Another Day in the Saddle...

For the third day in a row, I got out on my bike today.  Each day I've been increasing my mileage just a bit.  Saturday was 10 miles, yesterday 13.5 miles, and today 18 miles.  I felt really good when today's ride was over and I could tell that I'm getting back just a little bit of muscle tone.

Today’s ride started out like many of my rides, except that today was a bit windier.  In fact, for a while I felt that I was riding in Kansas, except for dodging the cows and pigs.  And the taxis.  Oh, and there are no palm trees or other tropical plants in Kansas.  OK, so I guess the Kansas analogy falls flat.  But, it was windy.

I decided to ride pretty much the same route that I’ve been riding the past few days.  So, at the appropriate spot, I turned off the boulevard and headed up toward the Volcán.   As I was riding along I started thinking about the trip I’m planning to do in January.  It’s a cross country bike ride here in Honduras and there will be lots of mountain miles.  Lots of uphill.  And, thankfully, lots of downhill.  I was thinking about how hard it’s going to be to do a ride like that on my mountain bike, even though I’ve done things like put thinner, slick tires on it.  It was one of those moments when I was thinking how nice it would be to have a road bike here. 

When I was a little more than a mile outside of town  a blue SUV pulled up next to me.  The guy slowed down to match my pace and opened his window.  He started asking me about my bike.  He told me that a road bike is much easier on the pavement than my mountain bike.  I told him he was right, but I have thinner tires on this bike.  I told him I had a road bike in the States that I ride when I visit there.  Then the guy told me that he has a road bike, and that he had it with him in the back of the car.  He rolled down the back window and, lo and behold, a road bike.  I stopped and we talked for a few more minutes. The bike was fairly old; it was still and it had down tube shifters.  I couldn’t see the brand, but it looked like a Bianchi, which was confirmed when the guy told me it was Italian.  Then he got to his main point:  he wanted to sell me the bike.  I asked him how much he wanted for it and he told me 6,000 Lempiras  (about $300).  I told him I couldn’t afford that and then he asked me how much I could afford.  I was able to graciously got out of the conversation without buying the bike and rode on.

Looking behind me in my mirror, I saw that the guy turned around and headed back into town.  Hmmm… He must have seen me riding by, tossed his bike in the car and chased me down.  Yeah, it was slightly tempting to buy a road bike, but without some serious test riding, I’d have no idea what I’d be getting into.  Besides, I’ve determined that I’m going to be in good enough shape to do the week-long trip in January on my mountain bike and still have a good time!

Tomorrow I’ll tell you about another first: two drunks and a rock fight!