I want to ride my bicycle...

When I was 18 months old, Santa gave me a bike/scooter. It had three wheels and the faster you pushed the faster you went and I could go FAST! I would wizz around the house and garden and shopping centers and every holiday HAD to have my bike. I was addicted to them, managing to wear out the tires of two. 







Then the time came to get onto the "big bike", with fairy wheels to start obviously. Soon I kicked those ol' things off and was master of the two wheels. Then one day when i was 7, against my Moms wishes, I took my cousins to see a secret bike area that we had found and on my way rode smack into a moving vehicle. I snapped my tibia so badly it pierced my skin, spit the skin just below my knee and in between all that was flung into a nearby tree, landed back on the ground and in the process burst a vein or two in my eye. 

I was in hospital for a week or so and had a cast that went from my toes all the way up to the top of my thigh. Not fun when you have to go on holiday and everyone else gets to swim in the sea!

Needless to say, I didn't touch a bike for a while, but four years later got the courage to get back on a bike. That started with a very steep hill and ended up with a concussion. So fast forward to today. 

After a brief chat with my brother, he mentioned he had a bike in the outside room. Small challenge, it's wheels weren't attached. Oh, and nor were the breaks. Challenge accepted. I needed to get down to Floria and there was no way I was walking it. An hour and a bit later, I had made progress. The breaks were a little shady, popping in and out as it felt like it but wheels were attached and the right way around. 

And off I go. After realizing that my makeshift breaks weren't actually working I had to make a plan. All I needed was a repeat of my steep hill concussion story. Simple, ride up the hill, and then get off and walk down the other side. Awesome. Still better than walking all the way, right?

A normal persons experience would have gone like this. Got on my bike, rode  past the grocery store, round the circle, along the path then went down along the beach and arrived at Floria. After that I headed off back home. 


No, not me. It took about 30 mins just to get down the road cause I was so stressed out about the breaks. Then it took me another 20 minutes to get across the circle cause I was worried the cars wouldn't see me. Then the real adventure started. It went on a beach, through a complex, on a highway, in the bushes on the side of a highway, the wrong way up a highway, on a walking path along the beach, on what felt like a bmx track full with hills and mud and water, and of course, experienced one and a half falls. The first big fall right in front of two guys. The second one I saved myself by grabbing onto a fence nearby. 

All in all, a disaster of a trip. I think until I get over my fear of bikes I should stick to walking. Well that, or I need to have a bike made specially for me, not like the bike that is for a 6ft3 man that I had today. 

Note to self, learn how to ask for an ATM in Spanish and wear cycling shorts!