Erich departs…

Last Saturday my friend Erich departed Hawaii but not before we got in one last longish, but flat ride. We’d talked about a quick trip out to Sand Island for the photo op standing in front of downtown Honolulu across the harbor but ended up biking out to Waipahu and back on the Pearl Harbor bike path.
And, given the flatness of the route, we actually had time to get in the Sand Island leg before I had to run off to A Prairie Home Companion’s New Year’s show here in town.
Here’s Erich at the harbor…

I haven’t done nearly as much riding since Erich left – I ran up about 200 miles last week all told. This week I’ve only managed about 25 so far, but I’ve made sure to include some hills as I’m more or less (mostly less this month) beginning to train for Oregon. It’s back to increasing miles per week – though with 200 as my starting point I think I’d be hard pressed to go for more.
In other notes, Rivendell is having a sale, their first ever (sadly noted according to Grant), and I managed to spend too much money on things I definitely don’t need. Still it might all be fun.
One thing I did pick up was an inexpensive crankset for my Fujiyama. It’s been neglected for most of the year and I’ve been thinking about the possibilities. With the new crankset aboard I’ll probably work on new wheels next. They’re pretty trashed but still get me by. What I think I really want to do is build up a 3-speed hub drive for my rear wheel and run really puffy tires. Good fun – sort of a semi-cruiser commuter bike. We’ll see.
That’s it for now!