Thursday I had to got out to Greenford in west London to pick up my new toy, more about that in another post. Since I was in NW6 and therefore not far from the Grand Union Canal, which runs from near the Docklands in east London all the way through north/central London to the west. You can even go as far as Bath and Milton Keynes and beyond if you are that keen.
I jumped on the canal in NW6 and started to ride on what I really hoped would be …

Our washing machine started a few weeks back to blink all its light like a discotheque. With a bit of random pressing of buttons and opening and closing the door we got it running. But over the weekend no matter how much pressing. swearing and dancing it would not do anything other than blink its lights.
So today I started to do a wee bit searching on the net and came up to a few things I could do. Armed with a Phillips screwdriver and my solar light cap I set …

I finally had the chance to cycle in the snow with my Surly Long Haul Trucker. What can I say, it is sooo easy.
I have done my fair share of cycling in the snow and snow storms where I couldn’t see further than 50 metres ahead. Quite often I had to stop to remove the snow out of the wheels and away from the brakes. The most “fun” to ride on is when there is one layer of snow that have plenty of tracks from people moving about on bicycles …

The last few miles of a wonderful first ride of the year got ruined by a plonker. And now, after some hours thinking about what happened yesterday, I know that we should maybe have acted differently, since now it is too late. And I honestly can’t be arsed since the work from our side will be a lot and with some banging our heads against the wall for little effect towards the plonker. Such is the system today.
Here is a little background on why I did what I did last …

It is amazing that you can post on the forum the night before and six others comes along for a cold ride.
The weather was just brilliant, sunny (though a bit low a times) and nice and fresh (which some would have called blooming freezing) and six wonderful people out for a ride with you.
The plan was to head straight to the pub but the consensus quickly turned to tea and cake, it is a yacf ride after all. A stop in Hampton Court coffee room with hot chocolate …

Last year took us to Scotland (Grand tour of Edinburgh) , Wales (3 wet days loop), Surrey Hills (3 days tour with TEA), Isle of Wight (one small wet ride), Pyrenees (more up hills than you can shake a stick at) and Denmark (flatter than flat rides) and a few more day trips and pootles here and there.

Well, nearly. I have seen, and been let to believe, that the streets of London will be deserted on 25th of Dec. But they were not. Well, I suppose they were pretty empty compared to a normal Sunday morning.
But the sun was out and we had a nice 28+ miles pootle around town. We didn’t have to worry about anything other than tourists walking around photographing the empty streets. Plenty of pubs, restaurants and cafes were open in the centre of town. And of course every corner shop worth its …

Yesterday was a three legged test ride. We went out in the dark to Richmond Park in London around the “off road bit”, well the walking path.
Part I : As you know I got the SuperNova E3 but I haven’t really tested the light, a bit hard in central London. Too bad last night we had a bit of cloud cover which did give a bit of glare in the park. So I think that I could cycle around the “yellow brick road” without any light. Though I would …

Last night we went to the O2 Arena in London out on the Greenwich peninsula. It was the first time out there so arriving on bicycle was a bit of a test.
No clear signs for a cyclist from Greenwich town centre and the closer we got we only got a dual carriage way and signs for the dome erm the O2’s parking lots, for cars that is. After been told at one car par that we couldn’t get in there, we doubled back and found a cycle path. This cycle …

There is a petition ‘Cyclists THINK! Watch out for HGVs‘ which calls for an addition to the LGV license.
The measures should create a two-part Safety Standard that is an addition to the LGV license. The safety standard would commit to Best Practice in both driver training and in vehicle specification. This would be achieved by: A) implementing additional driver safety awareness training; and B) recognising that vehicle specification must include suitability of the LGV for the city centre. The combination of both an LGV Safety Certified driver and vehicle, …