Three short stories from Hannah’s recent trip to the USA that demonstrate the reach of the bike and the unspoken bond shared by those who ride them.
A Field in Idaho.
I’m cruising round an unfamiliar town, alone, early on a Sunday morning. The bike I’m riding is not mine – it’s a hotel beach cruiser style bike with backpedal brake and high swept bars that seem designed to add wobble to every journey. But I am riding, covering ground and following my nose as the mood takes me. An interesting looking signpost here, an inviting snicket there. I’m free to roam free. I’m not really alone though. Other riders smile at me smiling at them as they tow goofy looking dogs in trailers. I shout ‘well done!’ to kids taking their first wobbly pedal strokes as parents run along ready to make the catch. And then in a playing field I spot a gathering of 50 or so mountain bikers, moving in purposeful coordination. This is not the pre-ride milling and testing of suspension, is it mountain bike ballet?
There is simply no way I’m going to ride on by, and I pedal my cruiser cross-country and introduce myself to one of the riders. These are coaches from the Idaho branch of NICA. I’m soon enlightened to the fact that this is the National Interscholastic Cycling Association, an organisation devoted to getting high school children to become mountain bikers. Yes, there are races, but the enthusiastic band of riders here repeatedly emphasise that they’re not about creating elite athletes: instead they want to deliver “the development of strong mind, strong body and strong character”.
They’re talking my language – participation and sport for sport’s sake is of far greater interest to me than elite athleticism. Not only that, they’re speaking with such effusive enthusiasm that I want to move my family right here, right now, so my kids can ride mountain bikes after school in what these folks say is America’s fastest growing high school sport. They’re all gathered here – and by all, I mean all of the Idaho coaching contingent (it’s hard to imagine there are this many mountain bike coaches for high school children in the whole of the UK) – to brush up their coaching skills and make sure they’re able to teach those basic riding skills that, all too often, experienced riders are unable to explain to new riders.
I leave them to their ‘light hands, heavy feet’ drills, and get on my way, heart a little bit lighter in the knowledge that there are infectiously enthusiastic and dedicated coaches doing everything they can to bring the joy of mountain biking to a new generation. A brief connection through the medium of mountain bikes.
The Right Side of the Tracks.
I’m in another unfamiliar place, only this time it’s a city; it’s getting towards the evening, and I need to find somewhere to stay. It’s an unplanned and unexpected venture – the airline had overbooked and I was willing to take the cash bung it offered to get a flight the following day. So I’m a single female, alone on an underpopulated tram, with a cumbersome quantity of luggage. Internet searches for hotels give a few budget options, and I wonder whether there’s a reason they’re budget. Spotting a guy with a battered old mountain bike, complete with bar ends and duct tape repairs, I sidle over. I don’t see the tattoos, the dusty clothing, or the eyes behind the shades – I just see the bike, and I ask his opinion of the hotel. When he discovers where it is, he tells me I should definitely not get off there, hell no. His response is strong enough that I heed it, as he apologises for arriving at his stop and needing to go, rather than helping me further.
A couple of minutes later the tram glides through the area where I’d been thinking of staying, and the scenes on the street are reminiscent of the The Wire, or Breaking Bad. Groups of people purposefully hanging out on corners, more than one person is lying on the pavement. This is definitely not a place to be encumbered by two suitcases and a backpack, nor one to be walking round with an iPhone in hand trying to navigate to the nearest tourist attractions.
Surely saved from a mugging, or at best a frightened night behind a hotel door locked shut with a chair against it for extra safety, I stay on the tram until the stop recommended by Mr Shades-and-a-bike, and am soon in a nice hotel room preparing to hit the safe streets of Salt Lake City. Which brings me to my final tale.
Freerolling.
If ever you find yourself in a strange and foreign land, alone and wondering what to do, go to a bike shop. Only, in this case, the bike shop was closed, so I did the next best thing and called Chipps. It’s just as well we live in a virtual world, as his Rolodex of contacts would surely have its own gravitational field. Sure enough, Chipps does know somebody in Salt Lake City, and after a few texts back and forth I’m off to meet someone whose text says ‘I’m the bikey person with scabs’. Before I can send an appropriate description of myself, I spot him. We’ll call him Fahzure Freeride, for that is his nom de plume, and my only previous contact with him was when he wrote an article for Singletrack a few years back.
If you’ve seen the video he made to accept his Singletrack Reader Award for best article, you might have some idea of what I thought I might be getting into. If you haven’t… well, it was pretty weird. OK, it’s not like there hasn’t been some kind of vetting process here, and Chipps knows who I was last seen heading off to meet in case my mutilated body is later found in a salty pool, picked over by vultures, or flamingos, or whatever it is that resides in the desert wilderness around the city. But still, I’m hooking up with a (male) stranger for an itinerary as yet unknown.
I shake Mr Freeride’s hand, only to have him retract it suddenly – it contains broken bones. There’s a bit of polite ‘so what shall we do?’ conversation. ‘No, what do you want to do?’ ‘I’m easy.’ ‘Well, I’m easy too.’ We keep it simple and head inside a bar for beers and a pizza slice. He says it’s a bit of a dive; I can’t help but think it’s probably the coolest place I’ve been in quite some time. There’s so much graffiti on the walls that when I head to the restroom (for a wee, not a rest), I struggle to spot which is the one I’m supposed to use.
We sit in a window seat and open our beers. And then it happens. Very briefly we establish our links to Chipps, and next we’re talking about bike share schemes, ‘proper’ jobs in public policy, then kids, art, sculpture, and instilling a love of education in your children. The conversation continues as we embark on a walking tour of the city, with Fahzure showing me the public realm works and city library, the mountains in the distance, the sculpture outside the police station. We look at plants, duelling piano bars, repurposed buildings, and then we stop for another beer where we finally talk about riding mountain bikes, and crashing, and injuries, and getting old.
Walking back to my hotel through the quiet streets in air that seems perfectly warmed and cooled all at the same time, I’m feeling anything but old. Mr Freeride may not have instilled in me a desire to share his determination to learn bar-spinning jumps in my 39th year, or even my 54th. But he has given me a look into the city beyond the guidebooks, and he’s reminded me of that sense of connection, or lingua franca as he puts it later, that being a rider can give you. I’ve had a brief visit to a very alien world, but a shared love of bikes has been the conduit to a whole realm of other common interests and passions.
Breaking ice with broken bones.
I’m not naive enough to think that everyone who rides a bike is lovely. I’m sure there are plenty of dickheads who ride bikes, just as there are probably some nice people who drive BMWs with personalised plates. But being a rider is an icebreaker. It’s something that, if you let it, can stop you from following the well-trodden path of guidebooks and TripAdvisor in the pursuit of a ‘must-see’ itinerary. It’s a richer experience than a bucket list of rated restaurants, Instagram panoramas and electronic tour-guides. People talk about ‘real’ or ‘authentic’ travel, of experiencing the local culture and finding (blogged, logged and pinned on a map) ‘hidden gems’, all in the name of finding happiness, or yourself.
If you’re a polyglot, then maybe you truly can seek out these richer local experiences, but for the rest of us, there’s the language of bikes to open the door to your next adventure. Go seek out these hidden turns, and I guarantee your heart and soul will be uplifted.
