First Ride In Prague

All right, I admit it.  I didn't end up with a guy named Vaclav. Instead, I spent  part of yesterday afternoon with a cute Czech cyclist named Michael:

He's a law student at Charles University in this town.  He speaks beautiful English and, surprisingly, pretty good Spanish.  And, as you may have guessed by now, yesterday he guided me on my very first bike ride in Prague.  


So, here's the answer to a question you may (or may not) have asked:

Yes, it's the bike I rode.  The alternatives were a single-speed cruiser and a mountain bike of a brand I didn't recognize.  I didn't mind the lack of a name brand nearly as much as the poor fit the mountain bike was for me.  


I don't know who made the bike I rode.  I doubt it was made in the Czech Republic; I'm not sure that any bicycles are still being made here.  For the kind of bike it is, it felt pretty good.  

The traffic didn't scare me too much. But the trolley tracks did.  It's so easy to get a tire, even a wide one, caught in the grooves or to scrape the sides of the knobs against the tracks, and to tumble over.  

Nothing like that happened on our ride through the central part of the city.   At least I know now about the tracks, and other hazards.  But more important, I started to see this beautiful city from one of the best possible angles.

A Prague Leg-acy

Well, I'm back...on this blog, I mean.  I am in Prague and so far this place is delightful.  I can see why people told me I'd love it here.  I mean, I got into the car that took me from the airport to my hotel, and the first thing I heard on the radio was a Dvorak symphony.  I mean, how can you beat that for an entrance into a city.  

As I listened, I "conducted" with my hands, as I often do.  The driver, a man about ten years my senior who spoke about five words of English, just gave me a smile.  "You like Dvorak," he said.  I nodded and smiled.

The hotel is in a quiet residential neighborhood a few minutes from the center of the city.  I compare the neighborhood to the 20th Arrondisment of Paris, where I once stayed, or what the 14th used to be like, except that this neighborhood is even closer to the action than either the 14th or the 20th of Paris.  The similarity lies in its apartment complexes and small houses full of working- and middle-class people, and the fact that it's so quiet in spite of the number of pubs and bars around here.

I also marvel at how clean and litter-free the streets are, even in comparison to other European towns I've seen. Plus, the mode of dress, among Prague natives as well as tourists, seems to be neat-casual with some style,  but not the self-consciousness one sees in Paris.  

Plus, I've been surprised at how easy it's been to find people who speak at least some English.  I tried giving myself a crash-course in some basic Czech phrases, but I haven't gotten much past "Prosim" and " Ano."  At least those words have vowels in them!  

Some of the older people speak German, of which I don't know much more than I know of Czech.  I know they had to learn Russian in school back in the days of Communist rule, but either they've forgotten it or don't want to speak it.  I can understand, and I can't speak Russian, anyway.

All right...enough of a travelogue.  Since this is a bike blog, I  am coming back to that subject.  More precisely, I'm going to show you a bike that was parked down the hill from my hotel:

It's a Favorit bicycle, which looks to be from the '70's or the late '60's.  The first shop in which I worked actually sold a few of these bikes; not many came into that shop, or the United States.  Their basic models, like this one, were actually pretty good bikes that compared favorably with, and cost less than, bikes like the Raleigh Grand Prix and Peugeot UO-8.  The paint jobs were not very inspiring, but the lug work was clean, if not fancy.  And Favorit made some higher-end bikes with some truly nice lugwork and elegant seat clusters.  It was rumored that their higher-end bikes were made of Reynolds 531 tubing; I would not have a hard time believing it because I rode one of those bikes and it had a very similar feel to some other bikes I've ridden that were made from the same tubing.  Also, Favorit were using Campagnolo Record (and, later, Nuovo Record and Super Record) components on their top racing model, and offered a  model that was equipped with Stronglight cranks and other mid-to-upper-range French components.  The components on the company's mid- and lower-level were their own brand but mimicked Campagnolo, Stronglight, Mafac and other western makers' equipment of the time.

They even made (or had made for them) their own brand of saddles which, like others of the time, mimicked Brooks and Ideale design and actually had leather that was a bit thicker.  

I must say, though, it's been a long time since I've seen a saddle mounted so far forward on a bike!

Enough about the bike for now.  And now to the legacy of racing in this country:

Miss Mercian II Gets Ready For Me To Leave

Just so you know this blog didn't go to the dogs the other day, I'm posting this photo:

Charlie just happened to be there when I was setting up my new camera, which I bought because my old one is dying and I wanted a camera with a wider-angle lens for my upcoming trip.

Believe it or not, he was rescued.  With a face like that, how in the world did he end up on the streets?

All right...Enough rhetorical questions that question the state of the human race.  You're not reading this blog for that, right?

So I'll answer a burning question.  Yes, Miss Mercian II is just about done.  I only took her for a couple of quick test rides: not enough to offer a detailed ride report.  That, I'm afraid, will have to wait until I return from my trip.

I've kept most of the equipment that was on the bike when I bought it.  However, I changed the fenders (from black plastic ones), brake and shift levers, and chainrings (from a triple to a single with a guard).  However, the most interesting--to some of you--change might be this:

I flipped over a pair of Northroad-style bars to give a position that's somewhat similar to what Helene, my other Miss Mercian, has with the Porteur-style bars.  The bike originally came with dropped bars, which necessitated changing the levers. 

I had originally planned to use the bars in the upright position.  But then I found it more upright than I really wanted, so, as per Velouria's idea, I flipped the bars.  That made yet another change necessary:

I had originally planned to use the Gyes Parkside I took off Marianela. However, I found it was too wide after I flipped the bars.  So I went to Old Reliable:  a Brooks B 17, the same saddle I have on Helene.  (Arielle and Tosca, my road and fixed-gear Mercians, have B-17 narrow saddles.)  And we all know that you have to put a honey or brown saddle on a green bike, right? Of course--especially when the grips match!

And I decided this bike simply had to have gumwall tires.  There aren't as many good-quality ones (that is to say, real gumwalls as opposed to ones that are merely yellowish) as there were in the '70's or '80's, and even fewer in 700C.  The ones on this bike are made by Schwalbe.

I might make another change or two once I get some miles on the bike.  But most of what you see is what will remain on this bike, I think.

Note:  My posts during the next two weeks will probably be more sporadic.  If you don't hear from me, I've joined some group that's riding to Moscow or someplace.  Or, I've gotten a job teaching English or met a guy named Vaclav!