Last Friday was bike to national bike to work day. I did take the tall bike down to the convention center, where I was attending a conference, but it wasn’t really “to work”. In fact, since the move last month, I haven’t manage to ride the full route…

We now live on the opposite end of the city. Getting from my house to campus is about 15 miles – 10 of which, are a steep crawl up Barber/Capitol Hwy. According to google maps the route should take about 1hour 45minutes on a normal bike and I believe it. On my way to the coast,  I have taken the climb on my lightweight racer – by the end, my shirt was drenched in sweat.

Now add a cargo bike

Add to all this the fact that Jamie, my friend at Metrofiets, has been challenging me to take one of his bikes to work.

These bikes are great for hauling cargo, but can be mighty slow to push uphill.

And sweeten the deal

However, his personal bike currently has a Stokemonkey electric assist hooked up.

The electric assist is awesome! It does not turn the bike into a motorcycle; you still have to pedal along. But, it does put some wind in your sails. With the stoke monkey, I was easily maintaining a 10-15mph clip uphill- passing other brave cyclists on road bikes.

If you have the opportunity, it is worth it. On the way here, I only found 2 negative aspects:

1) The controls

On this bike, the throttle was placed on the left-hand side. It was probably to avoid conflict with the gear shift on the right-hand side. However, this means that my hand would have to leave the throttle to signal, causing the bike to drop from warp at the most inopportune time.

2) The dirty looks

Cargo bikes and Metrofiets, in particular, tend to make people smile. They are still not very common, even in a bike town like Portland and curiosity gets the better of people.

However, today I got the “other kind of look”. That’s what I get for passing a spandex-clad race cyclist on the uphill :)