17.2.12

Biking in Cincinnati

"Do people bike in Cincinnati?" I asked when I just arrived. "Yeah, sure, there is a 50 miles bike trail, it's very popular!".

Perhaps I had to rephrase my question and actually ask: "do people use their bicycles as a mean of transport?" and the answer would definitely have been "no, especially not during the winter".

Most people seem to own bikes, but they keep them for the summer, to do bike rides with friends in a sunny weekend. The simple idea of me buying a bike to actually ride to work with seemed crazy in my colleagues' mind...

Now if it would be snowing here and be freezing all the time, then I would understand it. But it is surprisingly mild in Cincinnati this winter, a lot warmer than in Belgium :).

So we bought bikes and now bike to work. The speed, the freedom, the fresh air, I love it! I just use the sidewalks and nobody cares :D So it was all great for the first week. I put my bike in the bike rack our company has (3 spots, of which 1 is taken by the "company bike", which always seems to be there). I admit it felt good to be the ONLY one out of 500 employees coming to work by bike :D

And then I got a flat tire, because there is quite a bit of glass lying around on the bridge I cycle over :( so this weekend it's operation "fix the tire" time...

The proof: my bike

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