the swell was making me touch both sides of the hallways (the 6 beers probably didnt help either!).

Woke up and went to my bike below with all the cars and rode down the ramp and into Devenport. Referred to my map (still got it. heaps of wierd little notes all over it) and headed towards 'Sheffield'.
Did I mention the hills? Tassie has quite a few. Shall never forget the map of Tasmania again:P
Never having done more than 30k before, I spent most of the morning going up what seemed like the one endless hill and reached a location i was expecting a town and food/drink to be at, but was met by a roadsign!!!
Lay down on the grass by the road and bonking badly byt this stage, fell asleep for (i think) about 2-3 hours.
Rode on to Sheffield and camped next to the footy oval like a dead thing.

To be continued...

this one is looking like War'N'Peace!

"DaveB" <[email hidden]> wrote in message
news:[email hidden]...

Quoted message said:

I'm sick of stories of road rage, accidents, doom and gloom, flood
pestilence and famine, broken axles (oh that was me). How about some
cyclign stories from the good old days. I'll kick it off.

First road trip
I headed off on my first road trip when I was about 9 years old.
Yarrawonga to Tungamah, 26kms along country roads on a single speed
dragster (my little brother had a 3 speed, man was I jealous). And yes,
I did have my parents permission. Halfway there I got a flat tyre but
had no spare, no repair kit, not even a pump. Luckily one of the local
farmers came past and offered to help. Into the back of his ute went the
bike and down the road to his farm where he patched the tyre, pumped it
up again, then dropped me off again on the main road. Off I headed with
no more problems. Even if someone did offer to help these days, would
you get into the car with them?

Music before MP3
Alright the early 80's might not qualify as good old days, but back then
I was a teenager with a trusty BSA 10 speed and too much energy for my
own good. But I would never head out on a ride without music. And for
me, music involved a ghetto blaster (remember them huh huh), 3 ocky
straps to attach it to the rack, and a handlebar bag with at least 10
tapes to listen to (at least 4 of them had to be Midnight Oil), and a
spare set of 8 batteries. Off I'd go and not small trips. I'd do a 70km
circuit over Kinglake with this load. On the climb up to Kinglake I'd
see other cyclists up ahead turning around to see what the hell was
coming. And I must have been fit because I used to catch and overtake
people with this load. MP3 players, bah humbug!

DaveB

Ahhh yes....childhood memories!!........My first bike was a 26 inch (we used
to call them by wheel sizes not frame sizes back then) blue, backpedal
brake single speed job I got for Xmas 69( i wanted a Speedwell
Mustang(dragstar) with 5 speed derail),
This one was called a Magnet or something and it was a good normal shaped
boy's bike...in a basic kinda way, in fact my mate with the Speedwell
Mustang couldn.t even come near me for speed,, the Xmas morning i got it off
"SANTA" at 5am in the morning with the sun shinin', riding around in my
Pj's.....no pedo's(that we knew of) in my street.

Being from Newcastle, My mate and I decided to go for a ride in Blackbutt
reserve and this place had some awesome downhill bitumen slopes that really
looked steep to a 9 yr old, I asked my friend would he mind swapping bikes
for a change and he agreed and he got on my singlespeed with only a
backpedal brake and he took off downhill at god only knows what speed (i was
just cruising with the 'stang'😉 in the middle of this downhill was an elbow
bend that he forgot about and quickly engaged the backpedal brakes locked
wheel, and through the trees and out of sight at breakneck speeds. I didn't
give a [censored] about him (great mate eh) I was too worried about me bike and
more to the point what dad was gunna say when i bring it home mangled.
Lo and behold, when i got down the absolute bottom of this hill, near the
duck pond ,I couldn't beleive it.....i rubbed my eyes about 3 times and
slapped my own face trying to wake myself up, here was my mate, sitting on
my bike, not a bloody scratch on either of them....I was Flabbergasted,
didn't think it was possible he could come out of that alive let alone
without a scratch........he turned and said to me " jeesus mate...what took
ya so bloody long??!!" I remember this as if it was yesterday but this
happened in 1969-70 summer holidays.

Regards

DJ

DaveB said:

I'm sick of stories of road rage, accidents, doom and gloom, flood
pestilence and famine, broken axles (oh that was me). How about some
cyclign stories from the good old days. I'll kick it off.
DaveB

Kewl! We/me/us started cycling circa 1972/3 courtesy of a cute little trike with a tray. I can vouch for all the hilly stories about Tassie, grew up in Lutana. Cool hills to spin down, absolute mongrels to push the bike back up. Especially Ash Street.

Hills and an unsupportive social environment made me give up cycling until my late 20's. If I'd been a few years younger I probably could of been interested in BMX stuff. Unfortunately it was the heyday of the oversize 10-speed bike. An older brother used to work at Ken Selfs Bike shop in Moonah, I used to "ride" my brothers bike by sitting on the down tube and scooting along, fun until I sat back on the chainrings....

Anyway it's never too late to re-commence your childhood, I've been happily getting in touch with my inner child (or should that be inner tube ?!?) for the last eight years. Silly is good. 😄

Bow said:

I remember when I could go for a ride without arm warmers, leg warmers,
frozen fingers, numb toes, with the sun in my face, the wind at my back and
the birds singing.

Bring back a bit of summer please :-)

I remember when I could ride uphill on a hot summer's day without cooking my brain in a helmet.

I remember the feel of wind in my hair.

aeek said:

Bow said:

I remember when I could go for a ride without arm warmers, leg warmers,
frozen fingers, numb toes, with the sun in my face, the wind at my back
and
the birds singing.

Bring back a bit of summer please :-)

I remember when I could ride uphill on a hot summer's day without
cooking my brain in a helmet.

I remember the feel of wind in my hair.

While I agree with you, please do not start the helmet debate, it gets
as bad as the top posting debate!

--
Remove norubbish to reply direct

Jack Russell

Alan Erskine said:

I had a Dragster when I was a boy. SOME [censored] IN A CAR RAN OVER IT!

err, was this because you left it in the driveway? {:-)

DaveB said:

I'm sick of stories of road rage, accidents, doom and gloom, flood
pestilence and famine, broken axles (oh that was me). How about some
cyclign stories from the good old days. I'll kick it off.

[snip]

DaveB

I had a good 'ol day on Monday. T'was a bank holiday, so I had the day off.

Rode from Concord W. to Coogee to breakfast with friends visiting from Brisbane. Head south into Royal NP. Stop for coffee and muffin at the cafe at the Hacking River crossing. Ride up and down the hills in R. NP. Ride home. A nice 4.5 hr ride with beautiful scenery, fast roads, steep hills and perfect weather...ahhh.

Ritch

That's a good ride! What route did you take to get to Royal NP? Down the
foreshore then Princes?

Quoted message said:

Rode from Concord W. to Coogee to breakfast with friends visiting from
Brisbane. Head south into Royal NP. Stop for coffee and muffin at the
cafe at the Hacking River crossing. Ride up and down the hills in R.
NP. Ride home. A nice 4.5 hr ride with beautiful scenery, fast roads,
steep hills and perfect weather...ahhh.

Ritch

--
ritcho

Greetings,
This of course in the days of REAL touring. which I
started doing in the late 70s and early 80s, when there was only half
the traffic on the roads there is now (literally, the no. of cars has
doubled in 20 years). I did equally insane trips, with equally
improbable results.
At one point I had one speaker of a tiny cassette player mounted on the
handle-bars, the player itself was in the hadnle-bar bag. It worked
pretty good. Unfortunately, someone nicked it a few years later.
Regards,
Ray.

DaveB said:

I'm sick of stories of road rage, accidents, doom and gloom, flood
pestilence and famine, broken axles (oh that was me). How about some
cyclign stories from the good old days. I'll kick it off.

First road trip
I headed off on my first road trip when I was about 9 years old.
Yarrawonga to Tungamah, 26kms along country roads on a single speed
dragster (my little brother had a 3 speed, man was I jealous). And
yes, I did have my parents permission. Halfway there I got a flat tyre
but had no spare, no repair kit, not even a pump. Luckily one of the
local farmers came past and offered to help. Into the back of his ute
went the bike and down the road to his farm where he patched the tyre,
pumped it up again, then dropped me off again on the main road. Off I
headed with no more problems. Even if someone did offer to help these
days, would you get into the car with them?

Music before MP3
Alright the early 80's might not qualify as good old days, but back
then I was a teenager with a trusty BSA 10 speed and too much energy
for my own good. But I would never head out on a ride without music.
And for me, music involved a ghetto blaster (remember them huh huh), 3
ocky straps to attach it to the rack, and a handlebar bag with at
least 10 tapes to listen to (at least 4 of them had to be Midnight
Oil), and a spare set of 8 batteries. Off I'd go and not small trips.
I'd do a 70km circuit over Kinglake with this load. On the climb up to
Kinglake I'd see other cyclists up ahead turning around to see what
the hell was coming. And I must have been fit because I used to catch
and overtake people with this load. MP3 players, bah humbug!

DaveB

atacca said:

That's a good ride! What route did you take to get to Royal NP? Down the
foreshore then Princes?

Quoted message said:

Rode from Concord W. to Coogee to breakfast with friends visiting from
Brisbane. Head south into Royal NP. Stop for coffee and muffin at the
cafe at the Hacking River crossing. Ride up and down the hills in R.
NP. Ride home. A nice 4.5 hr ride with beautiful scenery, fast roads,
steep hills and perfect weather...ahhh.

Ritch

--
ritcho

From Coogee, down Malabar Road, Beauchamp Ave, Foreshore Rd, Princes Hwy, left into RNP at the first entrance (Farnell Av).

It was a nice ride - no time limits or rush to get home... if only we had bank holidays more often!

Ritch

DaveB said:

I'm sick of stories of road rage, accidents, doom and gloom,

flood

Quoted message said:

pestilence and famine, broken axles (oh that was me). How

about some

Quoted message said:

cyclign stories from the good old days. I'll kick it off.

Well, my first bike had ape hangers {:-).
Actually, it was me moms and we used to coast it down the back
lane in
Young.
Grouse {:-)
We stood on the pedals and hung onto the sit up and beg
handlebars.
I think I managed to clear the handlebars, but the siblings had
to peak
under.

After a few close calls (startled motorists) at the cross street
at the
bottom, we took turns at traffic guard, but my brother was a
hopless judge so there was still near misses. We even had to
police come around to the house about it. He turned out to be
related or something (well, mums & dad grandparents would have
made Peter Costello proud).

My first long ride was when I was in high school and went off to
a rural place about 40kms away because a girl I fancied lived there.
Two major problems; 1) I didn't have a devious scheme to go
into their place (puncture, ring parents?) and
2) they didn't have their name on the mailbox. {:-(

But the day wasn't a complete waste as there was this great
dirt back road downhill {:-) on the way back. Bugger about
the traffic lights at the bottom.

I think that gave me the taste for touring and I managed to get
to sit on mum's seat because I used it as my first touring seat,
until I wore it out. It was a fully sprung (horizontal springs)
that was wonderfully comfortable. {:-)

Quoted message said:

From Coogee, down Malabar Road, Beauchamp Ave, Foreshore Rd, Princes
Hwy, left into RNP at the first entrance (Farnell Av).

It was a nice ride - no time limits or rush to get home... if only we
had bank holidays more often!

Ritch

That's a good ride, I'm in Banksia so you would of past my place. Princes
can be a bit scary around Banksia/Rockdale as drivers battle for a parking
spot. Visit the Royal NP a lot for hiking and a little abseiling practise
but ridden only once, it's very much like the Karingai NP Big climbs either
side of the valley floor. Though the RNP is a bigger area with longer
straights.

If you have any other rides around the area I'd be glad to here them.

On Fri, 06 Aug 2004 14:24:10 +1000, DaveB <[email hidden]> Wrote :

When I were a little tacker I scored a dose of Polio leaving me with
a _WEAK_ right leg which, of course, meant that I was destined to take up
"leg" sports. Running, bush walking, cycling, skiing, that sort of thing.
At some stage my father thought that a scooter - yeah a SCOOTER FFS would
be just the ticket to build up my right leg. Pretty soon made a mess of
that...:-)

Next the old man thought a bike would be the go to help strengthen what
is in reality an un-strengthenable leg. He thought he was buying
exercise - WRONG - what he actually gave me was freedom. All sorts of
bad things ensued. A ride to Mordi from Maidstone and back took about
the same time as a school day so you know what used to happen with, what
turned out to be, distressing results....:-) Taking days off school
WASN'T an option so I found out AFTER I'd taken a LOT of days off to
explore...:-)

Fast forward a few years and I needed, or thought I needed, to get my
legs fit to play squash so I got another bike. I seemed to getting
through knee cartlidges(sp?) at an alarming rate and thought cycling
would strengthen things up and stop the rot. Cycling turned out to be
better than squash and I haven't played a single game since...:-) Some
time around then - the late '60's or so - the "Rack"(tm) on the bike
died an horrible death so I went over to a mob called Leisure Bikes where
they had these Karrimore things and some posters on the walls depicting
happy people on loaded up bikes - the damage was done.

FF to 1974 when I had the frame of the Old Grey Bike[1] made by one
George McDonald and fitted it out with what I thought was required for
touring including a Brooks seat. It was, and still is, a brilliant frame.
Made to measure by a craftsman for the purpose of touring and built with
F*&^%$G expensive DB Reynolds 531. Frame, forks and stays - the lot was 531.
In late 1974 the frame - unpainted - cost $750. I still have the original
drawings and the receipt somewhere. It still has the original seat which
is as comfortable as...

My first tour was a LOT over the top for a first tour. [censored] to Sale via
Mt. Hotham. [censored] it was hard !!!! and took near on two weeks...:-) But it
was just such a blast that I was totally and irretrievably hooked on cycle
touring. Somehow I discovered a mob called Action Unlimited and joined up
and went on just about every ride that was run. AU later became the
Melb. Bicycle Touring Club.

Well that's enough I reckon.....

[1] http://members.optushome.com.au/forsythm/GreyBike/

--

Humbug

"Alan Erskine" <[email hidden]> wrote in message
news:[email hidden]...

Quoted message said:

I had a Dragster when I was a boy. SOME [censored] IN A CAR RAN OVER IT!

Oh, sorry.

--
Alan Erskine
We can get people to the Moon in five years,
not the fifteen GWB proposes.
Give NASA a real challenge
[email hidden]

That was probably my dad, or maybe even me????

Quoted message said:

[1] http://members.optushome.com.au/forsythm/GreyBike/

Thats one nice tourer! Especially appreciate the hand break straps..
A most useful device when touring.

Tom