Best Bike Memories

[Henry morgan]

Summer of 1977 right before freshman year, My brother, cousin and me riding bikes all over salem oregon. we used to ride in a place call Bush Pasture Park. One afternoon on the way back to My grandmothers house we rode past the state capitol bldg.
They had an underground garage with a long ramp. we rode down it and out the otherside and nobody said anything to us SOOOO
we did it again :roll: This time on the drive bye the elevator doors opened. OOPS we rode into the elevator!!! Doors closed
and up we went. Doors opened 3rd floor and out we went riding down the halls of the capitol bldg. Secretarys looking at :shock: :shock: :shock: :? but nobody said anything, at the end of the hall we found a soda machine and snacks. So we dig in and have a feast. Some lady comes in, gets a drink, looks at us and tells us they called the cops we best get.
so back down the hall we ride I wanted to take the stairs. but we left via the elevators. it was a great summer, rode all over the city, but we never topped that day. unless you count cutting off a finger as a good time :roll: thats another story

 

[Rat Rod]

Man...I don't have any as exciting as that...ha ha. :lol:

I think I spent half my life as a kid on my bikes so it's hard for me to remember one particular instance.

Fortunately back then we lived in Midland, Michigan and it was a decent sized city back in the 80s, but not too big. We could pretty much ride anywhere that we pleased and we covered lots of ground back then.

We lived about two miles from the Jr. High School so my friend and I rode to and from school every day when the weather was nice.

Best bike memory was probably getting my brand new Fuji 12 speed when I started Jr. High on my 13th birthday....first and only bike store bought bike.

 

[outskirtscustoms]

I can't really think of one particular instance but I've always been tinkering with bikes and building different stuff so everyday feels like that. People stop me everyday just to see my bike.

 

[Buck Masterson]

It was early 80's and I had a Huffy Scout, and there was a dip at the end of a curb in my hometown. Made the PERFECT ramp. My buddies and I would always jump it. One direction you could just land back on the sidewalk, but from the side you would jump into the street. I was flying as fast as I could go, hit it, got air just as a car turned the corner. I cleared the hood of the car and landed perfectly just as if I had been practicing it! Even thought the guy in the car slammed on his breaks and called me everything but white I put the hammer down and got the heck out, and my buddies eventually caught up and I bet we talked about that jump for months before it started getting old! I still hear that story every so often. I don't know what that bike was made out of, but I always figured it was an alien substance because it was unstoppable. I still have parts of it on other bikes, but that will always be the my favorite bike I ever owned.

 

[schertztx]

Like Buck, mine involves jumping and cars :?

There was an empty lot between our house and the next and the sidewalk had a curve in it about in the middle. We would build a ramp (wooden bench with plywood) at the apex of that turn so we would land in the grass. (no landing ramps back then) Me and several neighborhood kids would jump that ramp over and over almost all day long and of course it eventually turned into a distance contest. Well, a couple of us got brave (read stupid) and decided to try and jump over this plastic 55 gallon barrell. Then it was who could jump over a barrell lengthwise. Well, when it got to two barrels lengthwise, I was first. I went down the street a little further this time to make sure I had plenty of speed. Everyone was lined up along the landing area to witness this jump of all jumps as I took off down the street, pedaling for all I was worth. I must have been looking down at the street and really concentrating because when I looked up, there was a car in the middle of the street stopped (they saw me coming) :shock: :shock: I looked up just in time to hit the front bumper and go right up over the handlebars, up the windshield, across the roof and down to the street. Mom came running out of the house and ran right up to the car to ask the driver if she was ok :? All the other kids laughed and teased me about that for years!

 

[highship]

Me and my friend Brian (RIP Buddy) lived on our bikes. I could tell stories all day long but I guess the best one is just spending the time I had with him on our bikes. Man, I miss that dude.

 

[Willg]

Really simialar to the first one mentioned, but every year my family takes a trip to the pennsylvania and we ride our bikes there. After I got my dad into musclebikes, he brought his schwinn stingray and i brought a huffy green draggin on the trip.

there is a parking garage next to the hotel we stay in that is rarely busy, so my dad and I got on the elevator with our musclebikes (tight fit) and went up to about the fifth floor. We raced each other all the way down. You can get going pretty fast doing that and I guess we were lucky nobody came int. We must have done that about four times.

 

[StepChld]

July 3, 1975. My 10th birthday. Dad took me down to the local Sears store and we came home with this bike (or rather its twin :wink: )

I still remember vividly riding the neighborhood waiting for my friends to wake up so we could go ride somewhere (and that I wouldn't have to borrow a bike or wait my turn). But I also remember thinking, it was good to be alone for a while and just ride.

 

[jwm]

I got my first new Schwinn, a Spitfire, sometime in '77. I was twenty five. I had the bike set up to ride on the dirt roads in the hills around here- I added a front brake, BMX pedals, a larger sprocket on the rear wheel for better climbing, and thornproof tubes. Nonetheless, my best memories of that old one speed are the street trips. I used to start out early from my place in La Habra for a ride I called the Giant loop. I'd ride south and east on the surface streets through Orange County until I picked up the Santa Ana river down near Angel Stadium in Anaheim. I'd take the river trail down to Newport Beach, then ride back up to Huntington, and then home- a mere twenty some miles more dodging traffic up Beach Boulevard. I never measured the miles, but the ride took the full day. After all, I was on a one speed Spitfire- not a fast machine. I'd leave in the morning with a few bucks in pocket for food, maybe a smoke or two for those quiet spots on the trail, and just cruise along easy, hour after hour, most all day long. I'd grab a hamburger down at the beach, and take a break watching the waves before turning back for the twenty mile crawl up Beach Boulevard. The ride got pretty tough near the end, but doing the giant loop always left me feeling like I'd accomplished something. I wouldn't get home till nearly dark.
Yeah. Good times.

JWM

 

[user 135]

Best or Memorable? Memorable, I broke my collar bone twice. Once when I was 5 and the other when I was 13.

Best? I rode ever where when I was young, which doesn't happen too much any more. I really like riding with my kids, especially on the the Rail Trails of North Idaho.

 

[Jimmy the Gent]

Like any great memory my first great bike memory is (slightly) bitersweet. I got my first bike for Christmas in (I think) 1976;a red Jr. Sting-Ray. (Oddly enough, the same shade of red as the one I have now. 8) The "wow" feeling is something I'll never forget.

The "bitter" is two-fold. I had to wait to ride it because it was too cold; and it the process of my trying to ride without training wheels, my dad let go of the sissy bar...and I crashed into the stockade fence in the back yard.

The crash itself was nuthin' - especially to a kid.The worst part was my dad getting so frustrated (and disappointed in me - at least in my eyes) that he stormed back into the house.

He never did teach me - my sister did.

On the other hand; somewhere my mom still has the note that I wrote as a seven-year-old not to worry when they woke up about me- I was out riding my bike. The best part was the P.S.:"I am getting it down." We lived in a house with some steps at the time; and the bike was kept inside.Rather than wake them up early on a Saturday, I took matters into my own hands. 8)

I rode around the neighborhood alone.."Kid logic" doesn't let me recall for how long.

I do remember the feeling of exhilaration. I'm sure you'll all agree that nothing beats that freedom; especially when you recall that first time.


Oh; and I still keep my bike inside - old habits really do die hard.

There are others; but I don't want to clutter the thread..

 

[kingfish254]

Some of my best bike memories have to do with the sense of freedom that bikes gave us as a kid.

I grew up on a little island (200 homes) on the Intercoastal Waterway in Savannah. The only way on or off was across a palm lined causeway, so for the longest time our parents only let us ride on the island.

About the time I got my Sears Screamer 2 for Christmas and my buddy got a Sears Gremlin, our parents started letting us ride across the causeway to the rural convenience store (Little S Store). It was less than 2 miles away, but for us like the whole world opened up.

By the time we graduated up to 10 speeds we were allowed to ride all the way to the mall (5 miles). Now we had access to the entire universe!!!! We would ride there almost every weekend. We even bought a big heavy chain and lock and kept it locked to the metal fencing around the Sears lawnmower area. I still remember going to Sears about 15 years later and seeing the lock and chain still there.

 

[Carbon]

My first new chrome bmx a Huffy Pro Thunder my pops got me back in around 1982, riding the old neighborhood with a couple of buddies building ramps and nearly killing ourselves launching and throwing out some whips, I used to always ride up to my uncles bodyshop during the summer down at the end of my street to hang out with the old man while he was working on cars, he always had the 56 FLH Panhead parked out front and to score a biscuit from the best little resteraunt in town, "The Spot Grill" when they made a food run. :mrgreen: It was always fun ridin wheelies on the big sis's nanner bike to, Good times, Good times.

 

[yoothgeye]

So many memories, BMX sleepovers, we'd get up before first light and hit the dirtbike trails in the woods, mountain biking when it was "new" with an adult from church, riding bikes on the beach with dad late into the night and early morning on vacations, mountain biking trips with my brother-in-law, crashing out bad on a 30 foot jump and getting stitches the night I first met my future wife's parents, I was strung out on pain killers and they thought she was dating a druggie, riding with my kids now and watching them pedal off without training wheels and fighting back tears, but it all started somewhere.

I remember that I already had a bike of some sort, but dad bought me a bike at the flea market, it had 16" solid rubber tires, the frame was covered in green plastic to mimic a motorcycle body and it had a hard seat, we hadn't gone there looking for a bike but we came out with one. When we hit the gravel lot I got on and he held the seat and ran with me and let go... I've been riding ever since.

 

[Gizmo]

The favorite bicycle memory of my youth involved my cousin and I and a clandestine ride down into a county owned limestone quarry.

We lived in a rural area and like most 11 year old kids our bikes were our recreation, transportation, and well, our lives. A regular ritual included a 5 mile round trip to the nearest mom and pop store for our daily sugar fix. This trip passed by said stone quarry which we visited often to practice our rock throwing prowess. We dearly wished to extend our explorations to the bowels of the quarry but there were all those "Keep Out" signs and men working and trucks and stuff, not to mention the whoopin' we'd get if our folks found out we were anywhere near that hole in the ground. But I digress.....

A summer staple of road maintenance then, was tar and stone chip sealing of the county roads. When finished with the sealing, the crews would dump a few hundred gallons of kerosine in the tar trucks, let it slosh around for a couple days then spray the resulting mixture on the gravel roads for dust control. Those roads included (unbeknownst to my cousin and I) the steep gravel drive down into the quarry.

Well, one fine summer day my cousin and I finally worked up the testicular fortitude to descend that steep gravel drive on our bikes (old, no fenders, apes, 'nanner seats - classic rats) to explore that quarry. We couldn't see any one around so we headed down the hill, very quickly realizing we were going very quickly, that our coaster brakes were not going to be of much use on that gravel, and that this was the point at which they had started spraying that gooey black tar mixture on the road into the quarry! So there we were, hanging on for dear life, afraid to brake for fear of skidding off the edge and getting a nasty, sticky, black tar stripe up our front sides and down our backs and all we could do is RIDE IT OUT! We made it to the bottom without crashing but our troubles had just begun. There was a coating of tar on us, our bikes, and everything else exposed, that had to be cleaned or explained To make things worse, a road commission pick-up truck was headed towards us as we set there with our shirts off trying to get the goop out of our hair and teeth. The gentleman got out of his truck, ambled over, took a look at our sorry ass/scared faces, smiled and mentioned that this was restricted property and that we weren't s'posed to be there. Then he handed us a couple of rags and chuckled about "that ..... kinda hard to clean off, ain't it?" Then he drove off without another word, certain there was nothing he could do or say that would rival what we had coming when we got home. We worked at the "cleaning" for a while, walked our bikes back up the hill and headed home.

Mom wasn't home when I got there so I finished the cleanup, threw away the incriminating, tar stained clothes and to the best of my knowledge she was never the wiser. At least I never got in trouble for it.

Ah the misguided antics of our youth. It's a wonder many of us survived.

Life is like riding a bicycle - in order to keep your balance, you must keep moving. ~Albert Einstein

 

[Henry morgan]

Gizmo you did something scary and u survived.. :lol: life in the bike lane