I want to ride my Bicycle; I want to ride it where I like

I went for a "sprint" ride yesterday. A sprint ride is a ride where I don't have much time but want a workout. It is amazing what you can get done in 30-40 minutes! I will ride hard knowing I am in my neighborhood zig zagging so that when my time is up I'm not far away from home. The streets are my gym. Yeah, I know I'm not supposed to ride on the streets. I am really trying not to like Doc asked. I pick times of day and side streets to be safer. I just think it's silly to strap your bike to your car and drive somewhere in order to exercise! I have my bike rack to take my bike with me out-of-town not cross town.



Today I got up wanting a longer ride before work. I went across the Broadway Bridge to the Esplanade that joins up with the Still Water Corridor. That is the path I would ride to Derby practice since it goes right behind Oaks Park and the Hanger. It also leads to SE Portland and intersects with the 205 path. The day was beautiful and not too hot yet at 11:20am. When I got to the part of the path under the Hawthorne Bridge (before OMSI) there were lots of people in stupid yellow shirts. It was for an event called "Walk and Roll". Mommies pushing their babies and having pause times to to muscle strengthening exercises. Anyway, this multi-use path is normally very busy but you get a bunch of suburban mommies out in the big city? They had no idea that this was a well traveled path and they should follow the "rules of the road". On the way out it was not too bad. I could have hit a few folks that didn't even look before crossing the path from the Dragon Boat parking lot to sit on the Vera Katz resting (?) area. The way back is where I kinda blew a fuse.


I was happy to see the crowd had dispersed from the parking lot. My happiness was short lived. I was almost to the Burnside Bridge where the ramp leads down to the floating dock before going back up to the intersection where you can cross the Steel Bridge to Water Front Park side or head up to The street by the Rose Quarter. They were blocking the whole path heading their way. Runners and dog walkers were being mowed over. I politely asked if I could pass but the crowd including supporting husbands and Grand Parents were so chatty and exuberant they did not hear me to let me through.That pissed me off! I saw the solid wall of stipid yellow t-shirts and snapped. I biked over to the stairs that lead up to the Burnside Bridge and proceeded to carry my not so light bike up six or seven flights of stairs. I felt like I was going to have a heart attack by the time I got to the top. I sure showed them. BTW one of the companies sponsoring this ridiculous event? Ken's companies logo was on the back of the stupid shirts. I tried to call him on my way to work. As if he knew why I was calling (to bitch) he declined to answer. Smart man.