What a nice Sunday afternoon. It has been quite some time before I can enjoy the peaceful weekend. I am so satisfied to stay at home and feel the good mood of “having nothing to do”, and start to think of doing something new, something crazy, and something unusual.
So, what is the unusual thing in my life? Yes. The bicycle. Since I bought the Giant bicycle and completed the Taihu tour in 2003, I seldom used the bicycle especially after I got my car in March, 2004.
This afternoon, I washed the bicycle, did some maintenance, and added air to the tier. Then, I visited the Decathlon Huamu Store. At the entrance, I saw this poster:
I learnt about 2Wheels trip – traveling from Shanghai to UK by bicycle. As the introduction said, “it may take you 12 hours to complete the trip by air, but it takes me 12 months. Why? Because it is a more environment-safe way to travel this way…”
New Bicycle
“Life is always at somewhere else”. This saying reminds us that to pay more attention to what we have, instead of what we don’t have yet. I feel so obliged to live in Pudong beside the Jin Xiu Road – the road with very nice trees and parks. I should use bicycle more instead of car. Decathlon is the sponsor for this tour. Very nice job!
At Decathlon, I saw a new bicycle that is cheaper than the one I already got with much better quality. After playing with the new one for about 15 minutes, I started to love it so much. So the result is, I finally bought it. :-) So there will be two bicycles in my home that Wendy and I can go cycling together.
Update November 21, 2005
The price for the bicycle is 499 RMB.
End of update
Pudong is More Bicycle Friendly
There are much less traffic in Pudong, both cars or bicycles. Biyun International District is doing the best job. They have specially bicycle lanes:
Check out the three lanes. The left most is for cars, the middle is for bicycles and the right is for pedestrians. I feel much safer to ride on the bicycle lane there.
The sign for pedestrians are also very interesting there.
Sunset in Pudong
Finally, check out some pictures I took today during the cycling. As I described before, Pudong’s sunset is different from those in Puxi (I, II. I cycled around 20km today, and will increase it to 30 km in the future as my favorite sports.
The bicycle is great.
cycling is a good sport. you have exercises while enjoying the goog scene. the air is much better in pudong, so maybe the view is much clearer there.
have a rest, have a good mood, have a try again.
Thank you grace!
AvantGo supports RSS now.
Just wondering, how much did the bike cost?
I have a business trip coming up on RFID technology in February 06. It is either to Singapore or Shanghai! I am still not decided as to which I should go to. What are the main attractions in Shanghai (or close proximity) that would make it a better trip than Singapore (I will be there with three friends for a week)? Any suggestions?
All the power to you!
Keep riding and safe riding! Inspire more people in Shanghai and in China to ride, and hope to read more about your riding!
Season’s greetings from Canada.
hi, i have been reading your blog by sheer chance and have been reading it ever since. It’s informative and makes me look forward to relocate to shanghai soon. However, it would be great if you could mention more about Puxi because the probability of me living there is much higher…though Pudong seems like a nicer place as described by you. I know this is not an information center but would love to have people living in Shanghai to tell us expats what is the real deal living in Puxi. So I sincerely hope that you can give us more insights about Puxi real soon!! Thx!!!
passer-by, thanks for your suggestion. Although I tried to be helpful to visitors, the fact is, I am living in Pudong, so there are much more chance for me to describe Pudong instead of Puxi. What a pity that Puxi is more like Shanghai and much more unique place in the world. Let me try to consider Puxi if I can, but if I really didn’t have experience there, so I won’t talk about it.
Better to have a helmut when you do mountain biking.
Those pictures look wonderful. I’ve been wanting to go to mainland China someday for Chinese study for a long time, but one thing I’ve worried about is that I’ve seen a lot of news that it’s not very bicycle friendly anymore. It’s great to see that you can still get around by bike!
BTW, I really like the tags feature on your site. Do you mind if I ask what blogging platform you use?
Not everywhere is bicycle friendly. In Shanghai, the Biyun International District is most bike friendly area I found so far.
The tagging feature are newly added and coded by myself. The blogging software is MovableType 2.66. http://www.movabletype.org
tier–>tire, 3rd paragraph, “a slip of finger” :P
nice bicycle
Yes. Let me fixed it, as I have already know there is a typo (and leave most of other hundreds of typo there.)
The bike is 499 RMB
I cycle every day on campus, enjoying the fresh air. It’s really a good exercise. Just enjoy yourself.
I gave up bicycling in Shanghai 2 years ago.
It is simply TOO dangerous !
You can be a perfect careful bicycle driver, but all the other lunatics are out for you !
And they have no knowledge of traffic rules, because it has never been taught them.
(Shame on the government !!!)
I even do not want my fiancee to bike here too (I do not want to find her in a hospital).
I see at least 3 accidents everyday, just to and from work (Car : Pudong-Minhang).
Jianshuo, if you ever consider to bike after dark, buy beam lights (1 strong white light in the front and one strong red in the rear). I’m sure they have those in Decathlon – the best are the most expensive, but worth every yuan ! It is a life insurance.
These will give you a fair chance to be seen, as NOone of the other bicycles has any lights on in China, as you well know as a car driver !
And, drive slowly. Shanghai traffic is not suitable for more than 15 km/h.
My collegues drove to work on the bikes like racing bikers, they ALL ended up in hospital.
The sunset are always like this because of the heavy polluted air in Shanghai.
The sun never sets in the horizon, like most other places.
Jianshuo, I have sent you a photo from today of the pollution over Lingang/Pudong, no copyright whatsoever ! Free to post.
By the way, please post some more shots of the very advanced light system in Biyunlu and around Jinqiao Carrefour. Not many places in the world has that ! (Is it designed in China ??)
My wife and I have been in Puxi Shanghai since Aug 31, 2005 and have been riding about 40km each day that we ride (not teaching)= 4-5 days a week.. We are pretty familiar also with Pudong having been over to Century Park, Decathlon, Walmart etc.
Riding in Puxi can be dangerous. Knock on wood we have been ok. My wife has been knocked down 3 times and me once (by a pedestrian!). we do limited riding at night without lights, but we wear helmets (decatholons) always.
I would not encourage or discourage anyone from riding in Shanghai, it is an individual choice. Flat out… we love it. I know it can be dangerous, but there are 1000’s of old riders (including us) poking along and taking few chances. Yes we run lights, but we are super careful in all that we do.
There is so much to see it just can’t be done on foot or by cab. keep your fingers crossed for us. we are certainly learning the streets and the best way from the fabric market to the Jade Budhist Temple (unbelieveable soup!!!!!) or the way from the O Market (organic good groceries) to Bodhi bikes etc. Every day is a trip. we did 25 miles today and loaded up with flowers at the flower market, etc.
take care, and be safe. jerry and jody Fox (2 one speed Giant city bikes)
It is not so good to cycling in Shanghai which is rather crowded. In shenzhen, doing cycling more better.
It is not good to cycle in Puxi – it is just too crowded. I agree. However, in Pudong, especially in Biyun area (near the Yangpu Bridge), it is nice to cycle.
I bought the same bike last Sunday and named him Xiaolan, referring to the blue color. Now I am totally in love with this cute bike. Just can’t get enough cycling :D Thank you! I live in Xinzhuang, Puxi and will be riding all the way to Pudong to visit my friend tomorrow. It’s gonna be fun!
Well, we finished out 10 months in Shanghai, so I can finish my report on our cycling that started above (jan 2d,2006). Overall every thing went very fine. My wife did at least 25 miles a day 6 days a week, and I did that in the Fall but the same about 4 days a week for the Spring semester. This meant, of course, that we learned the streets of Shanghai. To me it is NOT dangerous if you are somewhat conservative in your riding style, particularly at intersections. This is easier to do now since they seem to be cracking down on crazy riding though red lights, across traffic etc.
Problems really did not happen. we both were knocked several times, but not seriously. we wore helmets, I recommend that. There many many places to go and things to see…. try, for example, the tunnel building museum, very interesting.
It was projected back in August by a Shanghai friend that we would be “road kill,” but this was not to be. Be careful, ride to enjoy the ride and not to get somewhere in a hurry and I feel you should be fine. Oh, use a compass for getting around quickly, it is a big help. I have one on my watch and one on the bell of the bike. Decathalon is a big help with equipment as is Bodhi. One more point… have a digital camera ready at all times… you will see amazing things (I have a good shot of a fellow moving a standup refrigerator on a regular bike). Jerry and Jody Fox