3 Questions:
- Do you ride your bicycle to work?
- Do you carry a smart phone with you?
- Are you on social media?
If you answered yes to the 3 above questions, you are well qualified to participate in #BikeCommuteAdventure.
A few years ago, after I’d moved to a new house here in Tucson, I was enjoying exploring all of the bike route options for getting to CampfireCycling.com. I blogged about it at the time, not realizing how much my route would continue to evolve.
Refining the finer points of a daily bike route is where the fun really starts. With a somewhat basic route in place, there are often problematic areas that benefit from refinement. Figuring out how to get over a busy road, finding a shortcut through a closed off neighborhood, or working out the shortest path through a parking lot are all engaging puzzles to solve.
A great bike route should balance safety, efficiency and scenery, with safety at the forefront of course. As I settled in, I was lucky to have quite an interesting and scenic route. So much so, that I was inspired into thinking about the story of bike route. I started taking photos along my route and then thought of weaving this story together with the hashtag #BikeCommuteAdventure.
Now I am hoping to inspire other bike commuters to share the story of their routes.
Why Share your #BikeCommuteAdventure?
- Inspire others to bike commute!
- Develop and share knowledge about safe, enjoyable bicycle routes.
- Why not? Its fun and easy and it wakes you up to the subtle beauty of your daily commute.
- We’ll further amplify your commuting story, retweeting the best posts on BikeShopHub’s Twitter.
Get Started with Sharing the Story of Your Commute
- You’ll need an account on Twitter, Strava or Instagram. Or you can do it on two or three at once.
- Take a photo with your smart phone each day along your route.
- Start with a photo of leaving from your house and each day proceed a little bit further to interesting points along your route.
- At the end of your ride share the photo and a description of the point of interest.
- Use the hashtag #BikeCommuteAdventure.
- You might also want a 2nd hashtag to distinguish your commute. I used #CommuteDeBSH for mine.
- Here is an example of how to share:
- Day 1 of my #BikeCommuteAdventure, Getting my bicycle out of the garage.
And Finally, My Route #CommuteDeBSH
Sharing my route was a bit of work in progress. I started by just posting it to my Strava account, but then quickly started sharing it on BikeShopHub’s Twitter as well. I shared on the BikeShopHub Instagram a few times, but didn’t keep up with it consistently.
To check out my full route, see my hashtag #CommuteDeBSH sorted by latest. Scroll to the bottom and then scroll back up to see it chronologically. (Note: I did miss sharing my Day 1).
After I started sharing on Twitter, one of our followers Susanna Leino, joined in on the fun and shared her route on the #BikeCommuteAdventure hash tag as well as her own hashtag #biketoworkblog. Her involvement helped inspire the idea to get even more bike commuters in on the fun.
Here are the highlights from my#BikeCommuteAdventure …
Day 1: It all begins at the storage shed everyday, getting the bicycle loaded and ready to go.
Day 3: Goodbye to the house and I’m off.
Day 7: Going past the Arizona Inn
Day 13: Past the streetcar stop. Don’t get a big head.
Day 18: Past Old Main
Day 21: Past Party Central on University Ave.
Day 26: The Rogue Theater
Day 33: Through the big, empty solar parking lot
Day 34: Past the PreSchool with Tucson House looming
Day 35: Through the barbed wire gap
Day 39: Crossing Grant
Day 40: Abandoned Trailer Park Wasteland
Day 41: St. Michaels Ukrainian Greco-Catholic Church
Day 47: Another day of selling Ortlieb Bags (for both Bicycle & Rider)
See the whole deal at my routes #CommuteDeBSH
Share your bicycle commute route at #BikeCommuteAdventure