I remember about 2 years ago I was oblivious to the Metro network in and around Los Angeles. I was chained to the day to day grind of driving back and forth to work from my parent’s home. 
Ever since I started riding my bike, I slowly found that not only is bicycling great but the Metro network of buses and trains are an enjoyable way to travel around town. I am still picking up new routes even to this day. Combine both the Metro and bicycling, you can practically get anywhere in Los Angeles. That is why I am excited that the Metro Gold Line will be opening up the expanded route from Union Station into East LA on November 15th.
If you had told me 2 years ago that this was happening, I would have easily dismissed this as anything significant. Why would I care about an expansion of a Metro train? 
I would not have realized that this opens up a way of getting to a part of LA in which I would not have gone in any other circumstances. This was true about a year ago when I took the Gold Line from South Pasadena to Highland Park. I definitely wouldn’t have been comfortable going there in previous scenarios. I now hang out at that area more frequently than my own town. This new expansion means more business to each of the local communities that is fortunate to have a train stop at their neighborhood. It allows people to be able to mobilize easily between East LA to Pasadena which connects multiple cultures, a multitude of different wealth class, and open up opportunities for the people in the communities that line up against the path of this train track.
If you find the time on Sunday, try to get to a station on the Gold Line and see for yourself. I heard you will be able to ride free that day and may even get to attend a block party to see a Mariachi Festival in Boyle Heights. Heck! They promised a special appearance of Santa at one of the stops. What better way to kick off the holiday season than with Santa? 
Photos provided by waltarrrrr on Flickr.
I recently found out the founder the Bike Oven opened his own bicycle store down the street from the Oven. I dug around his website and found that he organizes a “Get Some Dim Sum” ride every Sunday morning. Last Sunday was the 9th iteration of such a ride.
Coincidentally, my schedule allowed me to take part on this ride last weekend. I woke up early on Sunday morning and pedaled my way to the South Pasadena Gold line station and rode the train one stop south to Highland Park station. Upon arriving I was accompanied by a few others who also wanted to be part of this morning’s adventure. There were 2 other bloggers who joined us. Shannon from Sha In LA and Pat from Eating L.A. (stunning picture of me on this post). Check out their blogs for additional point of views.
I was joined by a few familiar faces besides Josef. Veronica, DJ Chickenleather, and Martin showed up. We casually strolled through Northeast LA. The bikes looked really cool but seemed restrictive. I kept hearing that the brakes were as effective as any coaster brakes. Also they were more of a sit back and cruise bike. I wanted the option to cruise and the ability to kick it up a notch should I need to. Luckily I was on my fixie. During the ride, I finally realized the beauty of riding fixed. I didn’t have to use my brakes as much as some people while we traveled on a slight decent and was required to stop frequently.
Our pack made it to the San Antonio Winery and we immediately made our way to the kitchen. The food took awhile for some (they were cooking 20 meals just for our group) but when it came I polished off my Italian Omelette without any hesitation.
We were invited to tour the winery. Our tour guide guided us through the few rooms explaining the history and process of making wine in the middle of LA. You don’t have to drive to Napa or even Temecula to get your winery fix. We had the opportunity to try some wine (Pat’s blog should have details on what was given to us).
By the time we were done and ready to go, the sun came up and warmed everyone up. It was pleasant a pleasant ride back. I especially like that Chickenleather was documenting the whole experience. One of these days I’m going to see if I can get a copy from him. We passed by a group where someone yelled, “Are you guys Midnight Riddazz??” CL wittingly replied, “Of course we’re not! It’s daytime.” That made me chuckle. Riding in a group like that made me feel like a kid again. It’s similar to riding in a group of motorcycles but slow enough to carry on conversations. Hard to describe unless you’re there.
I bid farewell to the group when I stopped at the Oven to help out for the rest of the afternoon. I’m definitely going to do this again. Hopefully more peeps can join me.
Bicycle, Restaurants
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Bicycle, Bike Oven, Dj Chickenleather, flying pigeon, food, Highland Park, Josef, Martin Chow, San Antonio Winery, South Pasadena, train, Veronica
I’ve been fascinated with the idea of building my own fixed-gear bicycle for a couple of months now. I first caught sight of one when I was looking around for ways to improve my current commuter. I came across a beautiful bike with no brake levers and no derailleurs. It was just a bike with one chain around the wheel and nothing else. A fixed-gear bike does not have a free wheel. This means that when you pedal backwards on a complete stop, you actually can go backwards. It makes it challenging if you ride around hills both going up and going down. You can simply pedal backwards if you wanted to stop. There’s plenty of people who uses fixed-gear bikes for tricks and stunts. You can find clips on YouTube. Track bikes that are used in competitive racing are all fixed-gear. It’s suppose to improve your riding and is good for training. I’m going to be doing a triathlon in September and thought that this would be neat to ride.
A friend of my gave me his old Nishiki International road bike. It’s a pretty old bike but still in very good shape. I took it to the Bike Oven in Highland Park to begin my project last night. The folks at Bike Oven were awesome. They were very friendly, receptive, and most importantly patient. I spent about 3 hours taking parts off of my bike, rebuilt the headset and bottom bracket. Things I thought would be hard wasn’t too bad. Of course I was spoiled by the plethora of tools that was available around me. What remains is buying a cog for my rear wheel and a new chain. Hopefully I’ll have it completed by this Saturday so I can take it out to ride during the upcoming holiday weekend. The before and after pictures will come shortly.
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