Tuesday 13 August 2013

Meet Poppy

This is Poppy, my lovely bike.

She's so pretty, with her pale blue paint,  cute basket and white tyres. She's a bike for cycling while wearing summer dresses and heels, with some flowers and a picnic in the basket.





She's only got three gears, has a leather sprung saddle and those brakes definitely aren't v-brakes. She's not like my mountain bike - it has 18 gears, and different tyres for road cycling and off-road cycling. My mountain bike doesn't have a cute name as it's a grrrrr-manly mountain bike. It's a Trek. It's been on a few adventures, and one of my favourite was cycling on the 50-mile-long Buchan-Formartine old railway line in Aberdeenshire, which was dumped during the Beeching cuts to the national rail network in the 1960s in Britain. The only good thing to come out of that is people in funny hats and Lycra clothes go on cycle trips on the former railway lines, as many of them are now paths. Like this person (me).




 It was a beautiful journey. The sunny weather blessed us and the miles just rolled by with beautiful scenery. Like this.


 And this.




You can see an old railway hut on the left hand side, just before the bridge in this one.



 There are information boards telling you about the old railway line.



But when you turn around to look at something and fall off your bike, this happens. It was pretty sore.



But Poppy the Pashley hasn't been on a big trip like this. She's just used for pottering about town. But she has been on some fun jaunts. She's been to Fittie a few times, which is an old conservation-area fishing village at the harbour in Aberdeen. It's Sunday name (and the one found on most maps) is Footdee as it's at the foot of the River Dee but locals call it Fittie.


She's also been in Duthie Park several times. It's a big park which also has a Winter Gardens containing a talking cactus. Seriously.


She's also been to Victoria Park too which is a lovely place for reading the Sunday papers while eating a picnic underneath a shady tree. Or sitting on a bench and watching the world go by.



I think Poppy should go on an epic ride soon, but possibly not over hills and mountains!

1 comment: