Some fiddling about over Saturday as we assembled the trailgator and got his 16" bike attached successfully to my MTB. A bit of extra fun ensued as the ancient seat post bolt on my bike had seized good and proper, no amount of swearing cursing or straining would shift it, a little extra from the brute squad and a loud snap as the bolt sheared in half. A spare was located in the great box ‘o bits in the shed.
Pause for 24 hours while my sister and brother in law visited from afar.
Sunday morning and we took the whole ensemble out to the end of the street for a test ride in the park. 10m into it and there’s a very worried “Dad, it’s a bit too fast!” Apparently the wind in the hair makes 16km/hr on the bike seem a bit scarier than the … err … 45 or 50 that the trailer may have got up to at times behind the tandem… allegedly. First ride was half a km or so, up along the bike path and back home.
First test seems a success, Jo and I think we should go for a longer ride to the park to see how it all goes, and to get a bit more practice before Monday and possible trailgator commuting. Cam was dead-set against it, nearly in tears that it was “too hard” and “maybe next weekend” A bit of persuasion and he’s brought around so off we went to Packer park, about 4km away. Everything went pretty much according to plan, successfully negotiated all local hazards including a nuff-nuff who tried to squeeze us off the road with an attempt to pass as we entered a roundabout. Got to Packer park and went for a couple of hot laps of the velodrome, by lap two there was a very loud “THIS IS FUN!” from the rear.
The trip home included a detour via the local shops and Oakleigh’s one-way dooring streets to the bakery, we pulled up at home and the first words were “Can we go out again this afternoon?” Hooked.
An afternoon ride over to another park for a play, when it was time to leave I was told “That wasn’t a long ride, can we go somewhere different?” so the trip home included detours around Murrumbeena, traffic lights, level crossing gates and bits of the outer circle rail line.
Dinner time? Awesome appetite. That cycling makes a boy hungry!
This morning? One very proud trailgator rider. First ride to childcare on the bike, not a trailer passenger any longer.
