Anybody ever rend a cycle in Dublin, Ireland?
!Jones
Country this summer, so... do I have a choice? (I wanted to go to
Madison.)
Actually, we need a tandem because she's handicapped; however, that's
asking much, IMO.
Jones
Andre Jute
Here is an article on cycling in Ireland for tourists I wrote for the
magazine Inside Ireland a
few years ago:
http://www.audio-talk.co.uk/fiultra/BICYCLE%20Bicycling%20in%20Ireland.html
It also list shops that will rent you a bike and a direct link to the
biggest bicycle tour operator in Ireland.
Now for some inside gen. Pay close attention to what I say about our
major roads. Traffic moves at least 20mph faster than in the States,
and on far narrower roads, and some drivers have never seen a
cyclist.
Your best bet if you really want a *tour* is probably to buy a package
(bikes and accommodation) cycling holiday from experienced tour
operators like Celtic, net address in the article. If a tandem is
available, they will be able to get it for you. (Be sure your wife
will make the daily distance; there are no flat roads in Ireland; the
riders on the recent Tour of Ireland bitched bitterly about the
hills.)
That list of bike rental places I refer you to is no doubt optimistic;
my local LBS is on it and anytime he has offered me a courtesy bike
I've preferred to walk rather than ride some POS off his scrapheap;
you can forget about renting a tandem unless you get very lucky
indeed. The rental costs in the article has not been updated...
In Ireland, incidentally, unless travelling on expenses, one doesn't
as a first choice book into hotels but into the government-approved
guest houses (you find them in a book you buy as you come off the
plane, or on the net); they're cheaper and friendlier and very helpful
indeed. (One of my pedalpals runs the best one locally; she knows
which roads are good and safe and which aren't.) Forget camping; the
weather is so changeable, a camping holiday will be one long misery;
nobody does it; there are no campsites for cyclists and it is even
rare to see a motorhome or caravan.
Unless your wife has some kind of a schedule already (tracing her
roots?), or unless you want to take in the major cultural institutions
which essentially means Dublin, I would advise you not to try and
cover the country but instead to choose some pretty little country
town outside the major cities and book in for a few days, ride the
lanes around the town to the historical or picturesque sites, eat in
the restaurants and bars, spend your evenings listening to music in
the bars, then move on to the next little town for another few days;
often people who take this advice just decide to extend their stay in
the first little town. That way you get a feeling for Ireland and its
people which you don't from the rush of images and fleeting contacts
of a "tour". That's what I do for my holiday, though it isn't a
cycling holiday: I go stay in a town only an hour's drive away and go
to a music festival, and take walks in the lanes thereabouts. I'd
suggest my own town, Bandon, but it's a popular place, so you probably
have to book well in advance.
Here are a couple of photo essays about a ride from Bandon to
Kilmacsimon Quay and back again by a different route:
http://www.audio-talk.co.uk/fiultra/BICYCLE%20Kilmacsimon%201.html
http://www.audio-talk.co.uk/fiultra/BICYCLE%20Kilmacsimon%202.html
If I were in your shoes, I'd try find some little town with good
cycling on the lanes (don't worry about getting there -- we have
superb train and bus services, and information about taking a bike on
them is in the article referenced above) and book into a good guest
house for three or four days with an option to extend in case you
decide you like it too much to move on. Then try to rent known bikes;
if good bikes aren't for rent, I'd just cut a deal with an LBS to buy
a couple of new Trek mountain bikes with a guaranteed repurchase deal
for say halfprice after the holiday, something like that; you would
need to order the bikes in advance of arriving to be sure they're the
right bikes, as the stock at the big city dealers is horridly
expensive and the LBS in small towns may not have a huge selection of
styles and sizes. You need to have your second little town picked out
as either reachable by back roads or on the bus route but that isn't
difficult. From Bandon for instance there is a big ring of pretty
towns down the coast to Bantry and back up to Bandon that could
consume a fortnight; there's a smaller ring the other way, to Kinsale.
The same applies to virtually any other tourist center. Bandon is so
popular among other reasons because it is only half an hour from the
international airport at Cork; there is no need to waste time going to
Dublin or Shannon (which is literally in the middle of nowhere; a very
expensive place to get to and from).
To reach my private mailbox, lose the prime digit from my visible
spambuster e-mail address.
Andre Jute
Not speaking for the Tourist Board here!
paul.ka...@gmail.com
Renting a tandem will be impossible I think in Dublin, in 5 years
living there I have never seen one.
For renting bicycles Cycleways, http://www.cycleways.com/ They are a
decent shop close to the citycentre of Dublin.
Paul
carl...@comcast.net
Dear J,
"We offer a full range of bikes, from kiddies, tag-alongs, tandems,
mountain bikes, hybrids & racing bikes. Our bikes are all, 'Giant',
made in Holland, and perfect for a few hours or a day's biking. Our
fully experienced staff will guarantee you that your bike will be in
perfect working order and help you in any way they can to make your
biking experience with us a memorable one, for all the right reasons.
We have a total of 120 bikes to choose from."
Contact us at pa...@phoenixparkbikehire.com
www.phoenixparkbikehire.com
http://www.goireland.com/dublin/phoenix-park-bike-hire-dublin-attraction-bicycle-hire-id44830.htm
Given your situation, the Irish dealer at this site might be helpful:
http://buddy2.site.aplus.net/Dealers.html
Cheers,
Carl Fogel
Chalo
bicycles. Some of them were completely sundered.
Chalo
!Jones
Jute <fiul...@yahoo.com> wrote:
>Here is an article on cycling in Ireland for tourists I wrote for the
>magazine Inside Ireland a
>few years ago:
> http://www.audio-talk.co.uk/fiultra/BICYCLE%20Bicycling%20in%20Ireland.html
Thanks... got it bookmarked.
We're renting a microbus with a bed in it for most of the trip. We
don't like riding in groups and, no, my stoker isn't up to a full day
of hills.
We're just interested in a Dublin sight-seeing day trip.
But, thanks for the pointers.
Jones
!Jones
Yes, I have had that experience. That issue is even greater when one
needs a tandem; we rented one in Bar Harbor, Maine a couple of years
ago that simply wasn't safe to ride.
Jones
Clive George
news:c1454b24-06c9-4f3a...@z4g2000prh.googlegroups.com...
> you can forget about renting a tandem unless you get very lucky
> indeed.
Friends rented a Dawes Galaxy tandem in Ireland, which both surprised and
impressed me. Unfortunately I don't know where from.
Chalo
>
> Chalo wrote:
> >
> >I have not yet rent a bicycle in Dublin. But I have rent a number of
> >bicycles. Some of them were completely sundered.
>
> Yes, I have had that experience. That issue is even greater when one
> needs a tandem; we rented one in Bar Harbor, Maine a couple of years
> ago that simply wasn't safe to ride.
I was making a play on words, based on your use of the word
"rend" (break apart) in the thread title. I read the title and
thought, "hey, I do that".
The only bike I ever rented was a BikeE, because it was the only one I
ever found for rent that could be adjusted to fit my size. It was
educational, in that it taught me to avoid BikeEs and other similarly
ill-conceived bikes from that time forward.
Chalo
Andre Jute
> "Andre Jute" <fiult...@yahoo.com> wrote in message
>
> news:c1454b24-06c9-4f3a...@z4g2000prh.googlegroups.com...
>
> > you can forget about renting a tandem unless you get very lucky
> > indeed.
I simply misread the question; I thought Jones was using "Dublin"
generically for Ireland. In Dublin itself a tandem is possible -- for
instance from www.phoenixparkbikehire.com --but anywhere else it is
less likely. My remarks were predicated on the knowledge that Dublin
is a very tough city for a cyclist to escape onto friendlier roads
(more below), and Jones's stated family circumstances. But it seems
the tandem is for use in Dublin.
Repeat tourers that I meet on the road invariably put their bike on
the bus or the train for the first part of the journey out of Dublin,
and the really experienced fly in to Cork rather than Dublin or
Shannon (I'm not even sure it is legal anymore for a bicycle to go on
the road out of Shannon). Galway is another possibility; I met a
couple of very experienced Scots (hamstrings from Hell, as Simon
Schama said of the famous statue of William Wallace) on the road,
separately, not together, who always start their tours in Galway.
Actually, I find it odd that so few bicycle tourers -- I've never met
one anyway -- arrive by the ferries (to Cork and Rosslare) which are
easier to ship a bike by and which both decant cyclists in friendlier
cycling environments than Dublin and Shannon.
I know, I know, when you toured Ireland by bike thirty years ago, or
whatever, when even Krygo was young and Jesus was a teenager, you
could cruise out of Dublin and hardly ever see a tractor; that rural
Ireland was gone even before the Celtic Tiger. It's still very
beautiful in the lanes but the main roads are full of large cars with
drivers in a hurry and convoys of thundering trucks. The Garda
(police) Superintendent, on whose advise I depended when I wrote that
anyone but very experienced cyclists should stay the hell off the main
roads, was himself later killed while taking his exercise on his
bicycle, on a road I stopped cycling only six months or so before
after deciding it wasn't fun to have a continuous row of trucks
travelling 110kph twelve inches from your shoulder.
> Friends rented a Dawes Galaxy tandem in Ireland, which both surprised and
> impressed me. Unfortunately I don't know where from.
Celtic, net address in my article to which I referred Jones, supplies
Dawes bikes (apparently, now only to people who book tours with them;
when the article was written they listed bare-bike rentals as well; it
might still be worth a phone call). See near the bottom of
http://www.audio-talk.co.uk/fiultra/BICYCLE%20Bicycling%20in%20Ireland.htmlbut
note that Celtic isn't in Dublin. Nor do they advertise a tandem,
though they no doubt know where to find one if a customer insists.
Andre Jute
Visit Jute on Bicycles at
http://www.audio-talk.co.uk/fiultra/BICYCLE%20%26%20CYCLING.html
Andre Jute
<paul.kaldenb...@gmail.com> wrote:
> On 7 nov, 02:34, !Jones <swsm...@hotmail.com> wrote:
>
> > Looking for a good shop in Dublin. The wife wants to go to the Old
> > Country this summer, so... do I have a choice? (I wanted to go to
> > Madison.)
>
> > Actually, we need a tandem because she's handicapped; however, that's
> > asking much, IMO.
>
> > Jones
>
> Renting a tandem will be impossible I think in Dublin, in 5 years
> living there I have never seen one.
> decent shop close to the citycentre of Dublin.
>
> Paul
In nearly twenty years of cycling around and about Bandon, one of the
key Irish tourist centres and a chokepoint for the south-east of
Ireland ("Gateway to beautiful West Cork"), I have never seen a
tandem. Frankly, I think a tandem would be a nuisance in most of the
Irish towns and cities one might want to visit, and in the lanes as
well. Even my Utopia Kranich, wheelbase a not unreasonable 1149mm for
such a comfortable bike, already pushes the boundaries of pavements,
footbridges, narrow streets especially at the corners, and so on; I
thought of buying a tandem because I have enough pedalpals always to
have a stoker handy but decided the pure bulk of the thing would slow
us down irritatingly, and force us unto dangerous bits of road that we
normally give a miss. My Trek "Smover", on their standard (Benelux)
Navigator frame, was already the biggest bike in town before the
arrival of the Kranich, which is much bigger; the Trek is probably the
biggest bike one can ride dashingly in small Irish towns, not that I
regret having to smooth down my riding style on the Kranich -- its
other attractions more than make up for the lack of nip and tuck which
is anyway a bit undignified at my age. But the progression is a
pointer to the utility of a tandem in Ireland. A tandem might be a s
bit more usable in Dublin but I'm not surprised you've not seen one.
Clive George
> Frankly, I think a tandem would be a nuisance in most of the
> Irish towns and cities one might want to visit, and in the lanes as
> well.
I've ridden tandems in many places, and the roads in Ireland presented no
unusual problems at all. I've never heard an experienced tandem rider
complaining that the size of a bike is a nuisance over there.
A bike that large may be a bit scary for somebody who's never ridden such a
thing, but with experience they're plenty nimble enough. They can still
comprehensively outmanouvre a car - I was even taking ours down gaps Italian
scooter riders were unable to take.
Jay
> On Fri, 6 Nov 2009 20:52:50 -0800 (PST), in rec.bicycles.tech Andre
>
> >Here is an article on cycling in Ireland for tourists I wrote for the
> >magazine Inside Ireland a
> >few years ago:
>
> Thanks... got it bookmarked.
>
> We're renting a microbus with a bed in it for most of the trip. We
> don't like riding in groups and, no, my stoker isn't up to a full day
> of hills.
>
> We're just interested in a Dublin sight-seeing day trip.
>
> But, thanks for the pointers.
>
> Jones
Dear Jones!
Phoenix appears to be ideal for your situation.
However the pedals (essentially a modern version of ‘Rat Traps‘; read:
ouch! on the shins) of that strange looking tandem pictured are
potentially quite painful if a foot slips off the pedal. If your wife
has a bicycle @ home; I would suggest you take her own pedals &
possibly saddle w/ you. If her pedals are clip ins, take cycling shoes
too. If she doesn’t have a bike @ home that she is confortable with,
then ask Phoenix for a pair of rubber pedals. If you are going to wear
helmets, I would definitely take my own for reasons of both fit &
sanitation.
And you, Mr. Jones, might want to do the same.
Best wishes for your trip.
P.S. I’m not sure if this idea would help or not; (please note that
the tandem in image 3 of 60 is dirty, perhaps not a good sign) but you
might want to send a good sized tip (the $$$ type) in advance for a
bike that works reasonably well. I.E. lubricated, brake & cables that
stop the bike, true wheels, cones adjusted , derailleur’s that shift
effortlessly & accurately, etc. Also I noticed that the riders in some
of the gallery appear to have the saddle height mis-adjusted. If the
tandems don’t have quick release clamps, make sure that you get the
height & straightness adjusted before leaving the shop.
!Jones
<chalo....@gmail.com> wrote:
>I was making a play on words, based on your use of the word
>"rend" (break apart) in the thread title. I read the title and
>thought, "hey, I do that".
>
>The only bike I ever rented was a BikeE, because it was the only one I
>ever found for rent that could be adjusted to fit my size. It was
>educational, in that it taught me to avoid BikeEs and other similarly
>ill-conceived bikes from that time forward.
>
>Chalo
Oh... that was a "fat finger"... I meant "rent".
I have heard that a pun (play on words) is the most intelligent form
of humor... in that case, it's utterly lost on me. OTOH, you have Ed
Dolan. What can I say?
Jones... above a sea slug; however, less than genius.
Nate Nagel
You know, it took me until just now to realize the typo and I was about
to post something like "I've never kept a bike long enough, they've all
been stolen before they were rent" but I see it's already well under
control.
nate
--
replace "roosters" with "cox" to reply.
http://members.cox.net/njnagel
Andre Jute
It does look a bit like some of their customers rend every bike that
they rent. -- AJ
Pat
Another problem with your use of "rent" is that in the US, we say "rented."
Pat
Tom Sherman °_°
> [...]
> The only bike I ever rented was a BikeE, because it was the only one I
> ever found for rent that could be adjusted to fit my size. It was
> educational, in that it taught me to avoid BikeEs and other similarly
> ill-conceived bikes from that time forward.
>
'bent. I always have new riders hold the bars with only their thumb and
forefinger to prevent over-controlling the bike.
On a proper SWB 'bent, you just think where you want the bike to go, and
it does it.
--
Tom Sherman - 42.435731,-83.985007
I am a vehicular cyclist.
!Jones
<newi...@home.com> wrote:
>Another problem with your use of "rent" is that in the US, we say "rented."
Well... it also lacks a subject.
I once wrote a question for a final exam in some big data processing
section. The students were to write code to resolve: "What was the
outcome of the candidate's election?" I mistyped it as "erection"...
and this was in 1998 as Clinton's impeachment hearings were in full
swing.
Never truce a spelling checker, I say... not in the Untied States of
America, anyway!!!
Jones
Chalo
>
> Chalo Colina wrote:
> > [...]
> > The only bike I ever rented was a BikeE, because it was the only one I
> > ever found for rent that could be adjusted to fit my size. It was
> > educational, in that it taught me to avoid BikeEs and other similarly
> > ill-conceived bikes from that time forward.
>
> You must relax your upper body and only use light forces to steer on a
> 'bent. I always have new riders hold the bars with only their thumb and
> forefinger to prevent over-controlling the bike.
>
> On a proper SWB 'bent, you just think where you want the bike to go, and
> it does it.
Thanks, Obi-Wan. I'll have to try harder to stretch out with my
feelings.
http://www.wavsource.com/snds_2009-11-08_1707765946369560/movies/star_wars/stretch_out.wav
Chalo
!Jones
�_� <twsherm...@THISsouthslope.net> wrote:
>On a proper SWB 'bent, you just think where you want the bike to go, and
>it does it.
I think I wanna go where there's a cold beer... maybe two! ... aye!
...and the laughter of harlots!
Tom Sherman °_°
> Tom Sherman wrote:
>> Chalo Colina wrote:
>>> [...]
>>> The only bike I ever rented was a BikeE, because it was the only one I
>>> ever found for rent that could be adjusted to fit my size. It was
>>> educational, in that it taught me to avoid BikeEs and other similarly
>>> ill-conceived bikes from that time forward.
>> You must relax your upper body and only use light forces to steer on a
>> 'bent. I always have new riders hold the bars with only their thumb and
>> forefinger to prevent over-controlling the bike.
>>
>> On a proper SWB 'bent, you just think where you want the bike to go, and
>> it does it.
>
> Thanks, Obi-Wan. I'll have to try harder to stretch out with my
> feelings.
>
Yoda
Edward Dolan
"!Jones" <sws...@hotmail.com> wrote in message
news:dghhf5tshkaopm2ji...@4ax.com...
Beer is for barbarians ... and harlots are too for that matter. We superior
types prefer wine and women of cultivation who will accompany us to the
opera and the ballet. But Jones is not a genius like Ed Dolan the Great. He
is infinitely inferior as witness his degraded taste in liquid refreshment
and females. Alas, he has no powers of discrimination.
Regards,
Ed Dolan the Great - Minnesota
aka
Saint Edward the Great - Order of the Perpetual Sorrows - Minnesota
!Jones
Aren't we having that very discussion in another thread? Surely, sir,
can we not keep this nonsense from spilling all over the group like
the fight scene in "Blazing Saddles"?
One other point: Yesterday, in Message-ID:
<4_OdnXTQStplMGXX...@prairiewave.com>, addressing Mr.
Press, did you not write:
< QUOTE >
>Furthermore, this is my thread and everything that transpires on this thread
>is my business by virtue of that.
< /QUOTE >
Well, OK; however, you are now posting to my thread. Say whatever you
wish, but please don't cross-post it to a dozen other unrelated
groups. One reason we don't do that is that it annoys the people on
the other groups... neither my posting nor your reply to it had
anything to do with cycling. Why annoy the rest of the world by
cross-posting it to the Austrailian groups as it they care.
Jones
gotbent
"Tom Sherman �_�" <twsherm...@THISsouthslope.net> wrote in message
news:hdafva$sca$1...@news.eternal-september.org...
> Chalo Colina wrote:
>> [...]
>
> On a proper SWB 'bent, you just think where you want the bike to go, and
> it does it.
>
> --
> Tom Sherman - 42.435731,-83.985007
> I am a vehicular cyclist.
I tried that not too long ago. It fell over. Just kidding. When I try that
with my trike, it just sits there.
Somewhere along the way I have to stop thinking and start pedaling.
--
gotbent aka FRT rider
Norman
> Beer is for barbarians ...
Barbar! Barbar!
Michael Press
"Edward Dolan" <edo...@iw.net> wrote:
> "!Jones" <sws...@hotmail.com> wrote in message
> news:dghhf5tshkaopm2ji...@4ax.com...
> > On Mon, 09 Nov 2009 19:34:41 -0600, in rec.bicycles.tech Tom Sherman
> > °_° <twsherm...@THISsouthslope.net> wrote:
> >
> >>On a proper SWB 'bent, you just think where you want the bike to go, and
> >>it does it.
> >
> > I think I wanna go where there's a cold beer... maybe two! ... aye!
> > ...and the laughter of harlots!
>
> Beer is for barbarians ... and harlots are too for that matter. We superior
> types prefer wine and women of cultivation who will accompany us to the
> opera and the ballet. But Jones is not a genius like Ed Dolan the Great. He
> is infinitely inferior as witness his degraded taste in liquid refreshment
> and females. Alas, he has no powers of discrimination.
Anyone with a modicum of discrimination would notice
that the humour would be weak or nonexistent with
I think I wanna go where there's a glass of wine... maybe two! ... aye!
...and the laughter of women!
--
Michael Press
Andre Jute
Babar is sensitive about people misspelling his name. But he drinks
his beer through his nose, so what does he expect. Sneeeesh! -- AJ
Edward Dolan
"Michael Press" <rub...@pacbell.net> wrote in message
news:rubrum-B3932D....@news.albasani.net...
Jones thinks he is a wit, or clever, or even a genius - God help us! I am
here to put him in his place, which is infinitely below me.
Obvious humor is for jerks. You have to search to find the humor in the
posts of Ed Dolan the Great because his humor is subtle, if nothing else.
AMuzi
>>> Beer is for barbarians ...
> Norman <invasivenor...@gmail.com> wrote:
>> Barbar! Barbar!
Andre Jute wrote:
> Babar is sensitive about people misspelling his name. But he drinks
> his beer through his nose, so what does he expect. Sneeeesh! -- AJ
The Greeks described foreign languages as sounding like
"barbar" hence our "barbarian" (which is not 'barber' or
'beard'). I assumed Norman was volunteering himself as one
who would like a beer with 'barbar'.
--
Andrew Muzi
<www.yellowjersey.org/>
Open every day since 1 April, 1971
Andre Jute
Showing off your learning is not very sensitive when we have so many
PhD's without any on RBT. -- Andre Jute
Norman
> On Nov 11, 6:57 am, AMuzi <a...@yellowjersey.org> wrote:
> > >> "Edward Dolan" <edo...@iw.net> wrote:
> > >>> Beer is for barbarians ...
> > > Norman <invasivenor...@gmail.com> wrote:
> > >> Barbar! Barbar!
> > Andre Jute wrote:
> > > Babar is sensitive about people misspelling his name. But he drinks
> > > his beer through his nose, so what does he expect. Sneeeesh! -- AJ
>
> > The Greeks described foreign languages as sounding like
> > "barbar" hence our "barbarian" (which is not 'barber' or
> > 'beard'). I assumed Norman was volunteering himself as one
> > who would like a beer with 'barbar'.
>
> PhD's without any on RBT. -- Andre Jute
Everybody's got somethin', brother. & I don't make fun
of a doctor's education when he's stirrin' around in my
insides like so much bean soup.
Andre Jute
You let some guy jab needles into you without at least asking where he
was trained? Man, that's a recipe for dying young! -- AJ