Cycling is like life. Cycling with no goal is meaningless. What meaning is there cycling in circles? Or living aimlessly? Meaning comes from direction and destination. Join me in my life's journey on a mountain bike :)

Blogging since 2003. Thank you for reading :))

Sunday, July 28, 2013

Still searching

Jul distance: 157 km

File photo, 2005.
Scene is gone, photo remains
Seletar, 34 km. I seek another route today. A simple loop that doesn't take as long, yet gives me a good workout. Lots of slopes, little traffic would be ideal. Parked cars on narrow roads are bad for the health.

I check out a few locations. I'll be back. Hopefully, the haze won't.

Saturday, July 20, 2013

Piddling pedaling

Buangkok, 33 km. It's such a nice sunny day. I wait till it is dusk, then head out. I pack my camera to shoot the sights. Someday, all these open spaces will be gone. Watch this space!

While it was easy access last week, this week is different. I survey the terrain, carry and walk my bicycle, then double back. It's a balancing act, clambering past a fallen tree in tall grass.

I spy a trail beside a road and head up. A jogger looks at me. I pass a tree: someone has placed a pot of water in front of it (does a tree have a front?) and white cloth around it. Then, I hear furious barking. OK, I hear you, I'm out of here!

Then, to the medical park. It's so quiet, the road sweeper leaves her chest-high, four-wheeled outdoor garbage container half-blocking the road as she sits by the kerb to rest.

Barely two hours later, I'm back home. Such a short distance! But I did push myself hard sometimes. I can feel the burn in my legs somewhat. There are, after all, no traffic lights at all on this stretch and some (short) slopes.

Saturday, July 13, 2013

All dressed up. Where to go?

Buangkok 36 km. I dress in my cycling gear. I know I don't want to cycle my usual circuit. But I don't know where to go.

I wander into an industrial park, where car workshops sprout. I pass through flatland with a single track, with tall apartments within holler distance. Then I end up in a medical park. Not in an ambulance, but on my bicycle. I do laps there; during this time, only four vehicles pass me, and several joggers - there's a fitness park here too.

Overhead, a couple of F15s roar past. Below, a man sits by the roadside. I don't know if he's talking to me whenever I pass, or  just muttering to himself. I doubt he's a patient from the mental institution here.

This is a nice place to cycle. It's quiet, no traffic lights. If something bad happens, there's Accident & Emergency on the grounds. Somewhat disconcerting are the bars, some barbed wire and rows of beds.

Saturday, July 06, 2013

Clear the air

Woodland 54 km. Choking, hazardous haze above 400 PSI had made cycling too bad for health and kept me off the road. Today is different. Air quality is in the "good" range, below 20 even. I revel in the freedom. I draft a truck laden with metal rods as thick as thumbs. It's an easy pace of 38 km/h. I also cycle "hands free" uphill.

I'm glad to ride but then I think I should be running instead, even if it takes as long (2.5 hours) as cycling. Have things changed that much? 2.5 hours feels longer on foot than on wheels, though the distance is way shorter. Now that I've been alive so long, do I look for different things? This is beyond hedonic adaptation.

May be this has to do with being "poisoned"?