Bikes and Baggage Cargo Fun Ride, Sunday October 30th

One of the great pleasures of living in Greenbelt is the ability to run errands by bike. Of course, sometimes I have to make two trips, since I can only carry so much in my backpack, but that's just twice as much fun!

To give people an idea of some of the local errand/shopping in the area, my favorite local bike shop is hosting a utility fun ride on October 30. The ride starts at 9:30am from Proteus Bicycles in north College Park.

The goal is for customers and friends to experience errand/shopping riding with other riders on a low-traffic time of the week (Sunday morning). Some of us might do mock shopping or pick up gag packages at each stop — I'll probably have a backpack full of groceries by the time we're done! We'll visit several stores in north College Park (the area north of 193 and east of Route 1), and in Greenbelt.

All told, I'd say the ride will total about 10 miles, starting at the bike shop and returning. So it's not a long ride, but will also be a good challenge and way to experience utility riding around the area with a group. There are some small hills, in particular crossing the Beltway overpass, going up toward Route 1, and coming back into Greenbelt along Crescent Road. For folks who want a little longer ride, we're going to ride from Greenbelt over to the shop first!

If you'd like to join us heading over to the ride, we're going to leave from the New Deal Cafe at 9 a.m. We'll go down Crescent Road, cross 201 at the new connector path by the highway administration facility, take the bike lanes on Ivy Lane and Cherrywood Lane, and go through the Greenbelt metro station to get over into north College Park. 
Here is a link to the bike route from the Greenbelt Metro to the shop.

For folks coming from other starting points, here is a link to a bike route to the shop from College Park Metro. It's also pretty easy to get to Proteus from the University of Maryland campus — just take the Paint Branch trail north from the campus (near the Comcast Center). The trail goes under University Boulevard and around the Paint Branch golf course. After the golf course, there's a spur off to the right that goes up to Route 1 near the bike shop, and there's a new traffic light to cross over.

Here is the link to the announcement, and I've pasted the text of the announcement below if that link doesn't work. The announcement was made by Jill DiMauro of Proteus Bicycles.

email: jill@proteusbicycles.com web: http://www.proteusbicycles.com

Date: Sunday, October 30
Time: 9:30 a.m.
Place: Proteus Bicycles | 9217 Baltimore Avenue | College Park | MD | 20740 | 301.441.2928

Leave your car at home.

Dig out your backpacks, racks, panniers... any safe way you can carry small packages. Discover just how fun and easy it is to do local errands on your bike. We have a fun route all planned out for you. You will go from stop to stop picking up packages and surprises, returning back to the shop for awards and celebrations.

This will be about a 10 mile ride, routing you to various public places where one might commonly go on an errand. You will be amazed how fun and quick it can be using your bike instead of your car. Helmets are required and young and/or inexperienced riders should have a riding buddy with them. RSVP is appreciated. Check webpage in case of rain. Hope to see you there.