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Weird stuff you've done while cycling

Last Post 10/02/2019 04:25 PM by Cosmic Kid. 10 Replies.

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6ix

Posts:485

04/01/2019 07:29 AM
Yeah, this topic is pretty broad. Was just thinking about some of the strange situations that have come up this morning. 1. While doing intervals saw a woman with a flat tire and stopped to help. What a mess. She had probably four jacks but none of them were for that particular car and the spare was also flat. The tire was down to the wires but was able to get her along. Took forever and I was a mess afterwards. 2. Cycling through golf course I happened to see a golf cart roll-over on an older gentleman. Bystander syndrome set in as everyone kinda just looked at each other. I skidded in the grass, dumped the bike and helped get the cart off the guy as it was crushing his legs. Was difficult to do while wearing cleats and definitely got my heart-rate up! 3. Saw an injured cat in the middle of a busy road. Set bike in middle of road to stop people and carried cat over to side. Didn't know what to do as this was before cell phones. Got back on bike and hammered back to office to get my car and headed back. Cat was still there so wrapped him up and started towards the emergency vet. Sadly, he died before I got there but at least he was being petted and cared for while he went. Was really sad. To this day it still makes me tear up but at least I tried to help. 4. Stopped a bunch of times to help turtles across the street. Cycling allows us to see and witness so much more in life, both the ups and downs.

Dale

Posts:1767

04/01/2019 08:18 AM
In the weird stuff others have seen--> Coming back from mbt riding and saw a stalled car at an intersection. We all jumped out to push the car out of the way. When we got back in our vehicle we wondered what they thought of three guys in spandex were actually up to that day. One of the us had his shirt off, heart rate strap still on, and bibs with the straps down... must have looked like, I don't know what but couldn't have be good. Another time one of those aforementioned guys and I were winter riding on a trail. Cold, so we were in full winter gear including balaclavas, almost everything back. From the trail we saw a car that couldn't get traction on an icy patch so we laid the bikes down, scrambled through the trees and down the hill to lend a hand. When we were done we hiked on back up the hill laughing that some lady would tell her husband about the two Ninjas who silently showed up then disappeared back up a hill. My sister stopped us on a ride so she could shoo a tarantula across the road. Buddy had a copperhead strike at him when were were on a trail a couple years ago. Laughed that had the snake hit the rear tire the flat would have truly been a snakebite flat.

79pmooney

Posts:3180

04/01/2019 11:40 AM
I helped a turtle across once. Decent sized box turtle in Michigan. He did not want my help! Kept trying to push my fingers off his shell with his rather strong legs but they just weren't long enough. Two incidents on my regular ride home from downtown. First, a sunny mid-afternoon on the parkway. A man was sitting on the far curb, head down. There was a small crowd around him and cars stopped, asking the problem. I stopped too. The woman who appeared in charge said the man felt faint, that 911 had been called and all was good. Cars went on. I stayed. Watched as these bystanders debated what to do. Several were pretty sure this was a diabetes/blood sugar issue. Someone had a meter but no one knew what numbers they were looking for. A reading was taken. 400. High? Low? Just in case, someone gave him sugar. I stepped aside to just out of earshot and called 911. No, they knew nothing of this. Wanted a street address and they would send an ambulance. (This is a parkway through Portland's old hillside park. There are no houses. Not my only time trying to tell a dispatcher where I was . Without street numbers, they haven't a clue!) I finally told the dispatcher I would meet the ambulance at the restaurant at the top of the hill. Flagged down the firetruck, then the ambulance and went on my way. Don't know how that turned out. Hope the outcome was good. And on the same route, next hill 1/4 mile later, 10 pm Friday night, I came to a car rolled over in the middle of the road. Man in it, liquids flowing from the car. Man seemed OK. Now there was a big crowd of highschool kids coming down the hill (the football game had just ended). My first thought was that if any of these kids had a cigarette and that was gasoline, this could be really bad. So I parked my bike, stepped into the street between the car and the kids (a geek in bike gear and cleats) and told them to stop. They did. I just stayed there. Police showed up, I got back on the bike and continued home. How I came across with enough presence to command that authority I will never know. Found a dead hummingbird in the bike lane on a ride early spring. Perfect male Anna. Held it in my hand. What a beautiful little critter. And it weighed nothing. Just a 3" perfect and striking bird, every feather perfect, colors and brilliance perfect. Gently laid it in some grass to return to the earth that nurtured it. (I feed Anna's year 'round but from the house they are always backlit and I never get to see their brilliance. I found this bird when "Alphie", my resident alpha male was alive. Alphie and I got to know each other rather well. He was unafraid of me, would feed when I was very close and would scold me on cold winter days if I was late with unfrozen sugar water. To get to hold and see close up a still male was both a special moment and sad.) Ben

Orange Crush

Posts:4499

04/01/2019 12:29 PM
Oh that kind of weird stuff. I had other things in mind LOL. The only instance along lines of above that comes to mind is helping out a Brit wannabee cross-country (cross Canada that is) cyclist who was hopelessly unprepared for the mountains in BC. It was a very cold and rainy Easter, I was actually racing a couple of my wife's colleagues from Fraser Valley up a still very much snow covered Crowsnest Pass. Came across her around km 15, still 25 to go, pushing her bike up the highway, looking completely dejected and cold. Not much I could do about situation immediately but talked to her for about 15 minutes and encouraged her to try and flag down a car (which she'd already tried unsuccessfully). Told her I'd try to get help for her, booted up the pass as fast as I could where my wife already was at cabin that was rented for weekend. She drove down and gave the girl a ride up to our cabin where she spent most of evening in front of fireplace warming/drying up again. Just when they had put everything in our very small car, they saw two bears. We later got a post-card, our intrepid traveller had ridden down to Kamloops, put her belongings on a train and started riding again in the much flatter and friendlier prairies.

longslowdistance

Posts:2881

04/01/2019 07:32 PM
Number of box turtles helped across paved highways: Dozens. Number of snakes encountered on single track: scary but benign black snakes (they get really large here in VA): at least 5. Timber rattlesnakes (VA mountains only): 2 (time to turn around). Copperheads: 6, but all together on the same rocky mountain single track (definitely turned around!) Sad box turtle story: rode past one on a high speed but low traffic rural highway, Took a few moments to register, turned around to help him/her get across safely, as I had done many times before and since. But as soon as I turned around to help, a semi squashed it flat. Not pretty to watch. Not the truck driver's fault. Sad and angry at the time, just the wasteful stupidity of the situation. More than 15 years later this searing memory still lingers. Such noble creatures, the eastern box turtle. They are getting wiped out. By us. Too many roads chopping up their habitat, too much traffic.

79pmooney

Posts:3180

04/02/2019 01:24 AM
lsd, I've encountered a timber rattler at close quarters hiking. My younger bro's wedding party; hiking the day before. We passed a table-like big granite rock. I heard the rattle right behind me, turned and watched a 4' well fed all black rattlesnake pass between myself and the groom. Apparently we'd disturbed his warm-up snooze. I didn't know they could be black but there was no arguing either the rattle or the triangular head and I had a full-on front row seat!

zootracer

Posts:833

04/02/2019 10:28 AM
I almost ran over a Northern Pacific Rattlesnake years ago while descending at a pretty good clip on a back country road. It appeared to be a large tree branch laying in the middle of the road. I gently steered to the right to aviod it. When I looked down it was a huge rattler. Good thing I did not attempt to bunny hop him. I've seen a couple of Bobcats. One came out of nowhere and ran in front of me for about 100 ft then disappered into the woods to my right. Tough, scruffy looking little critters. I would not like to tangle with one. Saw a red fox run across the road in front of me. Beautiful. Weeks later I saw a dead red fox laying in the middle of the road a few miles away. I wondered if it was the same fox. Rescued a box turtle crossing the road in front of me. He was heading towards a lake on the opposite side of the freeway I was alongside. I picked him up and carried him to the wooded area on the other side of the road. I always wondered if I had sent him to his death. He was looking for water. Not much choice, too big too carry, and too big to carry under my jersey. I looked for him the next day where I had carried him, gone. I get passed often on rides, but that comes with age as I am slow and it comes to all of us if you ride long enough into the twilight zone. I've been passed by younger rides riding old mountain bikes. Once a guy was wearing sneakers, had a large rearview mirror on his handlebars, and a kickstand. No way I could have kept up with him. I wondered if it was just a roadie out looking to play with someone. It helps not to have an ego anymore. Years ago I was taking a short break on a side road and some newbie, wearing street cloths, no helmet, pedals with toe clips and sneakers. He was riding a brand new bike, I think it was a Pinarello. He admired my Conti tires with the blue sidewalls. We chatted for a couple of minutes then he rode away going down the road I was going to take on my return ride home. I waited a few minute, as I was sure I was going to encounter him on the descent. I never saw him again. He was gone like a ghost. Found a small bird laying on the road, stunned. Looked like he had flown into a car. I picked it up. It was shaking like it was in a lot of pain. I did not know what to do with it. Another roadie came by, saw my dilemma. He recommended that I place it in a hollowed out fence post on the other side of the road. I did so, thought about putting him under my jersey but i would have suffocated it. Checked on it a few days later, gone. Hope to think it recovered and flew away. I've helped numerous riders with broken chains. Stuck in the middle of nowhere. We've put chains back together without a connecting link using my chain tool. Encounterd riders with no frame pumps, no co2, no spare tubes, nada. Once ran into a gal with a flat front tire. No air, no spare tube, no patch kit. I asked if she needed help, she said no, she just lived up the road. I knew the location. Steep road, hard walk wearing cleats about a mile away. I left, regretted stopping and talking her into letting me use one of my spare tubes. But to weidest things I have seen is my own reflection in a parked cars side window. Who is that old dude with the gray hair and long mustache? Scary.

79pmooney

Posts:3180

04/02/2019 12:11 PM
I envy you guys, I've seen very few turtles in the wild and on bike just that one. Maybe my eyes aren't trained. In Oregon, we have birds. Lots of raptors. Hawks, eagles, ospreys, falcons and of course crows and ravens. Ravens flew under my radar all my life until I saw a big "crow" take off as I rode by in what appeared to be slow motion. "Duh! That's not a crow." I've been studied by more than a few really big red tailed hawks and several eagles. It's a bit un-nerving to be riding along with this huge bird (especially the eagles) 25' overhead knowing he is watching me closely and I cannot twist my neck enough to see him. They've tracked me for a 1/4 mile at a time. Two quick eagle stories, both non-bike and when I lived in Seattle. I used to walk to the tiny park at the top of the bluffs overlooking Puget Sound and the yacht club I sailed out of. Was there one day standing at the fence of the bluff when an eagle glided by in slow motion at eye level 25' away. That was huge for me. It was my first eagle sighting. I grew up on the east coast that had been stripped of predator birds by DDT. Not long after that sighting I was driving up the alley to my house when I saw an eagle (the same eagle?) overhead. I went inside and found my binocs and bird book. Yup, bald eagle. He hung in that updraft 45 minutes. I love sharing this world with animals and I am OK with the idea that I may not be the supreme one. (And speaking of not being the supreme one - we were observed by a black whale, again form about 25' away, swimming parallel to us while we stormed along (literally) under bare poles and a drogue hung off the stern in a storm midway between Newfoundland and Ireland. Whale was the length of our boat, 35'. It never raised its head so we never saw either its eyes or forehead. Again, its un-nerving to be watched and this time, it had the final say. Wrecking our boat and leaving us for dead would have been easy. I was fully aware we might well have been looking at a teen-age sperm whale. If so, I got to see the whale I read about as a kid, that fascinated me and more so as an adult as I have learned more about them, both physically and in regard to behavior including behavior around man. The whale that has sunk (wooden) whaling ships and come to the tiny Greenpeace vessel to thank them for sparing her of an explosive harpoon. I felt OK with that whale beside us but I knew from my boat building days of several boats that had been disabled far out at sea by friendly whales giving the boat a nice nudge and breaking off the rudder. Again, that day, the four of us on the boat were not the supreme beings out there.) Ben

eurochien

Posts:163

04/07/2019 01:05 AM
A few years ago while mountain biking (White Ranch, Golden, CO.), I came up on some distressed equestrians on the singletrack. One of their party had been thrown off his horse down the side of the trail and had a head injury. The horse had spooked while downclimbing a slick rock section and had thrown the rider off to the downslope side of the trail, so the dude not only got thrown off the horse, but he had also flown down about 10 more feet until his head met a rock. He was not coherent, he was bleeding, and his 2 lady friends were freaking out. At this point another mountain biker showed up. We put our bikes down, went down the slope to get the guy on his feet, while the ladies were trying to call 911 despite crappy cell coverage. It took about 25 minutes until a team of 2 young paramedics showed up on the trail, they had a knobby tired gurney with them. They assessed the victim and enrolled us to help put him on the gurney and push/pull/steer the gurney up/down/around the 1/2 mile of rocky, rooty and generally steep singletrack to where it intersects with a fire road. We were soon joined on the trail by a Jefferson County Sheriff. The equestrians were taking the victim's horse back to the trailhead and my bike and the other mountain biker's bike were somewhere on the trail... Eventually the paramedics figured the victim needed to be medevac'ed so they called a helicopter, but due to the topography, the helicopter could not land close to where we were, so we had to hike another mile or so up and down the fire road. The Flight for Life helicopter landed in a clearing, and the crew's nurse took charge. She was awesome. The guy was loaded up in about a minute and the helicopter was on its way to St Anthony's in Denver just as quickly. My mountain biking partner and myself walked up to the trailhead where we thought we'd meet the equestrians and they were there, with our bikes! We thanked them, they thanked us and we asked them how they'd gotten our bikes for us while riding their horses plus the victim's horse and they told us they'd asked hikers to grab our bikes, turn around on the trail and bring the bikes back at the trailhead. I don't know what happened to the old rider, I hope he survived the accident without further consequences. This made me briefly consider changing careers and becoming an EMT or firefighter, alas I was already too old (late 40's)...

bluezurich

Posts:17

10/02/2019 01:59 PM
I had a ride in San Diego one day, probably around 1991 where I kept finding tools on my way. In Point Loma alone I found lineman's pliers and slip joint pliers (not in the same spot, yet which I still have to this day) and later in the ride around DT and Hillcrest I found a stubby phillips and finally a micrometer. I weighed about 5 pounds heavier and had clunking jersey pockets...so bizarre.