New Bicycle

I've always enjoyed bicycles since I was a young child on Long Island.  By the time I was in high school and college, I was riding my bicycle all over the island and Long Island is no small island.  It is about 20 miles wide and 120 miles long.  I was hit by a few cars and had one bicycle stolen but I've always enjoyed biking.

When I first relocated to Vermont (my last Air Force/DOD assignment), I purchased a cheap bicycle and did quite a bit of riding while exploring.  Between kayaking (I lived on a major river), flying, biking and driving, I got to see most of Vermont in a short time.  

That cheap bicycle bit the dust about 15 years ago so I haven't done any riding since then.  Every summer I do some searching for a new bicycle but nothing in the lower price range ever catches my eye.  This summer, after having COVID again for the past couple of months and losing quite a bit of weight, I finally found a decent bicycle at a very good price.  I really need to build up my strength again and a bicycle seemed like the smartest way to go about accomplishing this.  

The new bicycle arrived yesterday and I quickly assembled it before dinner.  This afternoon I spent some time making some adjustment and tuning the gears and brakes.  I still need to fine tune the wheels/spokes but that can wait for another day.  

This new bicycle actually has hydraulic brakes which are very new to me and, so far, they seem to work very well.  

As far as the gears go...  honestly...  I haven't been happy with bicycle gear shifters since my old 10 speed racing bikes with simple stem shifters.  These new shifters on all the mountain bikes absolutely suck.  That being said, of all the bikes I tuned up with this new style of shifter, this bike seems to be shifting gears the best since today's tune-up.  

Tomorrow I hope to lube it a bit and take it for a short ride.  I'm looking forward to getting out on this new bike with a camera to shoot some landscapes and, in the process, build up my strength again.