Things I've Seen While Riding A Bike!

Gimme That Stat!  (To the music of the "Batman Theme" but with the word "Statman" playing in your head where "Batman" should be!)

In its first two weeks of publication online, this Life Cycles blog has had over 1125 pageviews!  It’s been seen in 7 countries including, Uganda, Ghana, Australia, United Kingdom, Mexico, Canada, and the USA!

In the past 24 months I’ve climbed 214,813 feet on my bike.  That’s the equivalent of climbing the highest mountain in the world, Mt. Everest, over 7 times!

From 2001 to 2010 I have ridden over 25,000 miles on my bikes.  That’s the equivalent of riding around the globe at the equator!

And yet I begin and end most rides in my driveway. Some might say I’ve really gone nowhere. Others might say I’ve been everywhere. Here’s a partial list of the things I’ve seen while riding my bike on the road . . .

·       A beached whale

·       Lizards

·       Rabbits

·       Squirrels

·       A herd of deer

·       A pod of dolphins swimming in the surf

·       Hawks (one dropped a rat on the pavement right next to me.  Seriously, the rat went splat right next to me! What was that all about?)

·       A big spider dangling from my leg. (I got off the bike and did a spastic arachnoleptic dance at a major intersection.  Must have been a sight to see!)

·       A Kestrel

·       Thousands of screeching crows at sunrise

·       Sparrows

·       Pelicans

·       An owl flying silently alongside me (Very cool and Harry Potterish!)

·       A hive of bees on the road

·       Spider webs across the road

·       Dogs

·       Toddlers (Maybe the most dangerous and unpredictable animal to have in front of you!)

·       Pigeons

·       Seagulls

·       A Wolf (In the fog on a hill . . . I think we were both wondering who was faster!)

·       Coyotes

·       Terns

·       Herons

·       Cranes (God made and man made)

·       Pipe Organ Concerts

·       Three lanes of cars parked in traffic for a mile while I zoomed by in the bike lane

·       Lawn Bowling

·       Frisbee Golf

·       Olympian Archers, Rowers, Soccer Players, Track & Field athletes, etc.

·       BMX Competition in half huge halfpipes

·       Elizabethan Pageants

·       Musicians

·       Magicians

·       Art Shows

·       Farmer's Markets

·       Flea Markets

·       Sand Castle Competitions

·       Cinco de Mayo street fairs

·       An evangelism crusade with 40,000 people attending 

·       Portable toilet being dangled 25 floors above the street . . . See Is There A Toilet Over Your Head?

·       Wind in my face for 85 miles of a 107 mile ride!

·       25 mph winds in my face going uphill in the desert

·       Hobos in their homes

·       The asphalt up close and personal at 18 mph . . . See In The Blink Of An Eye

·       The side of a minivan up close and personal when the driver decided to turn in front of me into a driveway without signaling

·       The rear wheel of my bike passing my front wheel when I slammed on the brakes to avoid a driver turning across the lane in front of me. We didn’t collide but my heart pounded hard for the first two hours at work that day!

·       Hundreds of cyclists dismounting their bikes and walking past a life flight helicopter parked in the middle of the road picking up a rider who had suffered a heart attack on a strenuous hill

·       Shards of glass and metal in my tires

·       Illegal aliens running through a valley

·       A helicopter overhead looking for the illegal aliens running through a valley

·       Children yelling for candy from the cyclists in a road trip in Mexico

·       Acres of beautiful flowers planted by people

·       Acres of beautiful flowers planted by God

·       A real salt mine.  It’s been there since 1870.  Second oldest business in San Diego County still doing business the way they did 140 years ago!

·       Thick wet blinding fog

·       Relentless punishing wind

·       Soaking to the bone rain

·       Blistering wavy line heat

·       People in the desert riding cruisers with sandals and no water bottles or tire tools

·       Car parts

·       CD’s

·       Cell phone parts

·       Paraplegic Olympic cyclists with hand cycles going much faster than me

·       Waterfalls in Austria

·       The gazebo used in the movie The Sound Of Music

·       Volcanoes on the big island of Hawaii

·       Promising sunrises

·       Beautiful tranquil sunsets

·       The “House Of Green Gables” on Prince Edward Island

·       The Tuscan coast

·       The Southern California coast

·       The house where L. Frank Baum wrote The Wizard Of Oz

·       Victorian hotels and homes

·       Oldest pedestrian suspension bridge in San Diego

·       Bloodied riders climbing out of a ravine on a curve they had taken too fast

·       Old road kill

·       New road kill

·       Litter

·       Unparalleled views on sunny blue days

·       Amazing inline skaters who easily beat me to a checkpoint 25 miles into the hills!

·       Absolutely drop dead gorgeous days

·       God’s creation laid out before me