After I left the Reno Bike Project, per this report  that I dashed off today and had taken a lunch break at the hotel, I traveled west staying within a mile of the Truckee River. Instead of turning right on Arlington and dropping down to the river path, I pedaled into the shade-tree filled Old South West neighborhood. Before I tell you about that find, take a look at this video which shows the bike lanes on Arlington and some footage of what I would soon be biking through for the next half hour.

The Old South West neighborhood is an important part of Reno for the out of town traveler to know about because it is a great place very near to downtown to go for a walk or an easy short family bike ride. The homes and their gardens are all nicely kept. And as an added bonus, there are many large shade trees  in an area that stretches for twenty to thirty blocks in either direction.

Soon I crossed the Truckee River, which I am told is a fraction of its normal raging self even this time of year, and made a stop at the Hub Coffee Roasters for some on tap Kombucha. I did not like the flavor of the only choice they had so I opted for water and sat at the outdoor table where I went over my iPhone notes for today. At the table I had chosen, when she got off the phone, a women named Loretta wanted to know what my bike was all about.

After we talked Advanta for a while, the conversation changed to my mission She was very interested and I sensed she might ride herself. Middle aged, however,  she was not dressed in sporty attire but looked more like the PhD professor that she was. In talking about UNR, where she teaches,  I learned that their student enrollment is bigger by several thousand students  than what I cited two days ago here. They are also expanding  their operation toward the city, by buying buildings there, instead of moving up the hill. Their goal is for Reno to be known as a university town and less of a gaming center

As the conversation returned to cycling, as she described her  bike and the rides she went on I knew I was talking to someone who knew the two wheel road! I turned my listening up as she told me about all the great riding near the small town of Verdi (only 162 people!), where she lives and about how a lot of the Reno cyclists roll on a lot of the roads up her way. She also told me how to get to Walden’s Coffee Shop from which a lot of the rides that head to her are based.

Well now I had to see Walden’s again, I had stopped in in 2009 when I rode from San Francisco to Salt Lake City on the Eagle. At the time I did not realize its significance to local biking. And now armed with tire liners, goat heads be damned!

Everyone I asked seemed to know where it was and how to get there. So after the Hub, I took Idlewild, a well paved road with delicious bike lanes all the way till it ended at a park about three miles later. Instead of continuing along the river on a beautiful path that headed for Verdi (I’ll have to look and see how far it does go), I turned left on to a little dirt path as soon as I crossed over a bike/ped bridge. Soon it changed to asphalt and bobbed up an down for a third of a mile  through a setting of neatly manicured rolling lawns and rocks  that looked almost surreal in its beauty.

Soon, I was on Blueberry with the famous Walden Coffee Shop near the corner of McCarren straight ahead.  Both roads were filled with excellent asphalt and wide bike lanes. Yahoo. 

However, by the time I  got there, Waldens was closed!!

I went next door to a Mexican restaurant names the Buenos Grill for some water. I should have known something was special about this place, because like Waldens, the sidewalk that surrounded it was curved, the kind you can ride up on a bicycle. Well, as it turned out,  one of the workers, a kid named Quinn, was curious about my bike and td me he was  a cyclist too. What’s more, he said that Greg,  the owner, is also way into bicycling!! Hopefully Greg and I will hook up before I leave town..

While there I also spent some time talking to another woman cyclist about my age about Reno biking. And just Reno in general, and why her and her husband so much love living here. She talked about all the great entertainment they get here and about how nothing in the city is more than 15 minutes away. She meant by car. So for the cyclist that would mean airports and colleges and parks and rivers, etc, are never  more than 45 minutes from wherever you happen to be in this fun population center.

I rode back to town, maybe three miles, on Blueberry, a fast slightly downhill road with beautiful asphalt and a wide, wonderful bike lane.

Did I say that Reno is  well kept bicycle secret? WOW!!

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