Tonya and PQBON's WebLog
Katie is about a day from turning 10 months old. She is now almost talking: Cat, Momma, Dadda. She actually knows what those words mean. She says, "Cat," when she sees Zoe. If you say cat she will repeat it and look for Zoe and smile when she finds her. She also looks for Momma or Dadda when you say either.
She can also stand on her own. She pulls herself up on things then lets go and can stand for a few minutes. We are waiting for her to start walking. She is going to start taking a few steps soon. We are both looking forward and dreading that day. She is already very mobile with her crawling so it won't be a huge change. She is now crawling everywhere including up the stairs.
She is also getting very demanding and stubborn. She will get pissed off and scream and cry if you take something from her that she wants. She gets quite the attitude when she is tired.
All in all she is still a great little baby. It is really crazy though, she is rapidly becoming a kid. She has changed so much in such a short time. It is really really intense.
So two months ago I traded my BMW R1150GS and my Triumph Daytona 955i for a BMW R1200RT.
I wasn't using the Daytona for track days anymore and I wasn't taking the GS offroad since I have a collection of dirt bikes. I thought a lot about what I needed out of a motorcycle. I wanted a comfortable, quick, sport/touring bike. With Katie and Tonya at home I've been only riding to work. However, over a single day that means I ride my motorcycle over an hour each day. I was looking primarily at the R1200RT and the K1200GT both BMW since I have a great relationship with California BMW. I would have had to order a K1200GT and wait for it to come in. The R1200RT was in stock. When I got the bike there was a special that the R1200RT came with a free BMW Navigator III and a free 49Liter Top Case. That really tipped the favor in to the RT. I am the proud owner of a dark gray 2006 BMW R1200RT.
After 2 months I really like the bike. The bike has more power then the R1150 it replaces but much less then the 955i that it replaced. It is a happy medium. The R1150 was just a little under powered while the 955i was probably over powered for what I need. The RT is also just as comfortable as the GS for Tonya on back. That was also an important consideration. The RT delivers on every thing.
The motor is slowly breaking in. As it brakes in it get torqueier at the bottom end and quicker at the top end. It cruises nicely in any gear. For the new R1200 they lowered 6th gear to make it less of an over drive and more of a 6th gear. Passing cars on the freeway no longer requires down shifting to 5th in the general case.
My bike has the optional ESA (Electronic Suspension Adjust). It has 3 modes and 3 weight settings. The modes are Comfort, Normal, and Sport. The 3 weight settings are Solo, Two-up, and Two-up with luggage. I normally keep the suspension in Comfort mode which eats up the bumps and irregularities in the local roads in the bay area. However, the bike can be vague in the corners at speed so I generally switch to sport mode if I'm going to be aggressively cornering. I find myself only in normal in wet weather when I want to ensure minimal brake dive or acceleration squat and less vagueness in the corners. Over all the suspension is nice. I just hope that by the time I wear out the shocks that there are ESA compatible after market parts available. Currently, the only way to get the ESA suspension replaced is to go with the stock suspension or to loose the ESA feature. There have been some reports of WP rebuilding and adjusting the ESA shocks to allow reuse.
I'm currently in the planning stage of adding in two options I didn't get when I bought the bike. The first is the radio system. I've speced it out and made some plans. It is now down to buying the parts and installing the hardware. The second piece is the heated seats. During the cold winter months when it is raining it would be awfully nice to have a nice warm seat to sit on.
Finally, I'm planning two system integrations/modifications. I'm going to hook my Autocom Pro7 into the bike. I'm installing waterproof jacks front and rear and going to use patch cables to for helmet connectivity. I have the Pro7, the jacks, and the headsets. All I need is some cable. I'm also planning on adding a built in a heat troller. I'm going to add a single controller to the front for now as Tonya doesn't wear heated clothing and I only wear a vest.
So far, I've put 1,600 miles on the bike. I've really enjoyed it so far. I do miss both the bikes I traded. I miss them a lot, however, for my riding the RT is doing a better job. The bike has better weather protection especially for my lower body. I've worn jeans in light rain on the RT and come out only slightly wet when on the GS or Daytona I would have been soaked. The RT also has an electrically adjustable windscreen. This is a huge feature that makes a big difference. I can block all the air on a cold wet day or none on a nice dry day when I want to enjoy the air. All in all the RT was a good choice.
Katie is almost a year old... That is a magical age milestone for many reasons. For the purposes of this article the significance is that she can now go in either a bicycle trailer or a baby seat on a bike. I started looking into both options about the time she was born (OK, a month before she was born). Now, that she is old enough, I wanted to be able to share bicycling with her. When I was a kid I lived on my bicycle and I hope she is the same way. I was also looking to get more exercise then the 2.2mile walk Tonya and I take with Katie.
I decided to get a bike. I needed a new one as the only bike I is a 20" wheeled BMX Vert bike (Hoffman Condor from 1997). It isn't conducive to pulling a trailer or mounting a baby seat. The more I talked to Tonya about getting a bike the more she wanted a bike too. The thought was that biking could be a form a family exercise.
We started shopping for bikes. It was a long process. I didn't know what I wanted. I kindof wanted a road bike but the more I looked into it the less practical they looked. So while I was undecided on what I wanted I focused on Tonya and Katie.
Tonya was going to be easy or so I thought. While it was easier then it was finding me a bike, it still wasn't easy. First, we cruised the bike shops in Palo Alto and Mountain View. The place we had the most luck was The Offramp in Moutain View. I won't even mention the other places we tried as they ignored us for some reason. We were at one place for almost an hour and no sales person ever made an effort to help us aside from a few inopportune questions (once when we first came in but wanted to get our bearings, then when we were finally going to leave and change Katie's poopy diaper). At the offramp we found the frame size for Tonya and two hybrid bikes that Tonya was thinking about. She was looking at the Giant Sedona and Cypress models. We were thinking she would be best suited by a hybrid. That thinking chainged when we went to a bike shop near our house in Fremont, The Bicycle Garage. There Tonya was encouraged to try different bikes in the parking lot and explore. She like the hybrids and the comfort bikes, however, she was more comfortable on a Trek Mountain Bike. She really like the Trek 3900 WSD in green.
I fell in love with the StumpJumper FSR while at the The Bicycle Garage. I rode several different models in the parking lot and I enjoyed the StumpJumper FSR the most. However, I knew we couldn't afford the price tag.
While doing all of this I started looking into the options for Katie. These days people tend not to like the baby seats. They are viewed as less safe and more difficult to ride with. The big thing for kids these days is trailers. So I started looking into trailers. Currently there are two major bike trailer vendors: Burley and Chariot. They come at the problem from two different directions. Burley is a bike product company. They make all sorts of bicycle related products while Chariot makes child carriers. However, both make competitive products. But neither one is cheep. We looked at both product lines and made some decisions. Since we know we are going to have more kids and are most likely going to have another one before Katie will be on her own bike we wanted a two kid trailer. I wanted it to be light and easy to pull since I would be doing all the pulling. I also thought that some kind of suspension would be really good for the kids. We wound up with a Chariot Cougar 2. There was nothing wrong with the Burley product. We actually came really close to getting the Burley as we almost had to wait for the Cougar2. However, in the end the Cougar2 was just more of what we were looking for and it was slightly less. So far all we have is the cycling kit and a spare hitch for Tonya's bike just in case we need it for some reason.
So now that we have Katie squared away back to me... I was going all over the internet trying to figure out what I wanted. First, I found a Motobacane dealer. I knew the name from my bike dealings as a kid so I was stoked. However, as I did a little research it revealed that they had gone out of business and a new company was now using the name. The new company wasn't making bad bikes but the were using cheap components and you could get better deals. One of the better deals I was pointed to was Ibex bikes. I was really excited about Ibex. I couldn't find anyone who was disappointed with products they sold and they're prices are great. I decided on an Ignition-3, however, I would have had to wait until Feb of '07 for one. That was just too long to wait. So then I was thinking the Asta X7. It was perfect, except for one thing. It was red. For $1,000 I wanted to like the looks of what ever I got. I just could get behind the red Asta X7. I loved the look of the X9 or the bare frame but neither was in my price range (and the frame wasn't available until Feb '07 anyway). Ibex was out, which made me sad. They have a great internet presence and a reputation for working to meet all customer needs.
I was back to the StumpJumper FSR I had ridden. I really liked it but couldn't afford it. I started scouring Ebay and Craig's list for a StumpJumper FSR. I couldn't find one (actually, I did find the perfect bike on craigslist and at the perfect price but I never got a response from the seller). I started to broaden my search on Ebay to other bikes comparable to the StumpJumper FSR. I found a seller with no feed back selling '05 Marin mountain bikes for a killer price. They were selling both Rift Zone and Rock Springs. The thing about the listing that cought my eye was their location: Palo Alto. It turns out it was the Bike Connection in Palo Alto. I drove over to try the bikes. I tried both the Rift Zone and the Rock Springs. I was sold. They felt like the StumpJumper FSR but because they were hold overs from '05 didn't cost like the StumpJumper. I really liked the Rift Zone. It was a touch lighter and more designed for the lighter use I would be giving it. However, the Rock Springs was cheaper. To save money I went with the '05 Rock Springs. I still think the Rift Zone would be a better bike for my riding, the Rock Springs has been GREAT! I was very happy dealing with the Bike Connection. They have a nice knowledgeable staff. The only change I made to the Rock Springs was clipless peddles to allow me to use the up stroke along with the down stroke. My leg bad leg doesn't hurt after riding with the clipless peddles, wear as without them my leg gets very sore.
Once we had bikes and a trailer we were ready to go. We have done two family trips. The first was just around the neighborhood. On the first trip we learned Katie doesn't like having her helmet put on and get a little nervous in the trailer until we start moving. Once moving she stops playing with her helmet and gets happy about the trailer. She also falls asleep really fast in the trailer (this has been true all 3 times I've taken her out). I was also getting used to my clipless peddles. I haven't fallen over in them yet except when trying to do tricks (riding up stairs or up walls) or ride up steep hills offroad (rear tire brakes loose and I can't get my feet free fast enough). However, when I'm doing tricks or offroad Katie isn't attached. The other family trip was to Fremont's central park and then around the lake. This was a fun trip and a reasonable amount of exercise.
Personally, I'm also trying to go riding at night while Tonya puts Katie to sleep. I'm hoping to use biking to get back in some kind of shape. I'm not there yet but I can tell my legs are getting more fit each day. I've also looked into commute options. There isn't a direct bike route from Fremont to Intel Santa Clara. However, I discovered ACE Train. They have a stop not too far from my house and not too far from work. I can ride to the trail station and then from the Great America stop to my office. I signed up for their free trial pass to see how it goes. It will make a nice alternative to riding my motorcycle everyday.
In summary, so far we are really happy with: Tonya's Trek 3900 WSD, my '05 Marin Rock Springs, Katie's Chariot Cougar2, the Bicycle Garage in Fremont and the Bicycle Connection in Palo Alto. This is all with an honorable mention for Ibex bikes which was almost perfect.
