Bought a new bike. It is a Giant Cross City hybrid bike. Basically a flat bar road bike. Recent bike riding experiences in Singapore and Malaysia convinced me it was time to purchase a new bike. Riding a bike in the gym is okay but not as scenic. Yesterday I rode the bike home and later, went for a ride around local streets and on local bike paths. I purchased the bike from Spearman Cycles. Excellent service.

Today I rode for an hour on the local streets and bike paths. I have resisted buying a bike for some time as the suburb where I live is hilly. I will get a bike rack for the car so I can drive down to the various coastal bike paths and go for longer rides.

I signed up to RunKeeper today so I could share my rides with my bike riding friends in Singapore: Siva, Kevin and Kenneth. All three went on an extensive ride around Singapore with the Zendogs today. Sixty or more kilometres. I think they are still on the ride as I type. RunKeeper also allows me to record and track each of my rides so I can keep an eye on my fitness. Siva has some great cycling advice and photographs on this site. Siva often writes about his cycling exploits.

I stopped and took about 30 photographs during the ride today. I think RunKeeper allows me to set up an auto-pause so next time I shall configure that so that any stops I make will not form part of the equation. Hopefully my stats will gradually improve. I normally average about 20 to 25KM per hour in the gym. It is a bit hard to manage anything near that on the bike paths as they are shared by pedestrians, kids on bikes & skateboards, people walking their pet dogs and joggers. The hills here in Figtree do not help much either. [Although… coming back down the hill should counteract the uphill component, eh?]

When I arrived home Sootie greeted me and then went for a bit of a sniff about the bike. He behaved in a  way I have not observed before. He rolled around on the deck beneath the bike, hugging the wheels and sniffing them as if in a state of rapture. Obviously all the new scents picked up by the tyres turned his cat senses on.