Storm!

Biked home in a proper storm! Yes, the one with rain AND wind, not the California ‘pretend’-storm (aka, some rain with mild wind, if any). Right now it’s a sustained wind of 16 m/s (36 miles/hr), with gusts of 26 m/s (58 miles/hr). It may have been slightly less a couple of hour or so ago, but not by much.

The wind was mostly side-or-head wind, and threatened to knock me over a few times. Thankfully the sea wasn’t gushing up on the sidewalk, but I will admit to being a wee bit nervous when biking on that particular stretch of road. I found myself wishing for more scenery-blocking trees on the way…

Average biking speed: barely 2 x walking speed, until I gave up towards the very end and walked up the last hill. Total time: 75 minutes, including a stop to pick up Anna’s bike at her school. (Usual time is close to 45 minutes.)

Worth repeating? Barely, and definitely not if it were colder (currently 11C/52F). Pants and shoes held up against the rain, jacket did not – I was pretty soaked on the front, but thankfully still warm thanks to a good underlayer. I do have a better jacket though, but it’s less bike-friendly…

Surprise of the ride was that having a woolen headband really kept the water from draining into my eyes, and that the ‘bank-robber’-ish hood gets almost airtight when very wet, and thus hard to breathe through. Kept me warm though. Gloves stayed warm even though they were soaked and dripping wet.

So, all in all, I recon it was pretty successful… 🙂