My original goal was to ride until holidays at the end of October, but when we came back I actually found it invigorating and a bit of a cure for jet lag to ride my bike in to work my first day back.

Now my goal is to ride until the end of November or until there is snow on the bike path that prevents me from a stress-free ride.

The challenge at this time of year is figuring out what to wear. It’s not that I’m a wuss or don’t have all the clothing I would need. In early fall, when it got pretty wet, I bought the helmet condom and booties from MEC to stay dry. And they did work. I already had the long gortex cycling pants, and recently bought a light gortex cycling jacket at the big Sierra Design sale in Foymount on the August long weekend.  I couldn’t find my helmet headband that I’d bought before my accident so I ended up buying a new one.

I know how to dress for downhill and crosscountry skiing so cold isn’t a problem. It’s realizing that for most of my ride I don’t sweat, but when I hit the last km it’s uphill and so invariably I start to overheat. I don’t want to look like a pansy ass going up the hill, but I also don’t need to have sweaty helmet head when I arrive at the office. It’s not a long ride, but my feet have started to get cold so I’m now wearing my Ecco winter boots, which are light, waterproof and windproof. But your feet can still get cold because your toes aren’t really moving when you cycle.

The other thing I’ve taken to doing is riding on sidewalks. Usually, I’m against this, and for the most part I’m on the “recreational” pathways. But if you’ve ever tried cycling from the War Museum to downtown you’ll know that it’s not a really pleasant experience this time of year. I also discovered this fall that the sidewalk on the west side of Bay Street between Wellington and Queen is actually a shared pedestrian/cyclist sidewalk, with the right of way to pedestrians. This means I don’t have to fight two lanes of right turning traffic at Lyon. Instead, I go down Queen to Bank. This route is much more enjoyable now that they’ve finally filled most of the pot holes. On the return route, I take the sidewalk down Wellington again because I’ve had too many near misses waiting at the lights where Wellington, the Parkway and the Portage Bridge meet up. There is a right turn lane for buses, then a right turn lane for cars, then two lanes that go straight. I’ve been on the right lane going straight and had cars zip past me almost hitting the bike because they are turning right. No signal, nothing.

So I’m all set to ride until the first snow that stays. Much better than being on a cramped bus getting jostled around. I’ll keep up it as long as I can then consider walking home three times a week when I’m forced to resort to the bus.