[Anja]

Weather is a big reason why you have to have a tough disposition if you want to ride daily. Wind is a nuisance nearly everywhere. There are winds on the prairie here which will have you riding at a 45 degree angle, then you pass a grove of trees and the wind "disappears" for a moment and you have to rebalance fast.

Here a grove close to the road is a red flag. In the winter that's where the spots of ice will be. And the doggies. And the deer.

I've ridden two days in driving rain so heavy that I could scarcely see and felt like I was drowning. The bike hydroplanes which is really a thrill when you meet a semi and you're afloat on the road.

And here we can have snow from October to April.

But it doesn't mean you can't ride. In the day we just put the bikes away from Dec. to March. I've ridden in freezinng weather. If you like to ride there is good equipment to protect you from the elements.

I have a girlfriend in Florida who is sixty and she travels soley by cycle. This summer she went to Colorado for a vacation. She has, more than once, traveled all the way to Canada by bike and has electric boots and gloves. Says she can put on seven hundred miles a day.

I don't call this traveling. I call it masochism! Iron-butt riding. Heh.

There are a lot of people, (certainly not INFPs) who seem to think the goal of riding is how many miles they can rack up in a twenty-four hour period. Sunday afternoon ride? "Yeah, we put three-hundred miles on today."

Weather, bad drivers, all that stuff. It's a person's choice what they are willing to put up with. I just plain like to ride enough to deal with it.