Cycling In Atlantis

I got up late today and had to run a couple of errands--including a trip to the farmer's market on Roosevelt Island.  As the day was a hot and humid day, I waited until it was almost over to go for a ride.



So I let Tosca take me wherever she wanted.  Being a fixed-gear bike, she tends to favor flat areas.  As I am still not in my best shape, I am happy to go along with her.



Among other places, we went to this:

And this:

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In Newark, there's a section of the city called "The Ironbound" because railroad tracks form its borders.  That's not where I rode today.  But the part of the Bronx shown in the photos could just as easily have been so named.  It's ringed, bound and criss-crossed by elevated highways and railroad tracks, all in steel of one kind or another.


I don't spend enough time in the neighborhood on weekdays to know whether or not the tracks shown in the photos see very many trains.  I know that the neighborhood is still an active industrial area:  the fleets of trucks and vans parked in lots and on streets are testimony to that.  But on the weekends, it could just as well be one of those ancient Greek and Roman ghost towns I've seen along the Mediterranean and Aegean coasts.  The people are gone, but the looming monoliths stand, and probably will stand for some time to come.


As you might expect, on the other side of the tracks and highways are low-income neighborhoods populated almost entirely by people of color.  Hip hop music was born on those streets.  Someone, I forget who, referred to the Bronx as the "Atlantis of Hip-Hop."  


Sometimes I feel as if I am cycling in Atlantis, or among shipwrecks.  However, the viaducts and buildings, while gritty, are hardly ruins:  They're intact, and on Monday they will be full of people and vehicles.  But, for now, they're empty.



All of the neighborhood is near water--specifically, the East River, which is really an inlet of the ocean.  However, you wouldn't want to swim in it, even if these guys do it:

Actually, they're in the Bronx Kill, which is a branch of the East River.  It separates the Bronx from Randall's Island and may be the most polluted waterway in the United States.  I took the photo from a spur of the RFK/Triborough Bridge.


If you're in the neighborhood and want to swim, this is where you go:

It's a floating pool in Barretto Park.  I always thought the idea of swimming in one body of water that floats on top of another was rather surreal, though, in practice, it's not much different from swimming in any other kind of pool.  Well, I don't know whether I can generalize.  I've swum in only one floating pool:  the old Piscine Deligny.  Going there was more like going on a cruise than it was like going to any other pool I've ever seen. 



I understand that a new Piscine Deligny is being constructed to replace the one in which I swam.  But that's not the reason why it's being replaced:  The old pool sank in 1993.  (I had absolutely nothing to do with that!)



And so people will continue to swim in one body of water that floats on another.  Then again, any journey-any bike ride-- we take is a bit like surfing the march of time.

You Ride Like A Girl!

"You throw like a girl!"

Hearing that'll ruin any boy's day.  I heard it again, today, except that it wasn't directed at me.  Then again, I wasn't throwing anything.

If I were to throw anything, would I throw like a girl?

I just got another catalogue from Terry Bicycles.  Some of their products are printed or emblazoned with the logo "Ride Like A Girl!"

That got me to wondering whether one rider in the Tour de France peloton ever told another, "Vous pedale comme une fille!"  What, exactly, would "pedalling like a girl"  look like?


I remember the time a couple of years ago when I passed a couple of guys on Greenpoint Avenue, just after crossing the bridge from Long Island City.  They caught up to me when I stopped for the light at the intersection with Manhattan Avenue.  One of them yelled, "You ride real good for a lady!"


Then, there was the time--not too long ago--when I was riding down Van Sinderen Avenue in East New York.  A bunch of young guys and a couple of slightly-older men looked like they were having a campfire, sans the campfire, on their bikes.  A couple of the younger guys yelled, "Hey, babe."  Another added, "Wanna ride with us?"  As I passed, I heard one guy say, "That's no chick.  She rides too fast!"


So...Fast women aren't supposed to ride bikes?  Hmm...Well, I'm not a fast woman.  First of all, I just ate.  And I am--and always have been-- monogamous, if serially.  


Now let me get this right:  I might ride like a girl because I ride real good for a lady, but I'm too fast of a woman to ride like a chick.  Now, if I can formulate a relevant syllogism from all that, I might get tenure someplace--unless, of course, some student actually understands anything I said.


Besides...How can you be offended to hear "You play like a girl" after you've seen Mia Hamm?  And why would "You ride like a girl" stick in your craw if you've seen Rebecca Twigg or Paola Pezzo on their mounts?


The irony is that all of the time I spent riding with guys so I could ride like them, only better, actually helped me to my current path.  So where will riding like a woman take me?

Velouria Gets Fixed Up

"Velouria," whose wonderful writing and photography graces her "Lovely Bicycle!" blog, has given new meaning to "Be careful of what you wish for."

She has written about her "attraction to beautiful track bikes" and "wistfulness for the velodrome," which she had dismissed as "ludicrous."

Well, I warned her....If we dismiss or resist something long enough, we'll take to it, or it will take us!  (Trust me, I know that as well as anybody can.) So I exhorted her to "go for it."  And, I made a deal:  My spirit would guide her if she promised to bring back one of those beautiful dress guards she always seems to find when she's in Vienna.

Yesterday she took her first ride on a track bike--yes, in Vienna!  And, from what she says, she enjoyed the experience.

I can just see it now:  Velouria on the velodrome in Vienna!


Could this be her future?:

Congratulations, Velouria.  And you owe me a dress guard! ;-)