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My most "rewarding" bike ride

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Memorable bike rides, are the Big Rides, all day long...
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Link to 120 mile ride 10/08/2019
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Headwind gets strong in the afternoon.
125+ miles in, longest ride of my life 06/21/2021 total 172 miles.
The Reward is the people met!
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Many friends have come from Bikes;
the list is phenomenal to ponder.
Many of the friends here, from bike rides....
Ride ON!!!
 
This is an awesome idea for a thread! I don’t have any really memorable rides… Any ride I do now with my wife and two little girls is my favorite. Being able to enjoy this hobby with my family. I just love it.

I suppose one ride that sticks out was this one. Probably around 2012 or so. This was the first bike that started my balloon addiction, before this was just stingrays mostly and an old 3 speed Racer. This was my 1950 Hornet that I painted like an army bike, it was extremely rusted and pitted. But it was mine. My first balloon tire bike. This was the day after a Memory Lane swap meet where I acquired the tank, fender light and rear rack. Just swapped them on and had to show it off. First major long ride for me, a whopping 12 miles or so with my cousin who was visiting from out of town for the swap meet. We set off that morning and rode most of the morning, this picture was taken as he was taking artsy pics of his custom bike inside the replica early 1800’s Fort that bears our towns name. He just happened to turn around and see me proudly standing with my bike. Not posing. Just snapped the pic.

If one ride stands out, this is the biggest one. The bike is gone now. Sometime after this pic I painted in an orange and white scheme, it never fully captured me after that. Lingered around till this year when if got sold at our garage sale to a younger woman who wanted an old beach cruiser for the lake. She fell in love with it and I decided to let it go.

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My most rewarding bike ride ever was the one I survived being run over by a semi pulling a 53 footer. Was on Mission St/HWY1 and the guy passes me on a curve in the road that swings right. I’m riding my ultra patina broken frame prewar hanging tank straight bar Schwinn. The trailer kept getting closer and closer. I could almost feel it on my left shoulder. I was trapped between it and the curb. So I slammed my right foot down on the sidewalk. Boosted the whole bike and myself up. Crashed straight into a business’ front wall. I felt the wind of the trailer as it went past me. The rear tires were tracking across the sidewalk a foot from where I was flat against the wall getting as skinny as possible. If I had stayed in the street. Dead. Any part of sidewalk other than the part I was flat against the wall. Dead. My “reward” is my four wonderful children. 😁
 
When I was young and in the prime of my life, I had ridden my bike about 14 miles down to the seaside community of Laguna Beach, California.
While there, I met a bikini clad woman about 10 years older than me.
Before I knew it, I had my bike in the trunk of her car, and we were off to a local hotel, where we spent some very loving hours enjoying each other’s company.
One of those days you never forget.

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One of my favs was about 20 years ago , my girlfriend and me, (now wife) stumbled upon the Hiawatha trail ride after visiting Cour de lane Idaho....such a relaxing mostly downhill ride through a really long tunnel, water dripping on us as it was so humid inside, they gave us headlights as the middle was pitch dark, and crossed many high train trestle's, you could just sense the history ,it was repurposed from an old track...then at the end a old school bus loaded us up and took us back to the start...did it later on with my boy, he loved it.
 
Not as rewarding as it is memorable. I was probably 10 and was hanging with my buddy who never seemed to have a bike of his own. We were riding in my yard when he took off down the street on my bike and I chased after him on my sisters girls pink Huffy Dusty Rose while still wearing my blue catholic school uniform. He headed up a trail at the end of the road to what we called the sand hill because that is what it is. I saw him go over the top so i followed. he was well ahead of me as we headed down the other side in soft sand. He had made the turn up the trail back to my house and was attempting to do the same but i lost control in the sand at the bottom of the hill and took a serious header. There was another group of kids just up the trail and they saw me wipe out. I heard the kids yell out "Paulsie" now my name being Paul and not wearing my glasses i squinted and thought "oh I must know them if they called my name" As i got closer to them I realized what was up. It wes the neighborhood bullies. My heart sank as they walked up to me the one kid put his arm around me and said" we are going to kick you a$$. I shrugged him off grabbed my pink girls bike in my uniform and peddled away as fast as I could. I realized afterwards that at the time a "paulsie" was a reference to Cerebal Paulsie and was actually an insult. When I caught up to my buddy and explained what happened he got right back on the bike and went back with me following again. Once over the sand hill the kids saw us and approached. My buddy was one of the most naturally muscular people I have ever know. He had lat muscles from birth and a not so nice dad he was great at kicking ass. He pounded the s H ! T out of all 3 kids at once while I stood and watched ,a theme that would continue throughout our life. He was an enforcer and no one ever gave us crap when he was around. Often when trouble would start someone would say these guys know John Lindsay and that would be the end of their aggression. It was a looooong time ago and I have not seen John in 20 years I wonder if he would remember as well as I do. Needless to say that nickname stuck and a few friends still refer to me as "Paulsie" hahahaha
 
Not as rewarding as it is memorable. I was probably 10 and was hanging with my buddy who never seemed to have a bike of his own. We were riding in my yard when he took off down the street on my bike and I chased after him on my sisters girls pink Huffy Dusty Rose while still wearing my blue catholic school uniform. He headed up a trail at the end of the road to what we called the sand hill because that is what it is. I saw him go over the top so i followed. he was well ahead of me as we headed down the other side in soft sand. He had made the turn up the trail back to my house and was attempting to do the same but i lost control in the sand at the bottom of the hill and took a serious header. There was another group of kids just up the trail and they saw me wipe out. I heard the kids yell out "Paulsie" now my name being Paul and not wearing my glasses i squinted and thought "oh I must know them if they called my name" As i got closer to them I realized what was up. It wes the neighborhood bullies. My heart sank as they walked up to me the one kid put his arm around me and said" we are going to kick you a$$. I shrugged him off grabbed my pink girls bike in my uniform and peddled away as fast as I could. I realized afterwards that at the time a "paulsie" was a reference to Cerebal Paulsie and was actually an insult. When I caught up to my buddy and explained what happened he got right back on the bike and went back with me following again. Once over the sand hill the kids saw us and approached. My buddy was one of the most naturally muscular people I have ever know. He had lat muscles from birth and a not so nice dad he was great at kicking ass. He pounded the s H ! T out of all 3 kids at once while I stood and watched ,a theme that would continue throughout our life. He was an enforcer and no one ever gave us crap when he was around. Often when trouble would start someone would say these guys know John Lindsay and that would be the end of their aggression. It was a looooong time ago and I have not seen John in 20 years I wonder if he would remember as well as I do. Needless to say that nickname stuck and a few friends still refer to me as "Paulsie"
We used to cruise to the redondo beach break wall for safety meetings, one day three of us and “Bolington” a slightly older guy from the neighborhood did the ride, when we arrived two giant dudes started hassling me and my buddy, “Bolington” appeared out of nowhere dropped one of the thugs with one knockout punch and disappeared just as fast lol hahaha!! We stood there in shock and awe as the other thug tried to revive his bloodied co conspirator, we rode off somewhere else still in awe of “Bolington” the “sleeper” with a bad ass right cross!! Hahaha!!
 
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