Today’s Ride 100320

March 22, 2010 By: thenhbushman Geotag Icon Show on map Category: Lifestyle, riding, Taiwan

Photos by MJ Klein and Michael Turton + Video by MJ Klein

Michael Turton invited me down to Taichung to ride some hills on my recumbent trike. I don’t have that much experience with hills because there aren’t very many where I live. I was looking forward to seeing how the trike climbed, with my new 26 tooth chainring. I shot some video with my GoPro Helmet Hero Wide, video camera (visible on the front of my bike helmet) which you can see later on in this article. Michael took this shot of me standing in front of a reservoir at the top of the hill we climbed.

This is the wide-angle view from the top of the hill. The weather was perfect for riding!

We think that this is a house that got covered by water when the valley was flooded to make this reservoir.

Later on, we were treated to this vista. We crossed the bridge earlier in the day.

Another overview shot of the area.

As we crossed a bridge on the way back we saw gravel being taken from the river bed.

This is a very lucrative business in Taiwan. The raw material costs nothing. You get a permit and then extract the gravel.

The gravel bed is huge! Compare the thickness to this shovel.

We had a great time riding down in Taichung. Here is the video that shows what it’s like to climb a hill on a recumbent trike:

This is the route we rode, taken from the GPS tracklog.

Thanks for reading! We appreciate your comments, questions, retweets and recommendations!

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25 Responses to “ Today’s Ride 100320 ”

# 1 MJ Klein Says:
March 22nd, 2010 at 6:22 am
Today’s Ride 100320:

Photos by MJ Klein and Michael Turton + Video by MJ Klein Michael T.. http://bit.ly/9vnzqt
# 2 Taiwanderful Says:
March 22nd, 2010 at 11:25 am
(Best of TW) Today’s Ride 100320 http://cli.gs/vpmGZ
# 3 les katz Says:
March 22nd, 2010 at 1:29 pm
RT @Taiwanderful: (Best of TW) Today’s Ride 100320 http://cli.gs/vpmGZ
# 4 Brunty Says:
March 22nd, 2010 at 10:46 pm
MJ, what a great place to ride. SO beautiful it makes you want to cycle. I just wish I had that here. I am going to download and watch teh video tomorrow and enjoy your huffing and puffing.

I see it was a 200 metre climb overall and looked like a constant uphill gradient.

Thanks for sharing mate.
.-= Brunty´s last blog ..Congratulations Mum and Dad, 47 Years of Marriage. =-.

thenhbushman reply on March 22nd, 2010 11:13 pm:

hi Brunty. yes, that hill wasn’t exactly user-friendly, let’s say. there were a couple of inclines that had me mashing up on the small chainring. it was fun though, and i do need the exercise. going down on the other side of each hill was a good reward! i’m not as fast as the next guy, but i made them all! take care Brunty.

Dave reply on April 5th, 2010 9:21 am:
Hi. Have enjoyed your pics and narrative re the recumbent trike. Is this being sold in the US? If so, any sense as to where? Thanks and best to you. –Dave

thenhbushman reply on April 5th, 2010 12:20 pm:

hi Dave. the Artifice model is being sold in the US by Actionbent, the authorized TW-Bents dealer there. http://actionbent.com/ hope you can join the ranks of trike riders soon! take care Dave.
# 5 filination Says:
March 23rd, 2010 at 6:47 pm
(Best of TW) Today’s Ride 100320 http://cli.gs/EQnP1
# 6 les katz Says:
March 23rd, 2010 at 7:24 pm
RT @filination: (Best of TW) Today’s Ride 100320 http://cli.gs/EQnP1
# 7 Craig Ferguson (@cfimages) Says:
March 24th, 2010 at 10:00 am
Looks great, much better than my aborted Sunday ride in the hills outside Danshui.
.-= Craig Ferguson (@cfimages)´s last blog ..Back To Basics =-.

thenhbushman reply on March 24th, 2010 10:36 am:

hi Craig. what happened that you had to abort your ride? too many people on the trail?
# 8 Colby Says:
March 27th, 2010 at 9:08 am
Do you find it harder to make your way up the hills on a recumbent bike?

thenhbushman reply on March 27th, 2010 2:15 pm:

hi Colby. thanks for such an interesting question. i know what you mean, and i’m not nitpicking, but i ride a trike not a 2 wheeled recumbent bicycle. the distinction is almost as important as the distinction between an upright diamond frame, and a recumbent. on the trike, there are no balance issues. where bicycles have to steer through their next crash (so to speak) the trike is completely stable while riding at any speed. while climbing those hills, i didn’t waste a single ounce of energy on maintaining balance. going slow on a bicycle is difficult and one has to go back and forth in order to maintain balance. i was able to ride the trike in a very straight line and hence save energy while doing so. also, any time i felt like resting, all i had to do was grab the brakes. i was already sitting on a very comfortable seat, and recovering to where i wanted to go forward again, didn’t take that long because of the restful position. i would say that my experience with the trike going uphills was easier than my previous experiences on a mountain bike where i used to live. now that i have a 26 tooth front chainring, i feel like i can tackle any reasonable climb.
# 9 mike01905 Says:
March 31st, 2010 at 8:11 pm
I see your bike ride articles and get jealous that the weather here isn’t nicer for riding pretty much all year round

We’ll have some bike riding weather here this weekend. They are calling for temps to maybe reach 80 degrees (26c)… which will be a nice change.

We’ve just had… not only the wettest month of March on record in the Boston area (and they started keeping weather records in 1872)… but the 2nd wettest month on history in the Boston area. With 3 seperate storms… we received about 14.5 inches (368mm) of rain. Parts of the Charles and Sudbury Rivers are reaching record flood levels. There is flooding all over Eastern Mass and Rhode Island (they were the hardest hit with this latest storm). The only month where they’ve received more rain was Aug 1955 when 2 hurricanes came thru here.

(I’ll find some good links from the local TV stations showing the flooding to e-mail to you)

So… maybe this weekend I’ll be able to get some bike riding in… assuing I don’t run into areas that are flooded out.
.-= mike01905´s last blog ..2010 World of Wheels in Boston =-.

thenhbushman reply on April 1st, 2010 2:03 am:

hi Mike. thanks for the report on the New England area. the rain and flooding sounds pretty bad. i do remember Waltham being flooded in the past, and one of the radio stations there being almost under water. i hope you can get some riding in this weekend. we’ll be riding in East Taiwan on Saturday. should be nice there. take care.
# 10 mike01905 Says:
April 7th, 2010 at 7:51 pm
Well… I did manage to get some riding in last weekend… and so far this week. Temps Monday and Tursday were in the high 60′s (about 20c). Today they are expecting it to get to about 85 (about 29c)… and then a cool down to the low 60′s (about 16c) on Thursday and into the weekend. I would prefer to ride in the cooler weather later this week than the hotter weather today.

The flooding was worse in Rhode Island and Southeast Mass. At the Warwick Mall in Rhode Island…. the water was up the to roofs of cars that were in the parking lot. There was 2 to 3 feet (.6m to .9m) of water INSIDE the mall. They said the cleanup there could take weeks before the mall can reopen.

Speaking of a radio station being under water…. a few weeks ago before the rains hit…. there was a small brush fire at the radio station transmitter sire out in Ashland (the one with the 5 towers).
.-= mike01905´s last blog ..2010 World of Wheels in Boston =-.

thenhbushman reply on April 8th, 2010 4:24 pm:

hi Mike. sounds like the weather there is going to be some prime riding weather! i didn’t hear about the flooding (except from you) and that sounds bad, what happened at the Warwick Mall. that’s going to hurt the local economy i bet. i didn’t hear about the brush fire either but i bet Grady knows about it. take care Mike.

mike01905 reply on April 8th, 2010 8:09 pm:
Well it got to 92 (about 33c) here on Wednesday. They said it was the earliest it ever hit 90 in Boston in the month of April. However… a cold front came thru and today the temps will be about 30 degrees (about 15c) cooler on Thursday and into the weekend.

Well with the Warwick Mall… parts of Rhode Island and Southeastern Mass for like 8 inches (about 200mm) of rain in that last rain storm we had. I guess there is a stream or small river neaby the mall that flooded out the parking lot and inside of the mall. I’ll see if I can find some pictures of the area to e-mail to you on one of hte local TV station websites (might be better to look at the websites for the TV stations in Rhode Island).

The brush fire in Ashland wasn’t all that bad. As you know… trees/tall grass are a bit of a distance from the radio station towers…. so the brush fire most likely never got near any of the buildings at that site.
.-= mike01905´s last blog ..2010 World of Wheels in Boston =-.

thenhbushman reply on April 8th, 2010 9:26 pm:

Mike, if you find some photos of the area be sure to leave us a URL for them. it’s been raining a lot here. I spent the afternoon at the local store, sitting outside drinking beer and Suntory whisky while watching the rain come down. almost fun except for the rain!
# 11 mike01905 Says:
April 9th, 2010 at 5:39 am
There are a LOT of flood related video clips on WJAR Ch 10′s website…

http://www2.turnto10.com/jar/video/archive/Weather/10/20/
.-= mike01905´s last blog ..2010 World of Wheels in Boston =-.

mike01905 reply on April 9th, 2010 5:40 am:
Actually they start on this page…

http://www2.turnto10.com/jar/video/archive/Weather/10/0/
.-= mike01905´s last blog ..2010 World of Wheels in Boston =-.
# 12 Patrick Cowsill Says:
April 13th, 2010 at 6:57 pm
Great shot of you, MJ. Who took it? I’ve been a bit lazy when it comes to riding. I need to get back in the saddle. I’m looking forward to a ride with you. Why don’t you come this way? We could head out to Danshui or Bali, something like that?

thenhbushman reply on April 13th, 2010 9:10 pm:

hi Patrick. Michael Turton took that photo with my camera. the setting is really great, up on that hill.

we could do a ride sometime, on a Saturday. sounds like fun. let’s do it. thanks for the offer.
# 13 Patrick Cowsill Says:
April 15th, 2010 at 8:57 pm
Great! Let me know what Saturday works for you.

thenhbushman reply on April 15th, 2010 11:58 pm:

i’ll get back to you Patrick, as soon as this weather gets better! thanks.