Major Kong and the Holy Grail

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Sunday July 21, 2024 · 11:21 AM PDT

2024/07/21 · 11:21

PXL_20240719_172817009.MP.jpg — First ride on the René Herse.

Sometimes we need a little break from the craziness of politics and current events. This is the story of how I found the Holy Grail.

Okay, I’m a huge nerd from way back so of course I’ve seen Monty Python and Holy Grail about a million times. In college my nerdy friends and I would go around quoting lines from it to each other.

However in this case I’m talking about the holy grail of cycling, or at least French touring bikes.

You see, I was bored one day and decided to look at the cycling section on ebay.fr (French ebay). A quick search for “vélo ancien” and next thing I know I’m staring slack-jawed in disbelief.

There it was, a vintage René Herse touring bike, in near perfect condition.

This type of bike is called a “campeur” (camper) because it has racks for front and rear panniers.

“Too good to be true” I thought. These things are never in my size. They were either built for some giant or a tiny, petit woman.

No way it would fit me……...oh wait…….it’s a 54 cm frame, which just so happens to be what I ride.

Now a little bit of background. René Herse (pronounced “airs” not “hearse” by the way) is considered to be one of the greatest “constructeurs” (custom bike builders) that ever lived. To say that his bikes are sought after would an understatement. This would be like finding an original Van Gogh in a barn somewhere. Prior to this point I had only seen pictures of them in books.

The little touches are what separate a Rene Herse from the rest. The wire for the headlight runs internally through the front rack.

Time to consult Mrs. Kong. The price wasn’t bad actually. Not cheap, but I have more expensive bikes than what the seller was asking. This is where most spouses would probably say “What do you need another bike for?” but mine said “You should totally buy it. If you don’t you’ll always regret it.”

So, a couple weeks later a large box with French shipping labels showed up on my doorstep. Inside was a bike, in pieces.

The seller did a really good job of packaging, but the front fender suffered a crease during shipping and some paint was chipped off the bottom of the downtube. Otherwise it made the trip from France just fine.

The brakes are Mafac center-pulls. The little pulley on the straddle cable is a Rene Herse exclusive.

I dare say I’m a good bike builder. I can do everything except weld my own frame. That I leave to the pros. I was afraid to mess with this one, however. A man has to know his limitations. I took the box of parts to my local bike shop, who I’ve had a relationship with for over 20 years. He’s the only person I would trust beside myself to assemble this bike.

The bars were expertly taped and shellacked.

What can I say about it other than it’s beautiful. By the looks of it, this bike was well used but also well cared for.

The rear fender sports a “Federation Francais de Cyclotourisme” sticker. Included with the bike was a “Club des 100 Cols” pin, which signifies that the owner rode at least 100 mountain passes. I don’t know where this bike has been but I suspect it’s been all over France and maybe Europe.

I have never seen a rear rack quite like this.

René died in 1976 and his daughter Lily (who was a famous bike racer in her own right) kept the shop going along with his frame builder. They built their last bikes around 1985-86 timeframe.

Lyli-Herse-2-1-prgmb302xsj97bk300teqk1oehevi0e8at3y81r3wc.jpg — Lyli racing back in the day.

The frame is lugged Reynolds 531 tubing with internal cable routing.

I don’t know the exact date this bike was built, but would say it’s one of the last ones made before the shop closed in 1985. It doesn’t have the characteristic René Herse stem and sports a TA crankset instead of René Herse crankset. I have a book dedicated to these bikes and there is a picture of a bike from 1983 that has similar components.

Drivetrain is 3x6 with a Huret derailleurs. The chrome has been worn from the rear rack, probably from carrying panniers.

The bike has some very unique features like a rubber chain-stay protector. First time I’ve ever seen something like that. It has “Mafac” inscribed on it.

Look closely and you’ll see a rubber chain-stay protector. I have never seen anything like it.

The lights are powered by a Shimano “Dynapower” generator attached to the bottom bracket. The wiring to the taillight was badly corroded and will need to be redone when I can get to it. Local bike shop guy was afraid to touch the electrics but I’m really good at that sort of thing.

I’ve never seen one of these before. Seems like it’s halfway between the old “bottle” generators and modern hub dynamos.

This clever little setup controls the Dynapower generator. Flipping this little shift lever moves the generator into contact with the rear tire. The cable is cleverly routed through the seat tube. It’s little touches like that which set these bikes apart.

Anyone recognize this saddle? I don’t think it’s a Brooks.

I took it out on one of the local bike trails and did twenty miles on it. For a forty year old bike it rides beautifully. It’s tight. No squeaks, no rattles, no noises whatsoever, except for my crappy shifting skills. The Huret derailleurs and I are still in the “getting acquainted with each other” stage.

I have a set of Simplex shifters like this on my Vitus 992 and in my opinion they’re the smoothest working friction shifters I’ve ever used. I hate to say it, but they work a lot better than the vintage Campagnolo shifters I have on another bike.

The vintage leather saddle is very well broken in and quite comfortable.

The bike is quite stable and handles well. The drop of the handlebars seems a bit “aggressive” for a touring bike but as long as I keep my hands in the randonneur position (where the bar just starts to curve) it’s comfortable.

I like these TA cranksets because they’re relatively narrow and can take a near infinite range of chainrings. This one looks like it has a nice “granny” ring. I’m not a fan of toe-clips, but these are the original pedals so they stay.

I weighed it at exactly 30 pounds, which is good for a bike like this. It’s not particularly fast. I don’t know what the exact gearing is, but I can tell it was optimized for carrying a touring load up a mountain rather than top speed. In the tallest gear I “spin out” around 20 mph. The bike seems quite happy at 14-15 mph, which is my normal touring pace.

Next step will be to find some hills and see how it climbs. I suspect it will do quite well.

It’s a privilege to own a piece of cycling history like this. Rest assured it will be ridden. These bikes weren’t built to sit around and collect dust.

Hopefully you enjoyed this little break from the post-apocalyptic hellscape that is the news these days. Time to go ride!

That Time the Brits Nuked Us

Major Kong

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Saturday June 08, 2024 · 6:15 AM PDT

2024/06/08 · 06:15

RAF crew scrambles to their Vulcan bomber.

I think a lot of Brits are military history buffs, because I’m always running into them on the various social media forums. Which is all well and good, except for when these things turn into nationalistic chest-thumping contests.

The latest thing I’ve seen going around the you-tubes is a series of videos with similar titles about “American reacts when Britain nuked America — twice!”

Obviously this was simulated during some exercise because I don’t recall seeing any post-apocalyptic ruins on the East Coast, unless you count Newark.

So let’s look at what really happened.

Way back in 1961 NORAD staged a massive air defense exercise called Sky Shield II. Roughly 250 American and British bombers simulated an “enemy” attack while around 1800 US and Canadian fighters attempted to intercept them. All civil air traffic over the US and Canada was stopped for the duration of the exercise (approximately 12 hours).

Part of the attacking bomber force was composed of Vulcan bombers from the RAF. Using their excellent for the time electronic countermeasures, they were able to slip in undetected and hit their simulated targets.

Avro 698 Vulcan B.2.a XM575 was delivered to No. 617 Squadron (Dambusters) at Scampton in May 1953. (Courtesy BAE Systems) — Definitely one of the better looking Cold War aircraft.

They put one over on the yanks and they’ve been patting themselves on the back ever since. You can start humming Rule Britannia now if you want.

Rare shot of a Vulcan, B-58, FB-111, B-52 and I think a Vickers Viscount to the right.

But wait, there’s more to the story. Most of the other bombers, B-52s at high altitude and B-47s at low altitude, also got through to their targets. In fact, only about one fourth of the bombers would have been intercepted had this been the real deal. That probably says more about the state of air defenses in 1961 than anything else.

Vulcan, B-52 and B-58. One of these is still in service.

Fortunately we were defending against the Soviet Union and not the United Kingdom. To my knowledge Soviet bomber crews never trained the way we (or the RAF) did.

The times I simulated a Soviet bomber in exercises we were easily shot down. Once the Russians developed ICBMs they never looked back. By the 1980s we knew where a TU-95 was pretty much from the moment it took off.

When they build something that works they stick with it.

The RAF also participated in the Giant Voice 1974 exercise with similar results. That would be the “twice” part, and we’ve been hearing about it ever since. About what you’d except from people who are still going on about how they beat the French at Agincourt in 1415. They also tend to forget that they lost the Hundred Years War.

“Remember that time we were ahead at halftime but lost the game?” — said no football team ever.

F-106A59-0059318thFISGiantVoice79May1980AirCombatMagazine-450X464.jpg — Simulated “kills” on an F-106 during Giant Voice 1979. Vulcans were impressive aircraft but hardly invulnerable.

I myself have penetrated US air defenses. We were playing in some exercise on the East Coast.

The defending F-16s went chasing after our wingman while we snuck out over the Atlantic, turned around and “bombed” Savannah. Too bad. I always liked Savannah. No defense is perfect and a well-crewed bomber can be a difficult target.

Not that the RAF and Royal Navy aren’t highly skilled - they are, very much so.

Just don’t try to drink with them. That doesn’t end well. I think I crawled back to my room on my lips that night.

They’re a good bunch mind you, they just like to pretend that they’re the only people that know how to fly a low level.

Post of a picture on an aviation forum of an aircraft doing a low pass and within a nanosecond one of the blokes will be along to remind you that the Blackburn Buccaneer flew lower.

(Not sure why they named a jet after the price of corn by the way.)

Buccaneer doing what it did best. If I was a bloke I’d make some comment about the crew getting a nosebleed at such a high altitude.

And yes, the Buccaneer crews excelled at low level flying, but so did a lot of other people.

F-111s flew low and before that F-105s flew low. I’ve heard stories over the years of US Navy A-6s dragging their tail hooks through the water and Air National Guard A-7s coming back with tree branches stuck to them. Pretty much any aircraft with an “A” (Attack) designation had a low level mission back then because that was your best chance of survival.

images2.jfif — Navy A-6 Intruder down in the weeds.

Much as we like to one-up each other on low flying - the lowest pass cannot be beaten, it can only be tied. Also the ground has a kill probability approaching 100 percent. A few people have bounced off it and survived but I wouldn’t bet on it.

Air National Guard KC-135E of all things doing a rather low pass.

We also knew a thing or two about low level flying in SAC. In the late 1980s we were still training to take our B-52G’s into the Soviet Union if the “big one” happened. Going in low, hopefully at night, would have been our best chance of getting to the target.

My EWO took this picture. 50 feet over the Saudi desert at 390 indicated. Late 1990 just prior to the Gulf War kicking off. This was our last-ditch defense in case of a missile attack and I wanted to practice it at least once before the war kicked off.

Now it’s one thing to fly close to the ground in a nimble little attack jet. It’s quite another to do it in a 488,000 pound aircraft that handles like the controls are sunk in concrete and has a wing designed for 50,000 feet. We were in so much ground effect at 100 feet that it was hard to make it go any lower.

Hard to tell just how low he is but I would guess 100 feet or so.

Now just to make it interesting let’s throw in some darkness or bad weather. With the equipment and training we had, we could fly our wingspan off the ground — at night. Let’s see your Buccaneer do that mate.

B-52 “rigging” a ship. These were fun missions.

Messing with the Navy. Looks like the B-52 is down around 50 feet. The nose down attitude was disconcerting at that altitude.

So how does a Vulcan match up with a B-52? Here is my highly biased comparison, because hey, I’m the one writing this. Note that the performance numbers are approximate in case anyone feels the need to nitpick.

Category	Vulcan	B-52	Advantage
Top speed	Mach .96	Mach .90	Vulcan
CEILING	60,000 feet	50,000 feet	Vulcan
Thrust to weight	.31	.31 (B-52H)	Tie
range (Unrefueled)	2,265 nm	10,000 nm (B-52H)	B-52
payload (Conventional)	21 x 1000 lb bombs	51 x 1000 lb bombs	B-52
payload (nuclear)	1 free-fall bomb	4 free-ball bombs plus 12 ALCM	B-52
radar signature	Small	Madison Square Garden	Vulcan
Maneuverability	Good	Madison Square Garden	Vulcan
Defensive armament	None	4x.50 caliber or 1x20mm cannon	B-52
was in a james bond movie	Yes	No	Vulcan
Combat service	That one time	A whole bunch	B-52
LOOKS	Awesome	It’s called “BUFF” for a reason	Vulcan
Length of service	28 years	Probably to the end of time	B-52
Total SCORE	7	7	Tie

I made it a tie because both aircraft have their strengths and weaknesses and I could have gone either way. I’d say the Vulcan had a better chance of reaching its target undetected but the BUFF could do a lot more damage if it got there.

Vulcan cockpit. Cramped even compared to a B-52 and visibility was poor.

Also the B-52 crew had a better chance of at least surviving. Only the pilots had ejection seats in a Vulcan. The other three crewmembers had little chance of getting out.

Three brave souls sat downstairs with only a hatch to jump out of.

The pilots sat upstairs while the Navigators and EWO faced backwards.

The Vulcan’s main claim to fame was its role in Operation Black Buck during the Falklands War. While they did ingress to their targets at low level, they popped up to medium altitude (10,000 — 15,000 feet) to release their weapons. That was either to stay out of range of anti-aircraft guns or because they didn’t have “high drag” bombs that could be dropped from low altitude. Someone here is probably the expert on this and will let me know.

They managed to put a single hole in the runway at Port Stanley and damaged some Argentinian radars with Shrike missiles. These were at the time the longest bombing missions ever flown. How effective they were is up to debate. Some would say this was a bid by the RAF to stay relevant in a time of decreasing budgets. The Falklands War was mostly a Royal Navy affair.

During the first three nights of the Gulf War, B-52s flew multiple low-level strikes against Iraqi targets. I myself piloted one of those sorties but you probably knew that already. Amazingly none of us were shot down although we did have planes come back with holes in them. For some reason this has never been well publicized.

In conclusion, I’d say it’s hard to argue with success. One of these aircraft was retired in 1984 and the other one, well…..

The Electric Revolution

Major Kong

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Friday May 10, 2024 · 5:32 AM PDT

2024/05/10 · 05:32

A lot has changed since I first wrote about E-bikes back in 2020. Today sales of E-bikes are vastly outpacing sales of electric cars. Seems like they’re everywhere now. In 2023 roughly 40 million E-bikes were sold worldwide.

I was just at the local big-box electronics store and even they are selling E-bikes now. Mind you I would probably not buy a bike from a big-box store. I’m all about supporting my local bike shop, who has helped me countless times over the years.

PXL_20240509_180634926.MP.jpg — Probably not the place I would go bicycle shopping. Your local bike shop will likely give you better support.

Bicycles are already one of the most efficient forms of transportation. Modern electric drivetrains are also very efficient. Combine the two and you can go a long way on literally pennies worth of electricity.

I was drawn to E-bikes when Mrs. Kong was diagnosed with heart problems. She’s fine, thanks for asking, but she will only ever be able to go so fast on a bicycle. I am a reasonably fit cyclist and can average 15-17 mph depending on which bike I’m riding and how badly I want to beat myself up.

Unassisted, she’s maybe good for 12 mph. Now, through the magic of technology, she can easily keep up with me.

Using my patented “throw money at the problem” method I first tried two electric conversion kits, neither one of which really met our needs performance wise. Now either of these would work just fine for a commuter or casual rider, but we were looking for the ability to do rides in the range of 80 to 100 miles.

I finally gave up and just bought her the $$$ bike I should have gone with in the first place. I did learn a lot about e-bike conversions, however, and have since done a couple more for friends.

PXL_20230522_134704084.MP.jpg — This is the bike I should have bought in the first place. Riding the Great Allegheny Passage last summer.

The first bike I converted was Mrs. Kong’s mixte frame Soma. I originally ordered a conversion kit from a UK based company Swytch. They ran into supply chain issues and months later out of desperation I ordered a similar kit from another UK company called Cytronex.

The Cytronex kit uses a 250 watt geared front hub motor which makes for easy installation. Top speed is around 20 mph with a range of maybe 25 miles. I ended up buying a second battery so it can now probably go 50 miles. This kit requires you to take multiple measurements of your bike because they will size the cables to fit. A reasonably handy person could probably install this in a couple hours.

The one thing I don’t like about it is the cadence sensor works off the rear cassette and is a bit fussy to set up. Most cadence sensors mount to the crank and are easier to install. Note that a cadence sensor just knows if you’re pedaling (and maybe how fast you’re pedaling) while a torque sensor actually senses how much force you’re applying to the pedals. That’s why the better E-bikes tend to have torque sensors.

It’s fun to ride and I dare say it looks a lot classier than most E-bikes.

PXL_20240418_182159931.MP.jpg — The oversized “water bottle” is actually the battery. There’s a spare hiding in the front bag.

Meanwhile my Swytch kit finally showed up a full year after I ordered it. I think it’s a good product but I think the company is still dealing with supply-chain issues. Two of my friends ordered kits from them and had similar experiences with delays. If you order one of these don’t expect to get it overnight.

The Swytch kit is advertised as fitting most bikes and I’d say that’s the case. I managed to install one on my friend’s bikeE recumbent with a 20-inch front wheel, so it can be done. The most important thing is to measure your fork accurately to see if the hub motor will clear it.

If it will work on this thing it will work on just about anything. Keeping the cables clear of the rider’s feet was a real challenge.

Since I had finally bit the bullet and bought Mrs. Kong the bike I probably should have purchased in the first place, I now had an orphaned conversion kit looking for a home.

I ended up installing it on my faithful randonneur “Blue”. I probably now have the only E-bike with cantilever brakes and downtube shifters. The battery is cleverly concealed in the front bag while two spare batteries travel in the rear bag. Top speed is around 22 mph and I should be able to go 75+ miles.

Fear not dear reader. Blue’s replacement has already been built. I haven’t given up riding conventional bikes. I just thought a “stealth” E-bike would be fun (it is).

PXL_20240331_154403754.MP.jpg — You have to look close to tell that this is an E-bike.

Meanwhile, we had been eyeing a Co-motion tandem E-bike for a while. It’s a really nice looking bike but the price starts at $18,000! I’ve bought cars for less than that. Since we already had an older Co-motion tandem that we really like, a conversion seemed like the much more sensible, and much less costly option. This also solved the problem of having to store two tandems.

This project seemed a bit ambitious for me, so I farmed it out to a local bike shop that specializes in electrics and trikes. The kit itself came from a Pennsylvania company appropriately named “E-Bike Kit”, and is meant for “heavy duty” applications like tandems and cargo bikes.

With a 500 watt rear hub motor and a massive 15 amp-hour battery it will easily go 100 miles at 17-18 mph with battery to spare (we’ve tested this). Despite only having a cadence sensor, the controller has some clever programming that mimics a torque sensor.

The decision to use a rear hub motor was driven by the necessity of transporting the bike on a rooftop carrier. This requires removing the front wheel and attaching the front dropouts to the bike carrier. I didn’t want to be removing and reinstalling a motor-wheel every time we transported the bike. With the additional weight of the motor and battery, the bike is now a bit tail heavy. Since I outweigh my stoker by a good 50 pounds, once we’re on the bike it’s not really an issue.

We also considered a mid-drive conversion but were worried about putting too much stress on the drivetrain. Tandem components already need to handle the force of two riders pedaling at once. Adding a motor to the mix didn’t sound like a great idea.

We had some issues with it at first, mostly breaking spokes on the rear wheel. Mind you these are beefy 12-gauge spokes. In frustration, I finally shipped the rear wheel back to the manufacturer who built me a new wheel and added spoke washers. So far we’ve had no further problems. Kudos to them for standing behind their product.

PXL_20240406_175631540.MP.jpg — We’re very pleased with it now that the teething problems have been sorted out.

A word of warning to would-be do it yourselfers. Most of the hub motor kits will only work on a frame that has dropouts. Since the industry has largely switched over to thru-axles, these will not work on most newer frames. I think there is exactly one kit that will work with a thru-axle (Grin technologies in Canada) and it seemed like overkill for what I was trying to do.

Your other option would be a mid-drive conversion, which replaces your bike’s bottom bracket and crankset. You’re on your own if you go this route, because I have no experience with them.

This is a pretty typical looking mid-drive kit. The only advice I can give you is take measurements to make sure something like this will fit your bike’s frame and bottom bracket shell.

s263235063426757404_p1_i1_w800_f4e980eb-ccec-4d2b-9a95-479b85a57410_2048x.jpg

Before you dive into a conversion, note that I’ve seen prices on complete E-bikes come way down. Entry level E-bikes today are selling for around $1000 and occasionally go on sale for less. The disadvantages of a DIY conversion may not be worth it to save a couple hundred bucks.

I had this bike as a rental on a recent layover. I would say it’s a pretty typical entry level E-bike. I looked it up and it retails for around $1,100. It seemed pretty capable for an entry-level bike. Range is advertised as 45 miles, 65 if you buy the larger battery. It folds in half, which would be useful for someone with limited storage space. Keep in mind that these bikes are relatively heavy. This one weighs in at a hefty 64 pounds. You might be able to fold it, but it will still be tough to carry it up stairs. The components, as you would suspect, are on the cheap end of the spectrum.

You can get pretty much any style of bike in an electric version these days. Recumbent, trike, cargo, beach cruiser, you name it.

I think the cargo bikes are pretty cool but they tend to be heavy and take up a lot of space. Still, you can just about replace a car with one. I saw one that will cleverly stand on its tail to make storage easier.

This is a pretty typical cargo E-bike. It’s advertised as being able to carry 440 pounds with a range of 50 miles.

Since I’ve become the neighborhood “expert” on E-bikes, people tend to ask me what to buy. I usually answer: “It depends. What do you want to do with it?” Road? Mountain? Trails? Commute? Errands? How far? How fast? I’d suggest finding a good bike shop that knows E-bikes and working with them.

In general I would say that a mid-drive with a torque sensor is the preferred setup if you don’t mind the extra cost. In my experience this configuration gives you the most natural feel. The torque sensor feeds power on demand better than the “all or nothing” effect you can get with just a cadence sensor. Since the mid-motor works through the bike’s drivetrain it can take advantage of gearing, allowing for a more compact, lighter setup.

To throttle or not to throttle? This comes down to preference. I can see a throttle being useful for someone that doesn’t care about exercise and just wants transportation. It can also be useful to quickly accelerate across an intersection, if your bike has enough power. I removed the throttle from my 250 watt hub motor because it was pretty worthless. We do have a throttle on our tandem, but I almost never touch it.

Keep in mind that a throttle may change the legal classification of your bike so keep your local laws and regulations in mind.

Be sure to know your local laws. Oh, and don’t be an idiot. Enough people hate cyclists as it is.

Now what about exercise? I would say it all depends on how you ride. Since I’m mostly doing this for fitness, when I’m on an E-bike I expend just as much effort as I do on a regular bike, I just go faster. We went 100 miles on your e-tandem the other day and I definitely felt like I’d done a century ride at the end of the day. Obviously if you just use the throttle or “ghost pedal” (pedal just enough to engage the motor) then the bike is doing all the work and you’re not getting much out of it.

I think the biggest advantage of an e-bike is the way it can take the edge off a steep climb or a strong headwind. I’ve taken the E-bike out on days with 20 mph winds where I probably would have just stayed home otherwise.

Storing and transporting E-bikes can be a bit of a challenge. Even a relatively light E-bike weighs in excess of 30 pounds and I’d say 50 pounds is more typical. Your standard trunk mounted bike rack is not rated for that kind of weight. I ended up having a hitch installed on my car so that we could purchase a good quality hitch-mounted rack. None of this was cheap, mind you.

Another consideration is that you may or may not have the strength to heave an E-bike up onto the back of a car. Our rack didn’t come with a ramp (some do) but I was able to fabricate one so Mrs. Kong can load and unload her bike.

PXL_20230807_130859216.MP.jpg — This is a really nice E-bike. Priced accordingly. I thought the ramp was a nice little piece of fabrication on my part.

There are a few drawbacks to E-bikes. I’ve already mentioned weight, plus the occasional challenge transporting and storing them. Here are a few more:

Hardcore roadies hate e-bikes. They also hate disc brakes for some reason I can’t fathom. It’s a brake, not a religion. I have ten bikes and no two of them have the same type of brake. As long as it stops when I pull the levers I’m happy.

Now I may be a roadie but I’m not one of those guys. It’s a bike. I don’t tell people what to ride. Whatever gets you out riding is fine by me. Same goes for recumbents, even though I happen to think they all look like someone’s science-fair project. Only one person has to like your bike and that’s you.

E-bikes have put a lot of people on bikes that otherwise wouldn’t be riding. Overall I think that’s a good thing. However, I get the impression that some of these folks haven’t ridden a bike since they were a kid and it shows. Might want to brush up on cycling rules and etiquette. Enough people hate cyclists as it is.

Keep in mind that on an E-bike you’re likely faster than anything else on the trail except a very fit road cyclist (who is probably out on the road in that case). I can outsprint Mrs. Kong on her E-bike but I can’t sustain it and I certainly can’t pass her on a climb.

You’re quieter than you think and will overtake people faster than they’re expecting. I think most people’s brains “compute” a bike to be moving around 10 mph and anything faster than that surprises them. Keep in mind that some trails have speed limits, usually around 15 mph.

I have heard stories of lithium-ion batteries catching fire but I suspect in most of those cases it’s cheap bikes with cheap Chinese batteries. We’ve never had any trouble with ours. I won’t leave one sitting on a charger overnight, just to be sure.

So charge up and enjoy the ride.

A Bike Named Blue - Part 4

Major Kong

Community (This content is not subject to review by Daily Kos staff prior to publication.)

Wednesday July 26, 2023 · 5:14 AM PDT

2023/07/26 · 05:14

PXL_20230716_121308962.MP.jpg — Xenia Station. Usually very busy on a weekend but it's early on a Sunday.

Continued from previous

Day 4 of my bike trip across Ohio. Cedarville to Cincinnati.

It’s the last day and it looks like a good one. No rain in the forecast and my ill-fated rear tire seems to have held air overnight. I set off from Cedarville first thing.

PXL_20230716_113839875.MP.jpg — Leaving the (only) hotel in Cedarville

The first ten miles takes me to Xenia Station, which is the junction of several bike trails. I jump on the Little Miami Scenic Trail which should take me all the way to Cincinnati.

The plan is for Mrs. Kong to drive to the Cincinnati suburb of Newtown, and then ride north to meet me in Loveland. For me that will be the 50 mile point.

I’m making good time, right up until the 20 mile point when the rear tire goes flat yet again. For those keeping score this will be the forth time in two days.

PXL_20230716_122717240.MP.jpg — Riding the Little Miami Trail

This time I swear I’m going to get it right. I carefully remove the tire and tube as a unit so that they stay in position. Then I inflate the tube with my hand pump and reach inside the tire until I feel the air leak. Noting where it is on the tire I remove the tube. Sure enough, there’s that tiny piece of metal embedded in the tire. Or maybe it’s a different one. I have no idea what I rode through back in Columbus. It’s not even a millimeter in length but it’s sharp enough to cut my fingertip. I wish I had a pair of tweezers but instead I try to dig it out with the tip of a pen knife. It’s so small I can’t tell if I get it out or just drive it deeper into the tread.

Meanwhile every rider on the Little Miami Trail (and there’s a lot of them) stops to offer assistance. Unfortunately there’s not much they can do for me. Hardly anyone on the trail rides 650b tires, that’s more of a gravel bike thing. An extra set of hands wouldn’t do much good anyway. One woman can make a baby in nine months but nine women can’t make a baby in one month.

I have one final card that I haven’t played yet. I carry a section of an old inner tube in case I completely trash a tire and I figure that’s what I’ve done here. I cut a large patch with my knife and position it between the tire and tube where that pesky metal sliver was - just in case it’s still hiding in there. Now a smart person would have brought an extra tire on a trip like this, or at least had one in the car, but you have to remember who you’re dealing with here.

Thankfully that seems to have done the trick and I have no more tire problems for the rest of the trip. I normally get maybe one flat a year. Four in as many days has really left me frustrated.

I guess if it was easy everyone would be doing it.

PXL_20230716_142228945.MP.jpg — Passing under the I-71 bridge on the Little Miami Trail

One final obstacle remains between me and lunch in Loveland. At Kings Mills, just north of the old cartridge factory, is a very busy road (Grandin Rd) that the bike path used to cross. This area is under construction to route the bike path under the road and is normally impassable.

Picture I found on social media of the construction project.

I came down this way a couple weeks earlier to ride the suggested detour and didn’t much care for it. It required a rather steep climb and riding several miles on less than bike-friendly roads.

It is, however, Sunday morning and nobody is working.

Paragraph redacted under the advice of my legal team at Dewey, Cheatem and Howe attorneys at law.

Once past the detour I make it to Loveland with no trouble.

PXL_20230716_162848508.MP.jpg — I had a hard time even finding a spot to lock up my bike.

Loveland is a very popular spot on a weekend. Fortunately Mrs. Kong has arrived ahead of me, secured a table at a sandwich place and even ordered me food.

PXL_20230716_162842833.MP.jpg — A lot of people ride the Little Miami on a weekend.

From Loveland it’s around 30 miles to downtown Cincinnati. This section of the trail is busy on a Sunday afternoon.

Kong’s first rule of bike paths — a single walker or jogger will not hear your bell or verbal warning because they will be wearing earbuds.

Kong’s second rule of bike paths — a group of walkers or joggers will not hear your bell or verbal warning because they will be talking to each other.

Kong’s third rule of bike paths — when you say “on your left” half the time they will only hear “left” and move in that direction.

Kong’s fourth rule of bike paths — that jogger right in front of you will suddenly make a 180 without looking because their fitbit told them it’s time to turn around.

Kong’s fifth rule of bike paths — three people on a bike path will all meet at the same point at the same time even if they are the only three people in a hundred mile radius.

We ride past our car in Newtown and continue towards downtown. This route goes past Lunken Field, which was the original Cincinnati airport, and then along a couple roads with bike lanes until picking up the Riverfront Trail to downtown.

PXL_20230716_184850636.MP.jpg — Downtown Cincinnati. You can see the iconic suspension bridge in the background.

The Reds are playing a home game and downtown is crowded. We carefully make our way to the public boat ramp for the obligatory tire dipping on the Ohio River.

Under no obligation to ride any further I consider taking an Uber back to get the car but we both feel good and it’s probably just as quick to ride the ten miles back to the car.

The Riverfront trail is rough and parts of it run along some old trolley tracks. Mrs. Kong swerves to avoid a group of pedestrians, hits a track and goes down hard. Damn. Not how we wanted to end this trip. Fortunately it’s just scrapes and bruises and she is able to ride the ten miles back to the car.

More importantly her bike was OK (just kidding honey).

PXL_20230716_185021918.MP.jpg — This section was a bit dicey. Watch out for those tracks.

Special thanks to the Fulton Yards Coffeehouse for being so nice to Mrs. Kong who was obviously not having a good day at this point. She got a free croissant and use of their first-aid kit.

Total mileage for the day 87. Total for the entire trip 348 with 5300 feet of elevation.

It’s not going to get me into Paris-Brest-Paris but pretty respectable for a guy my age.

Here is the full route and statistics if anyone cares

Would I do it again? Maybe. I actually felt pretty good at the end and thought I could have gone further. Adding a fifth day and staying overnight in Massillon would probably make it an easy trip.

Oh, and I would bring an extra tire.

A Bike Named Blue - Part 3

Major Kong

Community (This content is not subject to review by Daily Kos staff prior to publication.)

Tuesday July 25, 2023 · 9:18 AM PDT

2023/07/25 · 09:18

PXL_20230715_130445041.MP.jpg — On the Alum Creek Trail in Columbus

Continued from previous

Day 3 of my bike trip across Ohio. Columbus to Cedarville.

This should be an easy day, or so I thought. As Woody Allen once said “If you want to make God laugh, tell him your plans.”

I leave the house early and backtrack roughly 5 miles to get to the trail. I live in the suburbs of Columbus, where we like to turn cornfields into subdivisions. There has been massive development out here in the last few years. I don’t know how much longer I’ll be able to get out of my neighborhood on the bike without taking my life in my hands.

Once on the Alum Creek trail I have one detour to contend with. They are rebuilding one of the bridges and there is no official detour. I know of several unofficial detours from social media and I decide to chance the shorter but riskier one. It requires me to jump on normally busy road for about a half mile. Fortunately it’s early on a Saturday morning and there’s no traffic to speak of.

PXL_20230715_124459210.MP.jpg — There’s no easy way around this.

The Alum Creek Trail is a well kept secret that runs along the east side of Columbus. There’s a more popular trail that runs past the OSU campus but it tends to be congested.

PXL_20230715_130408365.MP.jpg — Hard to believe you’re in the middle of a city.

Where the trail branches I take the I-670 connector towards downtown Columbus.

PXL_20230715_132130698.MP.jpg — Not the prettiest trail but it lets me ride from my house to downtown.

Let’s talk about food for a minute. A subject near and dear to my heart. The problem I have on these long rides is eating enough calories to keep myself going without eating so much I upset my stomach. A road cyclist at my weight supposedly burns 30-50 calories per mile. That means I’ll need an extra 2000 or so calories for the 70 miles I plan on going today.

I stop at a coffee shop downtown for a breakfast sandwich and a cappuccino. This will later prove to have been a good idea. Years of night flying have made me a bit of a coffee addict. When my doctor asked me how much coffee I drink I told her “as much as it takes”.

PXL_20230715_141324617.MP.jpg — On the west side of Columbus looking back towards downtown.

I plan to stop for lunch in London OH, which is right around the 50 mile point. London has: a very busy McDonald’s, a diner like the ones NPR goes to when they want to interview Trump voters, and a coffee shop with a bike shop in the back.

I lose the trail for a couple blocks on the west side and pick it back in a part of town called “The Hilltop”. For those not familiar with Columbus, it’s considered to be a rough neighborhood.

PXL_20230715_143650056.MP.jpg — Not a fun job with any bike but especially not a loaded touring bike.

No sooner do I get back on the trail when my back tire goes flat. My day was going pretty well right up to now.

After going through the lengthy process of removing the bags, flipping the bike on its back and getting the rear wheel off, I can’t find anything wrong with it. I feel around inside the tire but I don’t find anything. I’m usually careful to avoid pinch-flats but maybe that’s what I’ve got here.

I swap the tube, put the whole mess back together, and head back down the trail, about a hundred feet before it goes flat again.

I’ve got one more inner tube but it’s my last one. Fortunately Mrs. Kong had decided not to ride that day so she’s back at the house. I text her to grab as many 650b tubes she can find in our basement/bike-shop and put them in the car (just in case).

Despite the hilltop’s rough reputation nobody bothers me. I am carrying bear spray in my bag but that’s more in case I run into dogs. A woman on a gravel ride in southern Ohio recently stopped to fix a flat, was attacked by three pit bulls and ended up losing a leg. I’ve outrun dogs a few times but if I’m broken down that’s not an option.

A young mother and her two young children that are playing on the bike path come over and talk to me. I explain that I’m riding from Cleveland to Cincinnati and she in as many words asks me why any sane person would want to ride a bike to Cincinnati. I don’t have a good answer for her.

This time I pull the tire completely off the rim, like I should have done the first time, and give it a thorough inspection. I find what looks to be a speck of dirt but is actually a tiny sliver of metal. About the size of a breadcrumb (Americans will use anything as a unit of measure except the metric system). A pair of tweezers would be really useful right now (note to self) but I don’t have any so I dig it out with my pen knife.

By the time I finally back on the trail this incident has cost me at least an hour and I’ve got 45 miles to go.

Well, things are never so screwed up that they can’t get worse. I barely make it past I-270 on the west side of Columbus when the rain starts. I knew I would probably get rained on at some point today but I didn’t expect it this early. As I’m struggling into my rain gear a nice park Ranger stops her car and asks if I need any help. I wave her off and keep going.

I lose the trail at Darby Creek Metro Park and have to ride a section of gravel through the park to pick up the connecting trail. I don’t mind rain and I don’t mind gravel, but both is not a good combination. I work my way through much slower than I normally would.

PXL_20230715_161659985.MP.jpg — At Darby Creek Metro Park I pick up the trail to London

Fortunately It’s just a steady rain and not a thunderstorm so I don’t need to take shelter.

I have very good rain gear, but the problem with rain gear is that anything that will keep rain out will also keep sweat in. Fortunately the rain has cooled the temperature off somewhat so I don’t overheat too badly. My pace is slowed by the rain and the headwind that has been a constant companion on this ride.

The flat tires have blown my lunch plans out of the water. By the time I get to London the coffee shop has closed and I don’t really have time to eat at the diner. I stop at a gas station convenience store and grab a protein bar and a sports drink (it’s got electrolytes!). There’s no place to sit down so I stuff my face and get back on the bike.

I resign myself to having to eat a late lunch in Cedarville. The next closest town is South Charleston, which just has an IGA grocery store and an ice cream shop that never seems to be open when I ride through there.

Cedarville is roughly 20 miles from London, with South Charleston about halfway. Two miles outside of South Charleston my rear tire starts to go flat again. Some choice words may have been uttered at this point.

Fortunately by now Mrs. Kong has driven to the hotel in Cedarville so she’s only 10 miles away with the car. I text her to meet me at the South Charleston trailhead and bring inner tubes. She does better and meets me there with a couple of inner tubes plus a sandwich and a frozen chai from our favorite place in Cedarville. I inhale both as by now I’m seriously bonking as well as hot from riding the last 30 miles in rain gear.

I pull the tire off and sure enough, there’s that tiny metal piece. Or maybe there was more than one. It’s so small I can’t really tell. Once again I use the tip of a knife to hopefully dig it out of the tire.

PXL_20230715_192447542.MP.jpg — Bad picture of the trailhead in South Charleston. That’s an old train caboose in the background. Note that the path is still wet from the day’s rain.

By the time I get the flat repaired it has stopped raining so I’m able to ditch the rain gear. I push hard and ride the last ten miles to Cedarville at 17-18 mph. Cedarville has something like 4,000 people, a small college, a very good coffee shop and exactly one hotel that happens to be right next to the bike trail.

We have dinner in Yellow Springs, which is a funky little town that hosts Antioch College and one of our favorite restaurants.

Total miles for the day 71 with 1500 feet of vertical. Total number of flats changed — 3.

Tomorrow will hopefully see me in Cincinnati.

To be continued.

A Bike Named Blue - Part 2

Major Kong

Community (This content is not subject to review by Daily Kos staff prior to publication.)

Monday July 24, 2023 · 4:19 AM PDT

2023/07/24 · 04:19

PXL_20230714_112114727.MP.jpg — Getting ready to head out in the morning.

Continued from previous.

Day 2 of my ride across Ohio will be from Millersburg to my home in northeast Columbus.

I like to get an early start on these long rides because one never knows what can crop up along the way. I grab a quick breakfast at the hotel and head out.

The Holmes County Trail takes me 5 miles to Killbuck, where I have to ride country roads to Glenmont to pick up the Mohican Valley Trail.

PXL_20230714_112736904.MP.jpg — You share the Holmes County Trail with Amish buggies. Watch out for horse by-product.

I can’t say much about Killbuck except there’s not a whole lot there and the place looks like it has seen better days.

I have no trouble on the roads. I see maybe five cars between Killbuck and Glenmont. I have a radar taillight plus a helmet mounted mirror so I have no problem “checking six”.

The cars give me a wide berth. I have fortunately never had someone actively take a swipe at me although a couple have come too close for comfort over the years. If I see a line of cars getting backed up behind me I try to pull off and let them pass. No sense pissing people off. Enough folks hate cyclists as it is.

PXL_20230714_120106081.MP.jpg — Out on the road. Fortunately not many cars this time of morning.

The Mohican Valley Trail features a 3 mile climb at maybe 2% grade followed by the same on the descent. The nice thing about rail trails is the climbs tend to be long and shallow because that’s what a train needed.

PXL_20230714_130518201.MP.jpg — On the Mohican Valley Trail. I can imagine the workers had to blast through the rock when they built the railroad through here.

There was a time when that climb used to bother me. Since then I’m done a lot of riding in NORCAL and climbed Mount Tam three times. It hurt just as bad each time.

PXL_20230714_131158324.MP.jpg — I’m not sure why it’s called that but it’s a very nice bridge.

The Amish like to drive their buggies on the trail. I don’t really mind except the horses leave, you know, horse stuff on the trail. I get stuck behind a buggy for the last couple miles on the trail. I might have made it around him but I wasn’t willing to chance getting ground into pate by his steel-shod rims.

PXL_20230714_132534807.MP.jpg — This guy wasn’t giving me much to work with. Usually they stay to one side of the trail.

The trail ends at a smallish town called Danville. I ride maybe five blocks across town and pick up the Kokosing Gap Trail which will take me roughly 15 miles west to Mount Vernon. Meanwhile Mrs. Kong has parked 15 miles on the other side of Mount Vernon and plans to ride her bike to meet me halfway.

PXL_20230714_142931618.MP.jpg — Crossing an old rail bridge on the Kokosing Gap.

Once I’m on the Kokosing Gap trail I’m on my “home turf”. It’s a very scenic trail and reasonably close to home so I ride it frequently.

PXL_20230714_143015967.MP.jpg — I sometimes see people kayaking and tubing on this river.

Our timing works out and Mrs. Kong meets me on the trail a couple miles outside of Mount Vernon, where we stop for lunch at a very nice little cafe. I don’t normally shill for people but The Farmer’s Daughter once actually opened on their day off so that a group of cyclists could have a place to eat. I figure that deserves a favorable mention.

(If I’ve violated a rule here let me know and I’ll take it out)

PXL_20230714_165854861.MP.jpg — Halfway to Cincinnati!

The town of Centerburg is the center of Ohio (hence the name) and also the halfway point along the Ohio to Erie Trail. Centerburg is pretty small and doesn’t have much in the way of food. There is however a coffee shop run by a Texas immigrant that sells kolaches. A kolache is Czech pastry that made its way to the Texas hill country with Czech immigrants. Kind of like a jelly donut but much better. To me part of the fun of bike touring is finding unique places like this.

PXL_20230714_165948216.MP.jpg — Mrs. Kong and her e-bike. I added the rack, fenders and extended handgrips.

From Centerburg it’s only about 25 miles to home along the Heart of Ohio Trail. Sections of this trail are relatively new so it’s pretty smooth. I make good time despite the afternoon heat and the headwinds.

I’m feeling pretty good and riding maybe 17 mph when I come up behind a guy on a carbon fiber road bike. He looks to be roughly my age but it’s hard to tell.

He suddenly sprints to stay ahead of me. At first I figure he’s doing interval training but he repeats it every time I start to close on him so I think he’s actively trying to hold me off.

Mind you neither one of us are particularly fast. This isn’t the Tour de France. This is more like the time I raced my 73 VW Bug against a Datsun B210 back in the day.

Hey, I’m just trying to get home here but I’m game if you are. By now I’ve already ridden 60+ miles but I manage to kick it up to 20 mph, which is about as fast as I can sustain without sprinting. He can’t hold the pace and I go by him with fenders, racks, bags, lights, bell etc.

Blue isn’t exactly fast, but she’s faster than you think. I have to enjoy my small victories sometimes.

PXL_20230714_171930422.MP.jpg — This is a fairly recent stretch of trail between Sunbury and Centerburg OH.

PXL_20230714_185102733.MP.jpg — Crossing the dam at Hoover Reservoir. Almost home.

The last 5 miles is on roads but I’m close to home so it’s familiar territory. I roll into the driveway with 81 miles and 1500 feet vertical under my belt. This will prove to be the easiest day of the trip.

To be continued

A bike named Blue - Part 1

Major Kong

Community (This content is not subject to review by Daily Kos staff prior to publication.)

Sunday July 23, 2023 · 11:35 AM PDT

2023/07/23 · 11:35

PXL_20230713_125812242.MP.jpg — Somewhere in the Cuyahoga Valley National Park

(Note. This is a very long post with a lot of pictures. You were warned.)

This is my bike.

Well, it’s one of my bikes. You see, after I built this one I kind of got hooked on building bikes. Fortunately I have a wife that indulges my bike habit.

Odds are you don’t have a bike that looks like this. Most people don’t. I certainly don’t pass myself going the other way on the bike path.

It’s not my most expensive bike, or my fastest, but it’s my favorite. If I could only have one bike, this would be the one. Ha! One bike! Who am I kidding?

“Blue”, as my wife named her, is an elegant French lady.

At least she looks like French. I designed her to look like a classic French randonneur.

In reality she’s a mix of parts from various places. A veritable United Nations of cycling. Velo Orange is an American company but they probably make their frames in Taiwan, as most do these days. She’s got a bit of Italian in her (Campagnolo), some Japanese (Honjo), and there’s a modern German light, powered by a hub dynamo, hiding inside that antique French headlight. The saddle and front bag are French (Berthoud). The handlebar tape is British (Brooks).

Her frame is steel. Yes, I’m one of those “steel is real” people. I have an expensive carbon fiber Colnago that I bought for my 50th birthday and have never really warmed up to it. Other than my aluminum Vitus 992, the rest of my bikes are steel. I think steel gives a better ride plus I like the classic looks of the skinny tubing.

I also like shiny bits on my bike. Somewhere along the way the powers that be decided that all bike components had to be black. I prefer more of a classic look for my bikes. Think E-Type Jaguar versus Cadillac CTS.

Sure, Blue’s a bit heavy at 28 pounds (without bags) but I really only notice the weight on climbs. With the 3x10 drivetrain I can gear down to a 24x30 combination and grind my way up most hills. On flat ground it’s about as fast as anything else plus able to go where the fast road bikes don’t dare.

What really makes her special are the extra wide 650b x 42 tires. With gravel bikes being all the rage today, fat tires are making a comeback. People sometimes forget that bikes had fat tires before they went to skinny tires. At 50-60 psi they make for a smooth ride and handle rough roads and light gravel easily.

I built her to go the distance and that’s exactly what I plan to do. For years now I’ve wanted to ride the length of the Ohio to Erie Trail, all the way from Cleveland to Cincinnati. Officially it’s 326 miles and I plan on doing it in four days.

I plan on staying at hotels and at my house in Columbus along the way. I’m a bit old to be sleeping in a tent. Air Force survival school got camping out of my system for life. I have no desire to drag a bunch of camping gear along on this ride and sleep on the ground. My idea of roughing it is if the hotel doesn’t have a bar.

Day 1 — Cleveland to Millersburg

We drive to Cleveland the day prior and spend the night in a hotel downtown. The plan is for Mrs. Kong to drive partway, ride part of the trail with me, and then meet me at the hotel in Millersburg. That way she gets to do more than just drive the car but still gets to ride within her limits.

PXL_20230712_192703835.MP.jpg — Edgewater Park in Cleveland is a popular starting point.

I set out from Cleveland early and have no trouble getting out of the city. Just south of downtown I pick up the Erie Canal Towpath, which will take me all the way to Massillon.

PXL_20230713_104141345.MP.jpg — Heading out of downtown.

There are a few ominous looking clouds over Lake Erie but the weather to the south looks good as I head out.

PXL_20230713_104537406.MP.jpg — Looking back at downtown Cleveland.

The trip was almost over shortly after it started. Rain the day prior had left the trail wet with puddles in some spots. I go to swerve around a particularly deep looking puddle, hit a slick patch, and almost go down. Spooked me pretty good. After that I gave up trying to miss the puddles. After all, that’s what fenders are for.

PXL_20230713_104947211.MP.jpg — The Towpath starts just south of Cleveland.

The Towpath is mostly crushed limestone and it can be rough in spots. You could ride it on skinny tires (I see people do it) but fat tires definitely help smooth out the vibrations.

PXL_20230713_123747147.MP.jpg — A typical section of the Towpath.

A section of the trail was closed for repaving. Fortunately I knew about the detour ahead of time from social media so I wasn’t surprised by it. Getting around it took about 5 miles of riding on the roads plus a rather steep descent down a gravel path to get back to the trail. This would be the first of three detours I would have to contend with.

PXL_20230713_115429999.MP.jpg — Detours are unfortunately a fact of life.

After passing through the Cuyahoga National Forest the Towpath goes through Akron, Canal Fulton, and just past Massillon. I will break off at Massillon and ride west on the Sippo Valley Trail.

PXL_20230713_131730396.MP.jpg — Crossing a wetland north of Akron

Riding north from Dalton on her e-bike, Mrs. Kong meets me somewhere between Akron and Canal Fulton. We stop in Canal Fulton for lunch and I ride back to Dalton with her. She takes the car while I have another 25-30 miles left to ride.

PXL_20230713_140035823.MP.jpg — There is a bit of a climb into downtown Akron but it’s not too difficult.

PXL_20230713_140751984.MP.jpg — Following the canal south of Akron

Canal Fulton is a cute little town that boasts a couple of restaurants, a coffee shop and a very popular ice cream stand.

PXL_20230713_162145488.MP.jpg — This is a popular stop for cyclists in Canal Fulton

PXL_20230713_171414710.MP.jpg — On the Sippo Valley Trail just west of Massillon.

The Sippo Valley Trail is mostly paved but it’s very bumpy in spots. Even with the fat tires I have to slow down in spots to avoid a pinch-flat or getting bounced out of the saddle. My front bag bounces out of its mount once or twice, which almost never happens.

The Sippo Valley Trail ends at Dalton. There’s not much in Dalton except a park and a couple convenience stores. From there I will have to ride about 15 miles on country roads through what’s called “The Amish Country” before I pick up the Holmes County Trail in Fredericksburg.

Amish buggies are a common sight on the roads in this part of Ohio but they also have taken a liking to E-bikes in recent years. Makes about as much sense as anything else I suppose. Must be a loophole in the bylaws that allows E-bikes.

The prevailing winds in Ohio tend to be from the southwest, which just so happens to be the direction I’m going. I’ll end up bucking headwinds for the entire ride. It’s also hot. Close to 90 degrees. Despite trying to stay hydrated I’m feeling the effects of the afternoon sun.

This part of Ohio is rolling hills and there is one pretty good climb just outside of Fredericksburg. It’s just under a mile and tops out at 11% grade. This is the only time on the entire trip I will need my small chainring and of course I drop the chain when shifting down to it. Doh!

Trying to balance a heavy bike on an incline while struggling to put the chain back on I have my first “I’m 61 years old. Why am I doing this to myself?” moment of the trip. There will be others.

Starting back up the hill my bike starts making a horrible noise. I’m certain I got the chain back on correctly so I have no I idea what’s causing. I think the asphalt has actually melted in the heat because my tires are coated with asphalt and gravel and I’m hearing it getting flung into my aluminum fenders.

I slowly grind my way to the top while my bike makes rock-crusher noises and an impatient SUV glues itself to by back fender. Sorry pal, I’m doing the best I can here. This is the point where I really start questioning my life choices.

In all my years of riding I’ve never seen this happen.

Fortunately Fredericksburg has a hardware store downtown. I buy a paint scraper and scrape what looked like a good quarter inch of tar, sand and gravel off my tires. This is also why I carry a set of mechanics gloves, a rag and alcohol wipes in my bag.

From Fredericksburg it’s a mercifully short ride down the Holmes County Trail to Millersburg where Mrs. Kong is waiting at the hotel. Total mileage for the day is 106 with 2800 feet of vertical.

Between the heat, hills and headwinds I’m ready to get off the bike for a while.

To be continued.

Musing about Motors

Major Kong

Community (This content is not subject to review by Daily Kos staff prior to publication.)

Thursday March 23, 2023 · 5:46 AM PDT

2023/03/23 · 05:46

We just watched A Man Named Otto with Tom Hanks.

Excellent movie, which I’m not really here to talk about, except for one of the subplots.

(Spoilers Ahead)

The character played by Tom Hanks is throughout his life a devoted Chevrolet owner. His friend and neighbor likes Fords, which severely strains their relationship over the years.

In an early scene where Otto is a boy, his father shows him the car’s engine and says something like :“That’s a Chevrolet motor. That’s dependable.”

Oh boy. Heeeeeeeeeeere we go. I’ve been hearing that sort of thing since I was growing up in the 60s and 70s. I’ve known people like that over the years and I’m even related to a couple.

I think this is why the internet was invented. That and cat videos.

Apparently Chevys are marvels of engineering and never break. In fact, GM dealers don’t even need to have service departments. Chevrolet engines are immortal and will outlast the heat death of the Universe.

Meanwhile the roads are so littered with broken down Fords and Chrysler products you can hardly move.

This way I can piss off both sides. I’m equal opportunity.

Or maybe it’s the other way around. Ford trucks can tow an ocean liner up Mt. Everest while a Chevy can barely pull the skin off a day-old chocolate pudding. I don’t know these things. I always figure I can rent a truck for the one day out of the year I need to haul something that won’t fit in our station wagon.

You get the idea.

“First On Race Day”

“It’s MOPAR or no car!”

“I’d rather walk than drive a ___________ “

It seems to be worse among pickup truck owners. Ford trucks vs GM is like Catholic vs Protestant. Not sure what that makes Dodge, or “RAM” as they’re calling their trucks these days. Maybe they call them “RAM” because that’s what they’re always trying to do to my car.

And God forbid you drive an import. Might as well join the Communist Party at that point.

I can remember back when owning an import, at least in the Midwest, would mark you as an oddity at best and a traitor at worst.

Once in the early 1980s I was threatened with physical violence for riding a Japanese motorcycle. I have not forgotten this. In case you wonder at my sometimes disdain for Easy Rider cosplayers. Yeah, I know it wasn’t you but that sort of thing is hard to let go of.

Here’s the thing. A car is a consumer product. It’s not a religion. It’s not a nationality. It’s not a tribal identity. It’s a piece of metal. It doesn’t love me.

I am no more loyal to Brand X or Brand Y of car companies than I am to toaster manufacturers.

I don’t think KitchenAid and Breville owners are posting memes about each other on Facebook.

Speaking of which. What’s the deal with all the “Yeti” stickers on car windows? Yeah I know they make great coolers but Black & Decker makes some really awesome extension cords and I don’t give them free advertising space on the back of my car.

And no, I’m not going to buy a Brand Y just because it’s (mostly) made here.

Sorry Mister Detroit auto executive. If you want my hard earned money you might try building something I want to buy instead of waving the flag at me. The same goes for you Budweiser.

(Typical Budweiser commercial: Clydesdales, flags, heart-stirring music, more flags, even more flags, Clydesdales saluting the flag…..)

Cars are expensive and I’m not going to buy something that doesn’t suit me just because it’s made next door. Pretty sure that’s how Capitalism is supposed to work. You make something I want, I give you money for it.

I’ve owned a lot of cars over the years. Too many actually. Make that way too many. I’ve usually had a “hobby car” that I was restoring plus I keep an “airport car” for work. I still have my 57 DeSoto because I can’t bear to part with it. Everybody and their Aunt Susie has a 65 Mustang, nobody has a DeSoto.

Between my wife and I we’ve had Fords, GMs, Chryslers, VWs, Nissans, Acuras, Audis, Mercedes plus a couple of Jaguars, or “Jaaaaaaags” as Jeremy Clarkson likes to call them.

I had several muscle cars back in the 80’s when they were still just old cars. This was before guys my age starting paying six figures to own the car they had in high school. I found them generally to be troublesome regardless of make. To be fair, it probably had as much to do with how I drove them as the cars themselves.

One of them ate clutches like they were potato chips. Then I put a heavy duty clutch in it. After that it broke everything except the clutch. Plus my left leg got to be twice as big as my right leg. Driving it was like working out on the Stairmaster at the gym.

Most everything I’ve had that was built since the mid 1980s has been pretty reliable if properly maintained. The only modern cars that have ever left me on the side of the road were both airport cars and were probably on their last legs when I got them.

Some have been better than others, mind you.

I had a bad experience with a mid 1990s Chrysler which wouldn’t have been so bad if it wasn’t for the truly awful dealer service department. I finally ended up talking to the regional service rep who basically told me to go pound sand. Needless to say I haven’t bought another one.

Keep acting like you don’t like your customers and that problem has a way of sorting itself out.

Then there were the two Jaaaaaaags. Beautiful, powerful, comfortable, solid, wonderful handling sedans that were every bit as troublesome as you’ve heard. I didn’t learn my lesson with the first one and went back for more, because I enjoy pain.

The second one was a V12. Did I mention that I enjoy pain? I think I put the service manager’s kid through college with that car. This was long after the days of Lucas Electrics, so I can’t even blame the “prince of darkness”.

When it got to where parts on the XJ12 were breaking faster than I could afford to fix them I traded it on an Audi. We’ve been driving mostly Audis since then.

Shows how bad Jags are if they make German cars seem reliable. I think the Brits like to show off their engineering prowess by making every part twice as complicated as it needs to be.

The day Audi stops making things I like I’ll buy something else. I owe them no allegiance. I don’t have a cartoon of Calvin peeing on a BMW symbol in my back window. I don’t have the four-ring emblem tattooed on my body. To my knowledge, no one in Ingolstadt Germany has built a statue of me.

Heck, even my rural in-laws in Appalachian Ohio drive Subarus these days. Who’d have thought?

The Reformers

Major Kong

Community (This content is not subject to review by Daily Kos staff prior to publication.)

Friday March 10, 2023 · 10:50 AM PST

2023/03/10 · 10:50

(Author’s note. I worked on this for several days only to have it completely dumped when I tried to save it. This has been rewritten largely from memory.)

In the mid 1960s, with the country mired in the Vietnam War the Air Force determined that it would need a new fighter aircraft to counter the threat of newer Soviet aircraft.

The aircraft that came out of the F-X project is the plane we know today as the F-15. The F-15 would not be the plane it is today, however, if certain people had gotten their way.

Most notable of these people was Fighter Weapons School instructor John Boyd. Along with a group of like-minded fighter pilots who are often referred to as “The Reformers” or as “The Fighter Mafia”.

Today people might call them “disrupters” because they wanted to shake up the defense establishment.

Boyd himself was a very polarizing figure. People tend to think he was either the greatest military mind since Clausewitz or a total a-hole. He famously claimed that he could beat anyone in a dogfight in 40 seconds. A claim which as far as I know is unsubstantiated. Boyd flew in Korea as a wingman and never scored an aerial kill.

At the time all this was going on the main fighter of the USAF and US Navy was the F-4 Phantom.

The Fighter Mafia particularly disdained the F-4. First off, it came from the Navy and the Air Force hates having to take Navy aircraft. It was too big, had too many engines, too much avionics and too many radar-guided missiles. Plus it could (Eeeeeek!) drop bombs. Fighter pilots generally hate dropping bombs. Even multi-role F-16 pilots would rather chase each other around the sky than do “air to mud” given a choice.

Air-to-ground is bullshit! — John Boyd

Fighter pilots make movies. Bomber pilots make history. — Anonymous

The worse thing about the F-4, however, was that it had too many people. Originally the Air Force put two pilots in the F-4, which drove the fighter guys nuts. Later on they switched to putting Navigators (WSOs) in the back seat. Even so an F-4 driver once told me “There’s not a WSO in the world I wouldn’t trade for 200 extra pounds of fuel.”

This looks like a late model F-4 with wing slats and an internal gun.

Boyd and the Reformers are often credited with the development of the F-15. I would say the F-15 was developed more in spite of them than because of them. While they did play a large part in its development, they didn’t really like the F-15, thinking it too big and too complex. They especially didn’t want the pulse-doppler radar and radar guided missiles, which is pretty much what makes the F-15 what it is.

The nose of the F-15 contains a powerful air to air radar allowing it to be a “mini AWACS”.

It’s tough to argue with success. The F-15 has a record of something like 104 to 0 in air to air combat.

No sooner had the F-15 been developed that the Reformers went back to pushing for the plane they had really wanted in the first place.

What the Fighter Mafia wanted was a light, simple (there we go again), single-seat, single-engine fighter with no radar, guns only or maybe a couple of heat-seeking missiles. Basically the YF-16 prototype, which was quite a bit different from the production F-16.

The YF-16 was everything the Fighter Mafia wanted. Small, light, highly maneuverable. Armed only with a 20mm cannon and two Sidewinder missiles.

general-dynamics-f-16-air-combat-fighter-prototype-shows-news-photo-1579811287.jpg

Compared the YF-16 this F-16C Block 70 looks like an entirely different aircraft.

By the time the F-16 reached production it had become a multi-role aircraft with an air-to-air radar and bomb dropping capability. It was larger, heavier and not as nimble as the YF-16. It has also gone on to be one of the most successful fighters ever. With over 4,500 of them operated by 27 different countries over the years.

The Fighter Mafia felt betrayed by the production F-16 and started lobbying yet again for their simple lightweight day fighter, which thankfully never came about.

They envisioned large numbers of these little guys would achieve air superiority through epic dogfights reminiscent of World War I. And then…….well I’m not sure. I guess put on airshows to entertain the ground troops since they wouldn’t be able to drop bombs. “Not one pound for air-to-ground!” was the mantra.

The problems with this approach are numerous:

First off, this was the Cold War and we were preparing for a major conflict in Europe. Now anyone who has spent any time in Northern Europe can tell you that the weather tends to be pretty crappy much of the time. All those wonderful little day VFR fighters would have spent a lot of time on the ground staring up at the overcast layer.

Then there’s the issue of logistics. We would need a lot more pilots to fly all those fighters. Which means more trainer jets, and more instructor pilots and more instructors to train those instructors and more mechanics, and more air bases to house all this stuff. Not so simple after all.

Then there’s the minor problem of between the F-15 and the lightweight fighter, roughly 2/3 of the USAF fleet would have had no air-to-ground capability whatsoever.

There was a popular saying back then: you can shoot down all the MiGs you want but if the Russian tank commander is eating lunch in your snack bar when you get back, you’ve lost the war.

I’m not diminishing the importance of air superiority but the air-to-air guys sometimes act like they’re the only reason the war is being fought.

Finally - it’s not 1964 any more and missiles actually work.

Every aviation geek knows the story by now. In the late 50s and early 60s the Air Force was run by bomber generals (true) and was focused on intercepting Soviet bombers with long range missiles (true) and had largely forgotten how to dogfight (also true).

Then we got into Vietnam and the F-4 didn’t even have a gun!

This is where I note that even “The last gunfighter!” F-8 Crusader scored most of its kills with missiles because its guns were notorious for jamming. F-8’s only made four gun kills in Vietnam.

(The shortest measurable unit of time is between someone posting something about the F-8 and someone saying the last gunfighter).

The F-8 had the highest kill ratio of any fighter during the Vietnam War. Much of its success was due to the skill and training of the F-8 community.

This is one of those instances where it’s possible to learn a lesson too well. Vietnam was a unique case where the harsh tropical climate plus restrictive rules of engagement put missiles at disadvantage. The much maligned AIM-7 Sparrow was almost never used in the manner it was designed for, so it’s no surprise that it didn’t work all that well in Vietnam.

Today we’re as far from Phantoms over Vietnam as those Phantoms and MiGs were from SPADs and Fokkers over Verdun. Fifty years from 1917 to 1967 and fifty from 1973 to 2023. Yes, it’s been that long.

Even by 1973 the Israelis had no trouble killing MiGs with missiles and certainly by the 1980s missiles had become very capable. They’ve only gotten better since then. Times change. Technology changes. Warfare changes.

By 1991 roughly 40% of the air to air kills in Desert Storm were from Beyond Visual Range. The only gun kill in that war was an A-10 of all things shooting a helicopter.

That A-10 is now on display at the Air Force Academy. Of all the things the A-10 has done, they picked the one that shot down another aircraft.

Likewise the B-52D on display at the Air Force Academy is one with a confirmed MiG kill.

Which goes to show the emphasis the USAF puts on air to air combat versus all else.

Today, if you were to find yourself in a dogfight something has probably gone very wrong. From what I’m told, most of the maneuvering takes place long before what they call “the merge”.

I was having a conversation with an F-16 pilot recently who described it like this. If you break off to go mano-a-mano against an enemy jet, everybody on both sides can see you and they’ve all got a missile. The philosophy today is having a “wall” of jets sweeping through and firing missiles ahead of them. Not unlike how the guys in the late 50’s thought we’d be doing things.

Now I don’t think Boyd and the rest of these people were stupid. Boyd famously came up with the concept of “OODA Loop” and the energy maneuverability theory which are still considered groundbreaking.

So I would say quite intelligent but I think he suffered from “smartest guy in the room” syndrome. A certain Representative from Wyoming named Dick Cheney was a big fan of Boyd, which should tell you something.

I think their main problem was these guys were fixated on dogfighting to the exclusion of all else. They spent a lot of time talking about “the white scarf stuff” and WWI dogfights. Chivalrous “knights of the air” wearing white scarves and outmaneuvering each other in epic dogfights.

Except there was nothing chivalrous about WWI air combat. WWI ace Eddie Rickenbacker described it as scientific murder. World War One pilots had very short life expectancies and a lot of them burned to death. There was nothing romantic about it.

Your options were: crash, burn, jump or use your sidearm. All were usually final.

There wasn’t anything chivalrous about medieval knights either, if you’ve read anything about them. The quickie version is, they weren’t very nice people.

It is forbidden to kill; therefore all murderers must be punished unless they kill in large numbers and to the sound of trumpets.

Voltaire

I also think the Fighter Mafia over emphasized simplicity. The F-86 that John Boyd flew in Korea was not a simple weapon and certainly more advanced than its main adversary the MiG-15.

The MiG-15 looks like a tractor next to the sleek Sabre Jet.

The F-86 was one of the most sophisticated aircraft around in 1950 with advanced features like automatic leading-edge slats and a radar gunsight that allowed it to score hits at much greater range than the MiG-15s powerful but inaccurate cannons.

Go back to World War II and the P-51 Mustang was a very advanced aircraft for its time. Featuring the best American airframe coupled with the best British engine. The B-29 that ultimately defeated Japan cost as much as the Manhattan Project to build.

Go back to World War One and the SPAD S.XIII and Sopwith Camel were the most advanced things they could build in 1917.

OK, you want simple? I’ll give you simple. Here, this is about as simple as it gets. Just walk up to the other guy and stick him with it.

main-qimg-e2ff2f3a2711cc8bac4ba5c0bd4288fc-lq.jfif

Oops. He had a longbow. I guess it’s not that simple after all. Ouch. That’s got to hurt.

A Reunion

Major Kong

Community (This content is not subject to review by Daily Kos staff prior to publication.)

Saturday February 18, 2023 · 9:52 AM PST

2023/02/18 · 09:52

PXL_20221218_192645222.MP-Copy.jpg — B-52G 58-0183

Tucson is a great place for bicycling, at least during the months where the temperature doesn’t approximate the surface of the sun.

On a recent weekend layover I found myself in Tucson with a rented bicycle and time on my hands. This was apparently the one weekend a year it rains in Tucson. But hey, I pay for bike, I ride bike. Needless to say I got soaked. “Builds character” as my mother would have said.

Fortunately I was back in Tucson two weeks later and the weather was more cooperative. I decided to ride out to the Pima Air and Space Museum.

Gratuitous cactus picture so you know it’s Arizona.

Tucson has a very nice bike path network called “the loop” which, as the name implies, makes a loop around Tucson.

Spotted a Roadrunner by the bike bath. Apparently they don’t go “Beep! Beep!” My childhood was a lie.

Riding “the loop” around Tucson. Really nice bike path.

The museum is just south of Tucson near Davis Monthan Air Force Base, home of the “boneyard” for mothballed aircraft. Note that you can no longer tour the boneyard so don’t bother asking.

I managed to get a look at the boneyard as I rode south. These C-130s are just a very tiny part of it.

The museum itself is huge. It covers 80 acres and boasts a collection of roughly 400 aircraft. Some of them are pretty rare. I spent a good part of the day going “Wow. I’ve never seen one of those up close before.”

PXL_20221218_192243430.MP.jpg — There are only four B-36s still in existence and one of them is here.

There is no way I can post pictures of 400 aircraft here unless you want to be scrolling for days. If you check out their website at pimaair.org they probably have better quality pictures than anything I could take anyway.

T-38 Talon, which I logged 1000 hours instructing in as a young FAIP (First Assignment Instructor Pilot). I think the aircraft directly behind it is a BAC Jet Provost trainer.

PXL_20221218_192745994.MP-Copy.jpg — These are at the end of their service life and will be phased out soon.

I was really here to see one plane in particular. You see, I was meeting an old friend.

After going through the large indoor exhibits I had to wander outside a ways to find it.

PXL_20221218_192543092.MP.jpg — You knew this was coming.

First off, this is a B-52G, the second to last model built. This one was built in 1958. You can tell the year of production by the first two digits of the serial number 58-0183.

PXL_20221218_192931715.MP-Copy.jpg — B-52G with a “tall tail” B-52D behind it. The D’s had all been retired by my time.

This particular tail number was assigned to the 2nd Bomb Wing, Barksdale AFB Louisiana. Odds are pretty good that I either flew it or sat alert in it at some point during my tenure at Barksdale. That was the main reason for my visit.

Nothing to make you feel old quite like seeing a plane you flew in a museum.

PXL_20221218_192936622.MP.jpg — The museum wasn’t very crowded that day. I finally found a nice German tourist to take my picture.

I haven’t been this close to one in thirty years and I had forgotten just how massive they are. At 488,000 pounds fully loaded it is still the largest aircraft I have ever flown. Since I will likely finish out my airline career on the 767, it will remain so.

The 767 maxes out around 400,000 pounds. The B-52G could actually be air refueled to just over 500,000 pounds in flight.

PXL_20221218_200024506.MP.jpg — The two chin turrets housed night vision cameras. The turret closest to me is in its stowed (streamlined) position. The other is rotated with the camera forward.

Cockpit photo showing the night vision displays (green screens). I think this was late 70s early 80s technology and pretty amazing at the time. We could fly 200 feet at night, which was basically our wingspan.

The Fleur-de-lis on the tail marks this as a Louisiana (Barksdale) aircraft. The gun turret and fire control radar are still there, but the four .50 caliber guns have been removed. Unlike older models the gunner of a G model sat up front in the cockpit.

The G models were all retired around 1993. Probably just as well. They were pure turbojets (J-57s) and burned a lot of gas. With today’s fuel prices I doubt even the military could afford to operate them. Most of them were chopped up by treaty with the Russians at the end of the Cold War. This is probably one of the few intact G models left.

This would be a good picture if my glasses weren’t crooked. I include it anyway because it shows the nose art and the 2nd Bomb Wing insignia.

PXL_20221218_193131794.MP.jpg — Sorry. Selfies aren’t really my thing.

PXL_20221218_193103080.MP-Copy.jpg — Either that’s my “steely eyed warrior” look or the sun was in my face.

The slightly newer B-52H is still around, and is scheduled to get new engines along with a few other improvements. They’ll probably still be flying long after I’m gone.

I actually had a Barksdale B-52H pass 1000 feet under us not too long ago. First time I’d seen one in flight in a very long time. We were over Arkansas on a flight to Memphis.

As I write this, I’m looking at the pictures and thinking, thirty years is a long time. This picture was taken in January 1991 right after our first Gulf War mission. I’m on the far left, totally rockin’ that ‘stache if I do say so. The mustache alone had three confirmed kills.

I would have been 28 years old when this was taken.

I could have spent the day there but it was a nice day and the bike path was calling.

I left mostly feeling old, but it was a good visit. Definitely check out the Pima Air and Space Museum if you’re in Tucson.

Oh Canada (In which I screw up badly)

Major Kong

Community (This content is not subject to review by Daily Kos staff prior to publication.)

Monday October 31, 2022 · 9:42 AM PDT

2022/10/31 · 09:42

We hadn’t been up to Canada since Covid so we thought we’d take a trip up to Niagara-on-the-Lake in Ontario for some biking, kayaking and wine tasting.

I can remember back when you didn’t even need a passport to cross the Canadian border but it hasn’t been that way for a long time. Since Covid you also need to go online and register on the ARRIVECAN system. Fortunately I looked this up before hand, saving us an embarrassing incident at the border. It’s pretty painless. You go online, register your passport and Covid vaccination status. Only took a few minutes. When you cross the border they scan the barcode that the app spits out.

Canada’s loss rate from Covid is less than half what ours is so I don’t blame them for not wanted a bunch of dirty furriners spreading disease around.

covid-deaths-united-states-promo-1643754664981-videoSixteenByNineJumbo1600-v3.png

Once that was done we loaded up our trusty 2009 Audi A4 Avant aka “the Barbie fun wagon” with our tandem bike and inflatable kayak. It’s about a 7 hour drive from Columbus Ohio up to Ontario if you go via I-90 through Buffalo.

Since the last time we drove up there they have replaced the toll booths on the New York Thruway (I-90) with cameras that read your license plate. I registered with them online and finally got the bill a month later. For a while there I was afraid I might be a fugitive from the state of New York.

We crossed the border near Buffalo and headed up to St. Catharines, where we had a vacation rental waiting. I’ve never had any trouble crossing into Canada. The only times I’ve gotten attitude from a border guard is on the way back into the US.

In case you’ve never been there, Niagara-on-the-Lake is a cute, touristy little town that sits on the Canadian side of the Niagara River where it empties into Lake Ontario. Being nestled between lake Erie and Lake Ontario tempers the climate enough for the Niagara region to have a large wine industry.

Niagara-on-the-Lake is a popular tourist spot and priced accordingly.

We like to stay in nearby St Catharines because it’s less touristy and also more affordable. We were able to rent a nice house in St Catharines for the price of a hotel room. Our hosts were a very nice couple named Brian and Richard and their dog Arlo. Arlo and I quickly became best buddies, but I suspect he likes everyone.

Enjoying some of the local product. I had never heard of Baco Noir but it’s quite good.

We’ve had mixed results with vacation rentals and Bed-and-Breakfast but I’d say the positives outweigh the negatives. This was definitely one of the nicer ones we’ve rented.

On a previous Ontario trip we had booked what looked like a really nice Bed-and-Breakfast out in the wine country. When we arrived they told us “we’re putting you in the annex”.

Turned out the annex was a couple miles down a country road and on top of a bar. But it gets better. The bar had a live band that played until well after midnight. Right under our room. Then the heater in the room went out sometime around 3:00 AM on a chilly fall day in Ontario. The next morning the owners got to see my “bad side”. Fortunately that has been our only truly bad B&B experience.

(Narrator’s voice) The only bad one so far…..

The first day we planned to ride down to Niagara Falls, repeating a ride we had done five years prior. It’s a pretty easy 15 miles from Niagara-on-the-Lake down to the falls, mostly on bike path. There’s one pretty good climb where you cross the Niagara Escarpment but it maxes out at 7.5% and we’ve done worse.

I have never visited the American side of Niagara Falls. I have always been told that it’s, shall we say, past its prime. The Canadian side is nice but it’s a huge tourist trap.

Re-enacting a picture I took 5 years ago.

After making the climb up Queenston Heights.

The bike path passes under the Queenston-Lewiston Bridge that connects Canada to the US.

We started out level with the river and now we’ve climbed quite a ways.

It may be touristy but it’s worth seeing at least once.

Horseshoe Falls and the Maid of the Mist.

We decided to take the roads on the way back north because the bike path was pretty bumpy and everywhere it crossed a drainage ditch it had a narrow bridge that was hard to navigate on a tandem.

Looking at the Queenston-Lewiston Bridge on the way back North.

Day 2 was supposed to be kayak day and of course it was raining that morning. We went into town and played tourist until the rain let up in the early afternoon. “We dragged this thing all the way here and we’re putting it in the water dammit.”

The story behind the inflatable kayak is that we wanted a kayak but live in a condo with limited storage space. The inflatable type seemed like a good option. Folds up into a duffle bag and doesn’t take up much room in our garage. With an electric pump we can set it up in about 15 minutes.

Good ones aren’t cheap, but the good ones are real kayaks and not beach toys. Not the kind of thing you’d want to take down the rapids but great for lakes and calm rivers.

We had hoped to take the kayak on the Niagara River to make up for our unsuccessful attempt 5 years prior. Long story short - 5 years ago our previous inflatable kayak sprung a leak, cutting our excursion short. Fortunately we’d splurged on a good one that had two floatation chambers and could stay afloat on just one in a pinch. We made it back to shore without having to practice my USAF water survival training.

Unfortunately on this trip we couldn’t find a decent place to put in on the Niagara River. If anyone lives in that area and knows a good spot that doesn’t require a 4x4 to get to I’m all ears.

Instead we headed over to Martindale Pond, which is just west of St Catharines. The launch point was a bit muddy but we got the kayak in the water and paddled around a bit. Got to see a Bald Eagle so it was worth the trouble.

This is a big, stable touring kayak that’s good for lakes and calm rivers.

Trust me. That unidentifiable blob is a Bald Eagle.

That’s as much as I could zoom in on it.

Day three the weather was perfect and we planned another bike ride. This time we started at the Welland Canal, went south along the bike path and then worked out way onto the roads through the wine country. Eventually we made a big loop up to Niagara-on-the-Lake and then back through the vineyards to St. Catharines. After stopping to sample some of the local Cabernet Franc, with is probably the best thing they make up here.

The Welland Canal connects lake Ontario to Lake Erie and is an important shipping route. There is a bike path that runs along much of it.

You wouldn’t think they could grow wine grapes up here but they do.

Can’t ride through the wine country without stopping at a winery. Except for the lack of mountains this could be Sonoma.

Ship coming through one of the locks on the Welland Canal.

We hated to leave St Catharines because our hosts were so nice and we really liked where we were staying. We made sure to check out some real estate in case we have to flee the country in a few years during the Greene/Boebert administration.

We hadn’t been to Toronto since pre-pandemic so we had planned a long weekend there before heading back to the States. I booked us a nice room at a hotel on the waterfront (rhymes with restin’) at an exorbitant price. I think there was a music festival that weekend, but then there’s always something like that going on in Toronto.

Arriving in Toronto on a Friday afternoon was when things started to go south in a hurry. First off, the city has had a big growth spurt in recent years and it’s a mess of construction and traffic. Much worse than I remember from previous visits.

When we pulled up to the hotel it was a zoo. I think they were hosting a convention (because of course) and the parking valet was beside himself. He told me they didn’t have any more oversize parking spots and they didn’t have any place to store our tandem bike even if we took it off the roof. I would have taken it up to the room but no way was it going to fit in an elevator.

Accepting defeat, I let him send me to a surface parking lot next door. This was mistake #1.

Now as I tell this, keep in mind that in aviation we like to talk about a “chain of events”. Usually there are several points at which the chain of events can be broken, preventing an unfortunate result.

I sent Mrs. Kong up to the room with our luggage (mistake #2) while I took the car and navigated the construction to the parking lot next door.

The attendant told me they were rented out for an event and not taking any cars over the weekend. He suggested I go next door to a parking garage. I pointed to the bike on the roof and asked about fitting into a parking garage. He assured me “a truck will fit in there”. I believed him (mistake #3).

Well, you can probably see where this is going by now. In my defense, I knew the bike was on the roof and I swear I thought I had clearance. It was a steep ramp going down to the parking garage which made the entrance look taller than it was. Plus there was a car behind me and I let myself get in a hurry (mistake #4) and the rest was a horrible sound of metal hitting concrete.

In the Air Force we used to say: one “oh shit!” cancels a hundred “attaboys!”.

In one massive screw up I managed to trash our beloved Co-motion tandem and our trusty Barbie fun-wagon.

The lady in the car behind me said she yelled “stop” but of course I didn’t hear it with my windows up. Being a polite Canadian she probably never thought to use her horn. (In New York and Boston they learn to use the horn before they learn how to start the car.)

This upset me because the car was in near perfect condition for a 2009 model.

As you can see from the picture, the tandem carrier tore lose from the roof rail and the whole assembly pivoted back, hitting the tailgate and buckling the roof of the car. At the same time the roof rack came lose from the rails and moved about six inches back.

Now I’m sitting there with a tandem bike rocking back and forth like a seesaw while the parking garage attendant yells at me to get off his ramp. I managed to restrain myself which is why I’m not writing this from a Canadian jail.

That’s actually $5000 worth of repairs according to the body shop.

I managed to back the whole mess back up the ramp and pull off to the side to assess the damage. Roof rack is trashed, bike looks bad but is probably fixable (it was). Car is definitely damaged. Oh well, if you’re going to screw up might as well do a proper job of it.

A “helpful” postal worker said “Careful eh! You could lose your bike!” I shot laser beams from my eyes and disintegrated him. Well, not really, but I would have if I could. That last thing I need at this point is someone telling me what in idiot I am. Trust me, I know.

After a couple frantic calls I managed to get Mrs. Kong to walk over from the hotel. No way could I do this by myself.

First order of business was to get the tandem carrier re-attached to the roof rack. Four bungee cords and a cable lock would be sufficient to get us home. Then we had to heave the bike off the roof so we could move the whole roof rack and cargo carrier assembly back to its proper place. Finally the bike had to go back on top.

If it’s stupid and it works it’s not stupid! Flight tested at 75 mph on I-90.

The tandem has a steel frame so the damage was limited to scratches on the fork. The handlebars and brake levers had been pushed out of alignment, the headset felt loose and I didn’t have the proper tools with me to fix any of this. Bike was definitely out of commission for the rest of the trip. (I was able to fix it once we got home).

So now that damage control had been accomplished we still had the problem of no place to park. We made our way back to the hotel and I explained our dilemma to the first management looking type I could find. They found a spot for the car out front of the hotel, where it stayed. Any thoughts of riding the tandem or using the kayak in Toronto were out the window.

I was so upset at this point I momentarily gave thought to calling the whole thing off and just going home but my better judgement prevailed. We’re here, the room’s paid for already, might as well make the best of it.

The view from our room looking out towards Center Island.

Toronto is mostly like a large American city minus all the guns. It has a nice lakefront and big theater scene. Parking can (obviously) be a problem as there are frequently festivals, concerts and sporting events — especially in the summer months.

Expect to pay big city prices, but the exchange rate helps at the moment.

This is the picture postcard shot of Toronto with the CN Tower in the background. Note the construction barrels.

With our tandem out of commission we ended up renting bikes for a day. The bike paths downtown are pretty crowded but if you head east away from the city you can get a good ride out to the Lake Ontario beaches.

You wouldn’t think they’d have beaches up here but they do.

If you haven’t been to the St. Lawrence Market it’s one of the best public markets in North America. Get a pea-meal bacon sandwich from the Carousel Bakery. It will change your life.

Ferries run out to the islands every 45 minutes or so.

Toronto from Centre Island. Swans are mean, by the way.

Epilogue — I took the car to a body shop when we got home. Cost to repair would have been over $5000 for a car that is worth maybe $3500 at this point (2009 with 100,000+ miles).

I now have a new “airport car” and Mrs. Kong is enjoying the 2020 Mercedes E450 wagon I found her. Truth be told we had been talking about getting one for some time now and this was just the excuse we needed. Plus the local dealer actually had one, which you almost never see in the Midwest. Most of these cars seem to live in New England.

Black cars look great — for about five minutes after you wash them.

I don’t know why people buy SUVs when they could have one of these for the same price as a Chevy Suburban. Carries just as much, drives like a sport sedan and will eat your (stock) 1960’s muscle car for lunch. Sure, it can’t go off road but odds are the Chevy Suburban hasn’t either. But station wagons are “uncool” because the Boomers parents drove them, so Americans don’t buy them.

I didn’t want a black car but good luck finding one that isn’t. Good luck finding a station wagon period these days.

Despite the “incident” we still had a good trip. As I like to say “A valuable lesson was learned that day.”

Mind the GAP

Major Kong

Community (This content is not subject to review by Daily Kos staff prior to publication.)

Sunday July 03, 2022 · 12:14 PM PDT

2022/07/03 · 12:14

The Keystone Viaduct just east of Meyersdale PA.

The Great Allegheny Passage is probably one of the prettiest bike paths in the country. It runs approximately 150 miles from Pittsburg to Cumberland Maryland through some really beautiful scenery.

This is a ride that we had been trying to do for several years now but the pandemic and other things got in the way. Finally the stars aligned - I had time off plus a good weather forecast. We decided to go for it.

The original plan was to ride the whole trail in two days, but we decided that might be a bit ambitious for Mrs. Kong. We cut it back to one day, from Ohiopyle PA to Cumberland, roughly 72 miles.

Now for the logistics.

If we stayed in Ohiopyle, we would need to hire a shuttle service to take us back there from Cumberland. If we stayed in Cumberland, we would need a shuttle to take us to the starting point. After negotiating with the shuttle service we agreed on the latter.

Cumberland is a small city in Western Maryland that has a few hotels plus a nice little downtown area with some decent restaurants.

The next morning we met up with a nice young guy named Jason who drove us and our bikes up to Ohiopyle. The earliest I could talk him into picking us up was 9:00 AM, so it was around 10:30 by the time we got to Ohiopyle and started the ride. I would have preferred an earlier start but we still had plenty of time to do the ride and get back to Cumberland before dark.

Now, what to ride? Confession time, we have a total of 13 bikes between the two of us. Of those, I’ve built eight. After I built my first bike it turned into a bit of an obsession.

I went with my “go to” bike which is a 650b randonneur and the first bike that I built. I’ve ridden over 5,600 miles on it and it does everything well. I can load it up for touring or leave the bags off and go fast. It rides comfortably and handles rough roads or light gravel with aplomb. It’s a bit heavy but with a 30-tooth small chainring I can gear it down and grind my way up the hills. If I had to pick one bike to rule them all this would be it.

That’s cute. One bike. Who am I kidding here? I crack myself up sometimes.

Mrs. Kong needs a bit of help to keep up with me so she went with her Specialized Turbo Vado SL 5.0 E-bike (can they make those names any longer). This thing cost me dearly but she loves it and if she’s happy I’m happy.

What led me to this particular E-bike is that it’s relatively light at 32 pounds versus a lot of commuter style E-bikes which can get as heavy as 70 pounds. Specialized claims a top speed of 28 mph and a range of 120 miles with the range extender (extra battery). I’d say those numbers are a bit optimistic but that’s usually the case.

Mrs. Kong normally rides on power setting 2 out of 3, which might give her 80 mile range out in the real world. Just to be safe, we brought an extra range extender and tweaked the settings on the bike to use the extra batteries first before expending the main battery. Sort of like drop-tanks on a fighter jet (you can always count on me to work an aviation reference in there).

If you’re looking for a sport/recreational E-bike and price is no object this would be one to look at.

The GAP trail is covered with very finely crushed gravel. Almost a powder, which is what your bike will be covered with at the end of the day. Stray too close to the edge of the path and it can get loose but if you stay towards the middle it’s fine. You could ride this on a road bike no problem. My 38mm wide tires ate it up.

Going south from Ohiopyle, once you get past the town of Confluence food can be scarce. Confluence is only 11 miles from Ohiopyle but we elected to eat there because most of the towns after that didn’t have any place open for lunch.

We stopped at the River’s Edge Cafe in Confluence. They were doing a brisk business on a weekday no less.

Lunch took a good hour out of our day. The restaurant was getting slammed. Food was quite good.

That’s the Youghiogheny River. Don’t ask me how to pronounce it.

My bike stands out in a sea of carbon fiber and black components. Steel is real!

From Ohiopyle to the Continental Divide is roughly 50 miles and you will climb for every one of those miles. It’s only a 1% grade at the most but over that much distance it will grind you down. At least that was my experience. I set an average speed of 12 mph as a goal and we averaged 12.5 to the Continental Divide.

This is a pretty typical section of the trail. Wide tires are not a necessity but they do help.

The nice thing about this trail is you hit a town every ten miles or so. Some of them are pretty small and have limited amenities so plan accordingly.

After Confluence the trail follows the Casselman River.

At Rockwood PA we met a couple that were riding all the way to South Dakota. Just call me “slacker”.

Rest stop at Rockwood PA. Everyone loves the minion.

Meyersdale is the last town before the Continental Divide. Fortunately they have a rest stop that sells bottled water because we were running low by this point. It was a warm day but most of the trail is shaded.

There is no shortage of beautiful scenery on this trail but crossing the Keystone Viaduct was definitely impressive.

This is about 100 feet up (I looked it up).

After crossing the Keystone Viaduct it’s thankfully only a few short miles to the Continental Divide. I was definitely ready to be done climbing by that point.

There’s a nice picture showing the elevation.

I’m tempted to try it the other direction next time. Twenty miles of pain up front and then 50 pretty easy miles.

Looking back the way we came gives you an idea of the incline. The last 100 yards or so was a bit steeper than the rest of the trail.

Looking south from the Divide it’s maybe a 2% descent most of the way to Cumberland.

I am so ready to go downhill at this point.

Shortly after you start down you reach the Big Savage Tunnel (and meat locker). They close the tunnel in the winter and open it back up in April.

Kids playing with bugs, as kids have done as long as there have been kids and bugs.

The tunnel is about ¾ of a mile long and probably 20 degrees colder than the outside temperature. It’s dimly lit and I found headlights were useful for seeing the trail and bikes coming the other way.

Right after the tunnel you get some spectacular vistas so it’s worth stopping.

The view was well worth the 50 mile climb.

You’ll cross the Mason Dixon Line (or the Manson Nixon Line as I call it) a couple miles after the tunnel. We didn’t stop because we had a pretty good descent going by that point.

After that it’s about 23 miles of downhill back to Cumberland. The trail surface kept us from going as fast as we could have on the descent. After the 50 mile slog uphill we barely had to pedal on the way down. We pulled into Cumberland around 6:30 at which point I wanted beer, food and bed in roughly that order.

Mrs. Kong had plenty of battery left on her E-bike at the end. I figure she could have gone another 25-30 miles on level ground. Plus it’s still a bike. Worst case you’ll just go slower without the electric assist.

If you really enjoy pain, you can pick up the C&O Towpath in Cumberland and ride all the way to Washington DC (184 miles). I might just be crazy enough to try it sometime.

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