Our Recumbent Bicycles

Lesley and I are proud owners of two Sun EZ-1 recumbent bicycles. These have proven to be so much fun that we have become quite the cycling enthusiasts. They are a relaxing way to experience the world, up close and personal. Because you sit upright, you can actually see all the scenery as it flies by. Okay, as maybe it doesn't fly by, but you do get to see it all.

The bikes did take a little time to get used to the way they balance, but now it is second nature for us. One thing we learned early on was to make sure that we are in a low gear before we stopped. During the learning process, we always gave ourself a lot of wobble room, especially when starting. If we forgot to shift down, we found ourselves unable to get up enough speed to balance within our wobble space, so we would put our feet down to balance. Of course, you can't peddle with your feet on the ground. There was more than one time that I pushed with my feet, like a toddler on his first trike, so that I would get enough momentum to balance. Or if I found myself trying to start uphill, I would turn the bike around and start it going downhill, shift down and turn around. Fortunately, that it is no longer a problem because we can now balance the bikes at a very low speed. If you decide to get a recumbent, I recommend that you practice in a flat, quiet neighborhood until shifting down before stopping is second nature and you feel sort of comfortable riding at slower speeds.

We have taken our bikes on a few riding vacations where we ride on some nice pave trails. We have ridden on the Vernonia-Banks Trail in Oregon, the Spokane Centennial Trail and the Sequim-Port Angles Trail, both in Washington. These rides were relaxing and the scenery was wonderful. We limit ourselves to less than 50 miles per day so that we can enjoy other activities as well. I've noticed that, the older I get, the harder it is to get into shape and the longer it takes to recover from over exertion. With that in mind, I try to stay in a motel with a hot tub so that my muscles don't rebel the next day when we hit the trail again.

We have ridden a lot of bike paths in the Vancouver area which is a bike friendly city. It is nice to be able to jump on the bikes early Saturday morning and ride to a restraurant for breakfast or to Starbucks for coffee. The other nice thing about Vancouver is that it is fairly flat so there is minimal huffing and buffing up hills. When we were just starting to explore Vancouver on our bikes, we were enjoying coasting down this nice hill in a residential neighborhood and looking at the beautiful houses. We soon learned that what goes down much come up, and the ascent was much less enjoyable. So now we are a little more picky about whether we really need to see what is at the bottom of that long hill.

When it is not raining, I ride the bike to work which is about 3.5 miles. Lesley will ride with me a part of the way, if she doesn't have an early morning obligation. When I am ready to go home, I give Lesley a call and we meet half way and ride back together.