#30DaysofScootering: Scootering the Long Way to Seattle

When I got the invite from David Kroodsma to attend the Seattle launch event for his book The Bicycle Diaries, it was just the excuse I was looking for to put into motion a plan I've had for a while. Wednesday is one of my days off from work, so I pretty much had all day to spend scootering from Issaquah to Seattle. The short way, which I've scootered before, involves going across Mercer Island and the I-90 floating bridge

but the old train station 2 blocks from my house displays the distance for the route the trains used to take. It's 42 miles from Issaquah to the heart of Seattle if you go around Lake Washington and almost all of that route has now been made into bike trails. Stephen Wright famously said "Any distance is walking distance if you have the time." I've long applied that wisdom to bicycling and over the past year, I've come to apply it to scootering as well. Today I have the time and the forecast is for a dry day so after I hearty breakfast, I roll out the door at 7:00 AM. I've got all day, the book event isn't until 7:00 PM. I've got a day to fill with adventures.

At Gilman Boulevard, I roll onto the southern end of the Lake Sammamish Trail.

The wetlands off to the left is part of Lake Sammamish State Park.

The trail is currently unpaved as it passes through the town of Sammamish (pavement is coming in the next couple of years), so just south of the Sammamish border I turn up and onto the Sammamish Parkway.

The Parkway has a good shoulder or bike lane all the way up to Redmond and in some places there is a sidewalk.

A lot of deer cross the Parkway to get down to the lake to drink.

Redmond is where the trail pavement resumes

so I cross under the parkway via this nifty little pedestrian tunnel.

I'm at the north end of Lake Sammamish now.

As the trail rolls into Redmond, I turn left to go through Marymoor Park.

There is some giant circus-like thing going on near the velodrome.

On the western edge of the park I turn north onto the Sammamish River Trail.

As the name indicates, the trail follows the river. There's lots of bits of art along the trail

including the statue I call the woman sitting on nothing.

This water fountain is handy for both humans and their critters.

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It's pretty much impossible to get lost on the trail and handy signs and mile markers point the way

The river is home to lots of waterfowl.

These geese are completely unafraid of bikers, joggers, baby strollers and people on kick scooters.

This is one of my favorite bits of trailside art. On one side, it's the man in the moon

and on the other side it's a leaping salmon.

I take a quick break at Woodinville. These tiles map my route.

It's a beautiful spring day.

In Bothel there are various boats in the river.

This bit of graffiti points the way to Bothel Landing.

More waterfowl.

Up in Kenmore, I pass by Crocodile Rocks. I can't go past without that Elton John song sticking in my head.

This is Kenmore Air. It's the quickest and most scenic way to get from Seattle to the San Juan Islands or Victoria, British Columbia.

I stop briefly at Logboom Park. The day is overcast, but mild and perfect for scootering.

There is a lot of fish-themed art along the trail.This fountain is still closed for winter.

A few kiosks along the trails display trail maps.

This mural in Lake Forest Park celebrates the rebirth of the old rail line as a walking and biking trail.

Ever since Bothel, I've been on the Burke-Gilman Trail. It's one of the earliest Rail Trails and it's in the Hall of Fame.

This bit of trailside art is really cool. From this angle, it looks like a hobbit house.

From the side it's a fallen tree.

At Sandpoint, I leave the trail. I'm headed up and over the ridges of North Seattle because I want to see my friend Davey's new bike shop in Greenwood.

By the way, this is an idiotic way to go to Greenwood. Lots and lots of up and down. I walk lots of the up, I'm not a total idiot. But if I was smarter I would've gone much further south before cutting over or even going "too far" south and then backtracking north.

Seattle has been adding bike signage to help folks find their way.

One advantage of my route is that I got to see these lovely trees.

I keep forgetting that ugly freeways cut off Seattle neighborhoods, so I have to work my way further north to get across I-5.

Around 1:45 I'm settled into G&O Family Cyclery. This is my famous friend Madi Carlson and her son.

Davey in his element.

Madi said, "There's a big yellow scooterish thing right next door, you should check it out." And sure enough, it's a Kickbike.

Madi and son check out the kid's seat that fits on a Brompton.

G&O has the coolest bike repair stand I've ever seen. It has a counterweight to help with lifting some of the heavy cargo or electric bikes.

Tyler building up a lovely Soma.

G&O has lots of practical bike gear for sale.

And a bunch of bikes, of course.

Cargo and Family bikes are their specialty.

And they have a nice little selection of bike books.

Madi loads up for the ride home. This is a small load for her, just one kid, a couple of long boards, clothes, food...

After visiting with Davey and Tyler for a bit, I head off in the general direction of Freemont and Wallingford.

I'm easily distracted. One thing I love about scootering is that I go at a pace (around 6 or 7 mph, twice my walking pace, half my biking pace) where I'm more apt to notice things and it's so easy to stop.

This mailbox converted to a free poem depot is lovely.

It's packed with poems. I take one.

Here's the poem I got.

Now I have an odd little true story for you. I'm scootering down the sidewalk when I hear a voice call out, "Hey, Kent!" I stop and yell out "Hey, what?" It turns out my friend Wayne Johnson, was looking out his window as I rolled past. Wayne and I have been friends for years through various bike connections but I never knew where he lived. Until today, when I randomly scootered by his place as he was randomly looking out the window

Wayne is a stay at home dad. He and his daughter invited me in for lemonade and a nice chat.

Wayne has all kinds of cool stuff in his garage.

A cargo bike. The batman-ish thing hanging from the garage ceiling is a rain cover for the cargo box.

Wayne and his super nice kayak.

Skoot bikes are the best way to teach your kid to ride. Wayne's daughter is really fast on hers.

After a refreshing pause at Wayne's place, I roll down to Freemont and eventually work my way to Wallingford.

Here's the signboard for the event. The store, Wide World Travel, sells books and all kinds of nifty travel gear.

I park my scooter next to bikes I recognize. This is Dave Shaw's Davidson. By the way, I have a little cable lock that I loop through one wheel of the scooter to secure it.

This is Barb Culp's Davidson.

These are my friends Julie, Barb and Dave. Barb's husband Andy joined us later as did my friend Bill Lippe.

It was a packed house for the talk and reading. David is an engaging speaker and eventually I'll get around to posting a review of his book. You can learn more about David and his past and upcoming adventures at his blog at:

http://rideforclimate.com/blog/

OK, one more story to wrap this up. As I'm chatting with my friends, I'm enthusiastically extolling the virtues of kick scooting. "It's great," I say. "You're at eye level with folks. You go at a great pace, you can work hard or not depending on your mood. And in the year I've been scooting, I've had nothing but positive reactions from folks -- drivers, pedestrians, dog walkers, everybody!" I also mention that I've been asked several times about whether or not I change which foot I kick with, a question which surprised me because it never occurred to me NOT to switch feet. So now I've been thinking about how often I switch (I paid attention today and it seems to be in the range of 6 to 24 kicks between switches) but I hadn't counted before and now I'm wondering if there might be some kind of Heisenberg effect induced with my counting. I also wonder if I give equal kicking time to each foot. I explain my plan to get two pedometers and strap one to each foot to count kicks. "I want to see if I'm balanced." At this point my friend Barb assured me that "Anyone who knows you can attest to the fact that you're imbalanced!" She probably has a point.

After the book event, I scootered over to the U-district and caught a bus downtown. I then grabbed the Sound Transit 554 for home. I was back home at a bit after 10:00 PM with 45.3 scootering miles for the day. This brings my April scootering total to 55.5 miles. Tomorrow is going to be a MUCH lower mileage day.

#30DaysofScootering: Up and Down and Around the Town

I live in the Issaquah Valley, in the old part of town. There are many fine trees here.

This is a statue of Harvey Manning, the founder of the Issaquah Alps Trail Club. Harvey mapped a lot of the trails around here and was instrumental in preserving a lot of the green places around here. He also hated mountain bikes, viewing them as mechanical intrusions on the land. He'd probably be pretty bummed that I've propped my kick scooter next to his statue.

We had a super wet (record setting) March, but this April morning is quite lovely.

I'm rolling up to explore a bit in the Issaquah Highlands. This is where Sunset Way crosses the I-90 and goes up the Plateau and becomes Highlands Drive.

This dirt hiking trail leads up to the Tradition Plateau.

There's a nice biking/hiking/scooting trail that leads up to the Highlands.

The trail switchbacks up the hill.

This is the view looking back down.

Yes, this a damp part of the world with lots of moss.

By the way, if the hill is too steep for my kicks to carry any real momentum, I just walk alongside the scooter.

This climb is mostly kickable, but there are definitely some sections where walking works better.

This is the bridge over Highlands Drive.

I brought my little tripod and I've figured out my camera's timer.

So now not ALL my pictures are of a riderless scooter.

Up in the Highlands they have some bike-friendly routing, but the gradient is not too bike friendly.

These stairs are the quickest way to gain elevation.

I demonstrate yet another scooter climbing technique.

You can see a long ways when you get up high. The Highlands are about 600 feet above the valley.

This "Multi Use Trail" prohibits skateboards and bikes. No mention of scooters (plus it's early in the morning and nobody is around) so I figure I'm cool.

I'm really wondering what multi uses they envision. Walking, horseback riding, unicycling, go-carting perhaps?

More warning signs. I'm not a local on a bike, so I turn back.

More steep stuff. The new college campus is going to be going in up here.

The street is already called College Drive.

I top out just above Grand Ridge Elementary School.

The tops of these walls are level, so I finally have a picture that does a decent job of showing how steep the terrain is here. By the way, going down is much quicker than going up. The rear fender brake on my KickPed works fine for keeping my speed in check and stopping, but today's a dry day. If it was wet, I'd probably be walking down these steep slopes.

I roll back down to the valley and check out more of the blooming trees.

Down in the valley, there aren't any stupid signs restricting the trails. We abide by a general "Don't be a jerk" policy and folks tend to get along.

The old Depot is a couple of blocks from my home. 7.3 miles so far for the day, but I'll be scootering off later to have lunch with Christine when she gets off work. Afternoon update: 2.9 more miles of scootering to and from the Issaquah Safeway (where Christine works).

10.2 scooter miles today.