Moving by Bike

Steve posing with the Fuji Royale II before I left on the second run.

There are alot of moving parts on a bicycle.  We move our legs to make it go.  The pedals spin, the crank spins, the wheels spin.  It moves our bodies from one point to another.  But that's not exactly the kind of moving I'm talking about for this post.  A bicycle can also move our belongings.  

The other day I helped my friend Steve do that.  Using a trailer from BikesAtWork, we took some trips from one house to the other, loading it with nice and light square boxes that fit perfectly to oddly shaped items that we had to tweak a few times to secure.  On one of the trips (about 1 mile or so one way), we moved the grill.  It fit perfectly on the trailer with no tweaking or extra work.  Each loaded trip took about 12 minutes.  It took less time than that to get back of course.  

Steve is very plugged in to his community.  We saw many people who he knows along the route between houses, and received smiling faces and thumbs up for our efforts.  

We weren't stressed about trying to get too much done.  It was kind of like just going on a neighborhood bike ride like you would as a kid, except you're taking a few things along with you, and dropping them off somewhere else.  The joy of riding a bike is still there even though you are working, and that keeps it fun.  

There was a natural break in between trips, and during one of them Steve had received a package in the mail.  It was a proof of the greenways map of Chapel Hill, NC that he has been working on recently.  If you live in the Philadelphia area, you may have seen or used the Greater Philadelphia Bicycle Map that he designed.  

My family and I are moving too in a couple of months.  Steve has said he'll let me borrow the trailer, which I'm planning to do.  I had already been thinking about moving by bike before I knew he was doing this.  Our new place is also only about a mile away from where we are now.  I've been daydreaming about moving my Yamaha P-22 upright piano by bike, but that's probably not going to happen.  If you've heard of anyone who has moved a piano by bike, let me know!  

If you're in a rush, then moving by bike is probably not for you.  If you can take some time, and want to make your move fun and memorable, then I suggest doing some of it by bike.