My dad came to visit, and directed a serious pruning/weeding/cutting back session in the garden. Although it’s lost some of its overgrown junglyness (seems it was all ivy and weeds), suddenly there’s a whole load more light and little plants I’d never seen before. We cleared some room to put in a herb garden, grow some veg… (in case you’re wondering, yes, our neighbours are buried)
But despite the bijoux size of the garden, in his wake he left a small mountain of foliage that couldn’t go in the composter. The van’s without an MOT (and anyway, the recycling guys don’t let it in).
So we put aside some time to shuttle a dozen bags down in the trailers. Much more fun (-:
Racks and panniers are great, but it’s at times like these that you realised quite how versatile trailers are. As you can see, 1 BOB = two big bins worth.
I was on the Thorn Raven Tour, which I hadn’t ridden for a while, with On One’s wonderful Mary bars. Every time I ride that bike, I’m reminded what a well rounded machine it is. The Rohloff’s going really well too.
Cara had our trusty BOB Yak, and I was pulling Carryfreedom’s compact Y Frame, complete with its magician-style collapsable box. After you’re used to wrestling with single wheel trailers, two wheelers feel ridiculously straighforward to deal with. Easy as pie to load and unload. Just have to remember with narrower wheelbase models that if you pile ‘em up too high and pop up a curb, they can *turtle*, as mine did while I was heading down one of Europe’s steepest residential streets… taking me with it…
Here’s Cara, at the bottom of that very same street (our local slice of San Francisco), looking like she’s dragging a small tree behind her. We left a breadcrumb trail of leaves.
The pile to the left isn’t all ours, honest.
Down the hill, and back up again. And repeat. A few times. Still, much more satisfying and soulful than using the van. The guys at the recyclers congratulated us after our last run. Job done (-:
I’ve just invented a new medical condition: “carbon guilt”. It’s the bad feeling I get when I compare my woeful attempts at a sustainable lifetyle with Cass ‘n’ Cara’s minty-fresh Green credentials.
That said, another explanation would be that you are over-compensating for some deep dark secret. So go on, ‘fess up – do you have a nuclear reactor in the basement at home?
Garden’s looking great guys – more space to store bikes!!.
Nice hill, I guess at least you had to cart the stuff DOWN the hill rather than up, but still…
No reactor kicking about, so I guess our carbon secret would have to be all those flights out to India…
We once went up (and down) that hill on a tandem! Apparently, according to a Google search (http://www2.flickr.com/photos/fray_bentos/185872507/), it’s the steepest gradient of any road traffic street in Britain.
Hello I am planning on taking the silkroad next year and I am interested in a trailer. wich do you recomend
BOB or Y-frame
thank you
Well, I think depends on what kind of riding you end up doing. On unsurfaced roads, a single wheel trailer like the BOB is definitely a better choice – or have a look at the Extrawheel. On the road, the Y frame works really well. It’s very simple, easier to hitch, shorter, has less impact on the bike’s handling and breaks down nice and small for travel on buses/planes. If you’re not sure what kind of surfaces you’ll be touring on, I’d opt for a single wheel trailer I think, as I had trouble with the Y Frame flipping if its hit bigger stones or rocks.
thank you very very much
You have been very useful.