Pick Your Pace, Find Your Place

Every week, usually on a Thursday but sometimes on a Wednesday, Christine and I walk to our favorite breakfast spot, The Issaquah Cafe. It's two miles from our home and we always walk. While there are faster ways in which we might cover this distance, we have no desire to rush. Walking is companionable and convivial to conversation. We have the time and take the time to enjoy being together and to not just note but to experience the place we are living. Our world is familiar, but every morning is new.

On our walk yesterday we talked of pace and how it informs our experience of place. It is tempting to rush because life is fleeting but often it is on our slow journeys that we discover what Dar Williams called "the gift of what you notice more."

I continue to think of pace and place when I am out on an afternoon scooter trip to Lake Sammamish Park. I'm often asked what I find so fascinating about the scooter and I've concluded that a big part of the appeal is the pace. On the scooter I experience the world at about twice my walking speed, which is about half my bicycling speed. More precisely I should say that my scootering spans the range between walking and biking speed. I can, with effort, exert myself up to bursts of biking speed and, of course, when the world slopes down, I coast. But I find, often, that I slow my scooter to the exact pace of walking for various purposes including conversation, courtesy, or contemplation. Going too slow on a bicycle feels too slow, the machine needs a certain amount of motion to make its way in the world. That's a fine way to travel but I've found much to love in the middle way I'm exploring by scooter. On the scooter I am literally only one step from walking at any moment and I find that quite liberating.

This is hair ice. This is only the second time in my life I've seen it. If, I'd been on my bike, I probably would have rolled right past it. If I'd been walking, I wouldn't have gotten out this far. You pick your pace and find your place.

I'm not big on New Year's resolutions, as Will Shortz once noted if you think of a way to improve your situation there's no need to wait for a certain date on the calendar to take action, but I do intend to keep exploring the world in various ways, at various paces.

I hope you have a fascinating 2015 and that you find paces and places to love.

Swifty Scootering Around Lake Sammamish

Yesterday morning Swifty and I set out for trip around Lake Sammamish. It was just getting light around 7:30 AM and the morning had a bit of light drizzle. The temperature was cool but not cold and it was a fine day for scootering.

The gateway door is a gift from Issaquah's Sister City of Chefchaouen, Morocco.

The Issaquah Train Station. The last trains came through here in the 1970s. This is now a museum.

Happy Chanukah

Starting at Gilman Boulevard, the old rail line becomes a multi-use trail.

Sammamish State Park. Ownership of this park is being transfered to the City of Issaquah.

At the Sammamish City line, the travel turns to gravel. Over the next few years, the entire trail will be paved.

Squak and Cougar Mountains in the background.

Sign explaining upcoming trail construction.

There are a lot of big houses with great views along the trail. Big mortgages and property taxes, too!

This is one of the older houses along the trail.

There's active construction and paving happening on the northern section of the trail.

The artist who lives here sells these various bits of fence art.

Here is where I switch over to riding on the Sammamish Parkway.

Detailed map of the construction area.

Construction on this segment should be completed in the spring of 2015.

Where there are sidewalks along the parkway, I make use of them.

When the sidewalks run out, I ride on the shoulder.

At the Redmond town line, I rejoin the trail.

There's a little tunnel that passes under the Parkway.

The trail in Redmond has nice, smooth pavement.

I stop at Peet's for fuel.

This is the Sammamish River crossing at Marymoor Park.

Rolling back towards Bellevue.

Here's where I turn south to go back to Issaquah.

I'm neither a walker nor a biker, but I mostly stay toward the right.

The PDW Lars Rover is a nice, bright light. Lots of debris on the shoulder left over from last week's windstorm.

One of the many nice entrances to the trail network we have here.

Details of the Lake to Lake Trail System.

Heading toward Issaquah.

This is an example of a climb that I can kick up.

This is the start of the prettiest way to climb up to the I-90 corridor.

It's not far to get to the I-90 trail, but there is a good bit of climbing.

First, there's this little bridge over a creek.

There's a series of switchbacks here.

You can tell that we get a lot of rain here, it's always mossy.

These switchbacks are too steep to scoot.

The spiral ramp leads to the bridge over I-90.

A better view of the bridge.

Going up.

The bridge over I-90.

It's a downhill run pretty much all the way into town from here.

I have to stop for one more picture at Montreaux.

Back in the Issaquah Valley, crossing the creek.

I was home by lunch time. This 27.45 mile trip was my longest Swifty trip to date. I'll be posting a detailed comparison of Swifty to my other scooters (a NYCEWheels Kickped and a Razor A5) in the future, but here are some of my impressions from the first week. Swifty is a larger, more expensive scooter but the extra money buys a much smoother ride. I feel like I go further with less effort on Swifty but the average speed on all the scooters are quite similar. As I've often said, scooters fall into the middle ground right between walking and biking. My average walking speed is about 3 mph, my cruising speed on a bike is about 12 mph, and I scooter at 6 to 7 mph. The rougher ride on the smaller wheeled scooters make them seem faster and "quicker" but Swifty is actually slightly faster in terms of average speed over the long haul. With the bigger wheels I can roll more places that I'd have to walk on with the smaller wheeled scooters. Swifty is more complicated to fold and heavier to carry than the smaller scooters, but he's quickly become my favorite scooter to ride.

More details to come in future reports.