Ciclovia...or not!

On Sunday's and Monday holidays (of which Colombia has many, especially this time of year), many of the roads are closed for bikers, walkers, runners, etc. It's a kindness considering every other day those not in cars risk their lives by simply trying to go from here to there.

So, along with another family staying here, we decided it was a grand idea to join in. We're joiners, after all.

Sunday, we reserve bikes to rent. Monday morning, with great hope and anticipation, we head out. We walk to the bike store, which is the last moment anything we expected actually happened. The bike store only had 2 bikes with training wheels for the little girls. One was blue and one was ugly. These two girlie girls both had looks of disgust on their faces. They had no other bikes with training wheels.

So, we head back in the direction from which we came to the other bike store we passed on our way to the first bike store- about 3 blocks. They have no bikes to rent for children. They'd sell us one though, but really, we don't have room in our suitcase.

So we strike a deal with the 2 girls...trade every 10 minutes. Karen, who had refused the ugly bike earlier, even agreed to take the 1st 10 minutes. She really wanted to bike and seemed to realize the ugly bike was it.

So, we walk back to the 1st bike store. For Joel, they either had bikes that were too big, or one that was small. The seat was raised all the way and they even had to raise the handlebars. It was still difficult to ride and he looked a bit silly on it, but he was a trooper (because there was no other option for him).

The adults got bikes then and we headed out. But, turns out, not really to bike. Karen was doing ok on her bike but our other little friend needed someone to pull her on the bike the entire time. The blue bike also used pedal breaks and that made it difficult to pull. So Karen actually ended up with the non-ugly bike for most of the time.

My bike was a mess- shaking, difficulty peddling. I traded with the another woman charged with the task of pulling the other little girl- she was just walking her bike anyway.

Then we made our way up the street. Slowly. Slowly. On our way back to the bike store, Karen realized that the training wheels were off balance and she became scared. So she too needed someone to pull her.

We returned to the bike shop and the woman looked at us with surprise. "Mas rapido" she said. Yes, it was a fast trip- I think about 40 minutes. She may have spent more time than that finding bikes for us.

While nothing seemed to go right and we didn't get to experience the freedom of Ciclovia, we laughed a lot. It was quite funny and makes for a very funny blog post to share.

Joel  heading out

We're there...you just can't see us.