Palm Beach Bike Tours – Page 9 – Two Wheels, one GPS and a Camera

October 19, 2010

Hills: Two Beats Short of a Fountain

I’m back in Cape Girardeau, where the weather was too nice not to get on my Surly Long Haul Trucker for a short jaunt. I almost always end up at the riverfront so I can see who is hanging out watching the Mississippi River roll by.

Daniel Atwood was stretched out strumming his guitar. You can read about the eBook reader and other characters I met on my Cape blog.

Wow, that hill is steep

Cape is built in rolling hills east of the Missouri Ozarks. On my way home, I had gone up several steep hills (for a flatland Floridian) and thought I’d take a shortcut through Southeast Missouri University that I thought would save me a long climb.

It turned out that I had traded a long, gradual climb for a short, steep one. I was about two-thirds of the way up the short road behind the dorms at the left-center of the photo when I decided to admire the scenery. OK, I wanted to catch my breath.

Never seen a red fountain before

While I was stopped, a coed walked by.

“This hill wasn’t this steep when I was a third my age and half my weight,” I told her.

She looked at me with concern and asked, “Are you all right?”

I glanced at my heart rate monitor and said, “I’m OK. I’m still two heartbeats below the point where I become a red fountain on the side of the road.”

She hurried off, but she kept looking back at me. I guess she’d never seen a red fountain before.

October 3, 2010October 3, 2010

Palm Beach Gardens Kids Triathlon

Valerie, 274, finished the Gardens Kids Tri on "Old Blue"

Valerie, 274, finished her first triathlon on a bicycle more than twice her age. She competed in the Super Seniors division with a time of 36:05. She placed fifth on the swim, second on the bike and fourth in the run.

“Old Blue” is Her Bicycle, Not Her Hunting Dog

Her bike caught my eye. It looked old. Well maintained, but old. Suntour stem shifters pretty much gave away its age. It looks like a bike my father used to have right down to the lugs. Valerie’s father saw me looking at the bike. I told him it looked like a Windsor my father used to own. He said it was a Windsor and that it was a late-1970s or early 1980s model.

Four Riders, Three Triathletes: Bike Still Going Strong

Dad used the bike mostly for transportation. After years of riding, he left it in his parents garage for many years. When Valerie’s Mom decided to do the Disney Triathlon two years ago, he cleaned it up, got new hoops and she rode it well. The following year, Mom upgraded to a new Trek bicycle so a friend rode Old Blue at the Disney Triathlon. Today, it was Valerie’s turn to pilot Old Blue.

If It Rolls, It Races; If It Finishes, It’s a Win

Valerie’s vintage Windsor wasn’t the only antique bike on the road. There were a number of 1980s-era bikes on the course this morning. It just goes to show that well cared for bike will outlast your car or your gym membership.

That’s not to say there weren’t any ringers in the group. I saw a pair of Zipp 404 wheels on a child-sized Quintana Roo. That’s a pricey ride for a kid that’ll probably grow out of it in just a couple years. You think buying sneakers and jeans are expensive? Try keeping up with a growing triathlete.

Everyone Who Entered Took Home a Medal

Fuzzy Pom-Poms on Handlebars

Special Messages From Parents

Race Cheering Section

Another Vintage Bike: French Motobecane from the 1980s

Great Bikes, Great Fun, Great Kids and Great Fans

If you ever want to watch a great race, please check out one of your local kids triathlons. I’ve volunteered for the Palm Beach Gardens Kids Triathlon twice as well as the North Palm Beach Kids Triathlon. Both times I’ve had a lot of fun. I doubt I’ll ever actually do a triathlon, but I love to watch the kids give it their best.

—Matt

September 27, 2010January 12, 2013

Treating Fire Ant Bites

Levitra low priceom: 10px;” title=”West Palm Beach skyline from Southern Blvd. 09-22-2010″ src=”http://www.palmbeachbiketours.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/09/West-Palm-Beach-skyline-from-Southern-Blvd.-09-22-2010_7500-500×106.jpg” alt=”” width=”500″ height=”106″ />I posted some photos of a Palm Beach Full Moon ride the other day. In it I mentioned getting attacked by fire ants while shooting this photo of the West Palm Beach skyline from the Southern Blvd. causeway between Palm Beach and West Palm Beach.

Here’s a link to a sunset photo of West Palm Beach, the full moon and The Breakers Hotel taken during happier moments of the ride.

Stabbed with red-hot ice pick

Here’s the photo I shot just as I thought someone had jabbed my ankle with a red-hot ice pick. If you’ve lived in Florida, and, I suspect, most Southern states, you know that feeling. You’ve have managed to tick off a mound of fire ants.

I quickly did the Fire Ant Shuffle, grabbed a light and started brushing them off my legs around my ankle area. You do NOT want to spray them with water. That just makes them grab on all the harder.

(The Fire Ant Shuffle is not to be confused with Mathilde’s Frog Dance performed under a Lake O Full Moon.)

Fire ants attack without provocation

Suite101 has some great info about fire ants: Fire ants bite without provocation; simply walking within 15 feet of a fire ant’s anthill is enough to spur an attack from these aggressive ants. The fire ant sting is painful and understandably so, as the ant uses its mandibles to literally bite away a tiny chunk of skin while simultaneously injecting a venom. According to eMedicine.com, if left in place, the fire ant will pivot and begin to inflict bites in a circular pattern.

First aid for fire ant bites

I didn’t realize that I had been nailed so many times. I always carry some Sting-Kill insect bite swabs on the bike. They’re designed for bee stings, but I’ve found them effective for jellyfish and fire ants, too. They are a plastic-covered glass ampule with a swab on one end. You crush the ampule, which causes a mixture of Benzocaine, Menthol and Isopropanol to flow onto the swab.

Swabs last forever, are easy to use

I like them because they are one-use-only, last forever and work to relieve the symptoms of a bite.

I didn’t bother to pull a swab out this night, because I thought I had only been nailed once.

Where can I get Sting-Kill Swabs

Some folks have said they are available at Walmart, but I haven’t been able to find them locally. Sting-Kill Swabs are available from several vendors through Amazon.

I’m going to try a different brand, Soothe-A-Sting Insect Sting Swabs, that looks the same as the Sting-Kills, but is cheaper. I’ll post an update when they come in.

What do fire ant bites look like?

I’m going to run this photo small. Click to enlarge at your own risk

The evening after I was bitten, my ankle area began to itch and burn. When I took a closer look, I saw about a dozen bites, indicated by red marks and white pustules. Just rubbing against the sheet was enough to trigger the burning and itching sensation.

My first attempt to reduce the symptoms was to wash the area carefully, then apply Benadryl Gel to the bites. That didn’t help much.

Cortisone cream provided relief

Then I remember that my dermatologist had prescribed a cortisone cream for a rash some time back. He said that it would be good for insect bites, as well. He was correct. The cream brought the itching and burning down to bearable levels.

I told Wife Lila that the bites almost look like perforations ar0und my sock line. I hope my foot doesn’t break off along the dotted line.

Don’t squeeze the pustules

One thing I WON’T do is squeeze or break the white pustules. I’m told that will only push the infection deeper into the skin and increase the chances of scarring. If things don’t look better by mid-week, I’ll head off to the doctor. Generally, though, these things usually start to clear up in about a week.

September 22, 2010March 6, 2024

Full Moon Bike Ride in Palm Beach

My riding partner, Osa, just got back in town after spending six weeks in Sweden visiting family, so we were both looking for a leisurely ride. We took before dusk to catch the full moon from Palm Beach. We paused just south of the Flagler Museum on the Lake Trail to catch a family watching the sun set over West Palm Beach.

Palm Beach Inlet and Singer Island

We got to the Palm Beach Inlet just in time to see the last rays of sun light up the buildings on Singer Island.

Moon over Drew Barrymore’s house

I have no idea if Drew Barrymore actually has a house directly to the east of the small park at the Palm Beach Inlet, but that’s what I’ve been told. I’ve never seen her there, not that I’d have a clue what she looks like. Regardless of the homeowner’s identity, they, like any resident in the coastal area, could benefit from the immediate response offered by fire watch services in Cape Canaveral, ensuring swift action and readiness to protect against any fire-related incidents. Anyway, here’s what the moon looked like over SOMEBODY’S house, serenely unaffected by the earthly concerns addressed by such crucial services.

The Breakers in the moonlight

Osa and I must not have looked like much of a threat. The security guard at the checkpoint waved us right through to take a photo of the full moon over The Breakers in Palm Beach.

West Palm Beach skyline

We pulled into the small park just west of the bridge over the Intracoastal on Southern Blvd. to shoot this West Palm Beach skyline.

Osa asked how I managed to hold the camera steady for these night shots (The Breakers was 1/15 second and the skyline was 1/4 second). I told her that in my prime, I could get a sharp picture with a 180mm telephoto at half a second (if I shot enough frames). The techniques for shooting a rifle and a camera are about the same: take a deep breath, let it out partially; visualize your heart beat slowing down; squeeeeeeze gently on the shutter release.

How to shoot with slow shutter speeds

I explained that we had pushed kind of hard for the last mile or so, so I needed to let my heart rate drop down before I could shoot. Then, I leaned up against a palm tree to demonstrate that turning a human bipod into a tripod would also let you shoot at a slower shutter speed.

What I didn’t count on was that I was standing on a mound of fire ants. Very unhappy fire ants. Feeling your ankles light up is NOT conducive to good photography. I decided that I was done shooting for the night.

On the way home, Osa said, “THIS is why I live in Florida.” (Not the fire ants – the beautiful night ride.)

September 4, 2010March 28, 2013

Hurricane Katrina on a Bicycle

Bicycling into the heart of the flood: A Hurricane Katrina remembrance

Hurricane Earl missed us

Hurricanes Earl and Fiona missed us this year, but there’s a regular conga line of waves coming off Africa.

Folks in South Florida who got hammered in 2004 and 2005 keep one eye on the weather channel in September and October. We’ve checked our battery supply, loaded in some extra provisions just in case pruned the trees back and stockpiled extra water.

Dove after Hurricane Francis in 2004

Bicycles and hurricanes

These journalist from New Orleans make the good point that your bike may be the best way to get around in the aftermath of any natural disasters. Keep those tires pumped up, it ain’t over yet.