Our New Family Hobby...

Over the weekend, we have decided to becoming a cycling family... We live close to some great bike paths and trails and we've finally decided to make use of these wonderful facilities and get out and about a lot more. It kind of all started with the shiny new trike that Beth got for Christmas... We went to the nearby park on Saturday and Sunday... me pushing Beth on her trike (which she totally adores) and Phan riding his (somewhat neglected) bike... it was fun to get out and about on the bike... I rode Phan's bike for a bit to see how great his bike was... and then somehow from all of this, we started thinking how much fun it would be if we could all go for long bike rides together and have family picnics and stuff... It's not the first time we've talked about bike riding together and Phan is (to my surprise) quite well versed in his knowledge of bikes and bike and child carrying options.

So, today we went on a mission and we came home with what is known as a "child trailer for bikes" and after a few phone calls we managed to hunt down a Croozer 535 (which is a quite a reputable brand and versatile model). It looks like this (we got it in this orange colour too)-

It fits 2 children, (up to weight of 45kg)... or in our case, just our one child and room for toys and stuff to amuse her... plus there's lots of storage space in the back of it for taking drinks and a picnic.
















Here's what Beth looks like in it -
































I also test rode a couple of bikes and am having a new bike delivered to me tomorrow from a shop called "Bums on Bikes"... LOL... I think it's such a funny name for a shop... I love the bike we've chosen (it's my Christmas present from Phan)... it looks so cool and it's effortless to ride... We've gone for a hybrid Shogun bike which has an alloy frame and Shimano gears... and it's a gorgeous purple colour. Here's a photo of what it looks like -


Can't wait for my bike to arrive. It started raining this afternoon not long after we came home with the Croozer and we were just dying to get it out and give it a spin... so once the rain eased off, we braved the humidity and went for a trial ride with Beth and she looved sitting in it (although, she loves riding on her own trike more!)... I even had a go at riding and pulling the Croozer and it's surprising light and effortless... the Croozer is about 10kg and Beth is about 12kg... so it's an extra 20kg of weight you're pulling, but it's really fun and you can almost forget you're carrying the Croozer (which is a bad thing, because you really do have to think when you're riding to make sure you're in the middle of the path so the Croozer doesn't go offroad with your child in it!)

On a completely separate note... Phan keeps going on about this *MASSIVE* lizard he saw wandering up someones driveway on Boxing Day as he was driving home from work. He saw it a few streets away from where we live and says it was humungous and apparently easily more than a metre long! (We went to Underwater world with Phan's parents recently and there were massive lizards there and he says it was just like those lizards!) So now whenever we're out and about Phan's always on the look out for this ginormous lizard... it is so funny... I really hope we don't have any encounters with it!