I have a shiny new bike! I should have started the whole adventure on it; but as is the way of things these days, it wasn’t quite built in time for that. Never mind, I was lucky to find any decent bike available as soon as May, and so this one more or less selected itself. My Rose Pro SL road bike stood up well to the task of riding through Maps 1-18 (with the help of my brother’s seat-post back-rack) and it deserves a long rest now that the brand new workhorse has arrived. I have cleaned it and removed all of its extra attachments and I’ll see it again in a few months!
And so, two days ago I walked down the hill to our local Alpkit store in Hathersage and picked up my new Sonder Calibri AL, which is painted a resplendent “reef” (I didn’t know that was a colour). According to the Alpkit website it is a “4 season endurance road bike” and it has “all the mounts you need for guards and racks, which means this really is a bike you can ride every day of the year. And love it.” Well, that’s pretty much what I’m about to find out!
I spent a few hours today getting it ready for next week. I added mudguards, back-rack, bottle holders, lights and put cleats on my shoes to fit its new pedals. It’s looking ready for the adventure ahead! I will need to take it out tomorrow and test it with panniers. It’s never the same with and without weight. I’m not sure; but I think I might go for two half-full panniers to give me even weight distribution. When Jenni left me in Scotland, she had to take one pannier with her, and I found that a fully loaded pannier on just one side caused my rear mudguard to need readjusting. In turn, that meant it rubbed whenever I wanted to ride pannier free, which led to me removing the mudguard altogether on these occasions. Not a major issue; but perhaps avoidable hereafter.
Ready for action
It is starting to feel like I’m ready for the road again. Still a list of jobs to complete and a festival to headline before Monday; but in less than a week I will be paying my third visit to the Hebrides!