I always carry a fat stack of the city’s pocket-size foldy bike maps to hand out to visiting friends and other people new to biking in Portland. But two groups of locals are one-upping the city, printing full guides to Portland by bike.
Bike activist Elly Blue and bike fun instigator Meghan Sinnott launched PDX by Bike a few months ago and just recently printed their cute, bright blue bike guide to Portland. The 32-page pocket-size zine is a crash course on Portland bike culture, infrastructure, and history. It’s fun! It’s pretty basic info for people who already know the ins-and-outs of the city, but would be a good gift for a newbie. The zine PDX by Bike is in stores all over town, but you can also get a copy on their site.
And then today established Portland bike tour company Pedal Bike Tours (you’ve seen them—the packs of a half dozen people with matching bikes and helmets on the Eastbank Esplanade?) launched their own guide book, Pedal’s Picks. It’s more of an eat-drink-bike guide to the city, listing neighborhood places that the tour company winds up always recommending to tourists. The book is only available at their headquarters (133 SW 2nd Avenue).
Books. Bikes. Portland can never have enough!
ugh, can we stop all this bike nonsense yet?
Biff: Well, here we are, young and in Portland.
Janie: Yep.
Biff: Yessiree.
Janie: …So, uh, anyone want to talk about bikes?
Oh come on, you leave the nice young lady alone. So she is a bit singular in terms of casual interests ,so what? You’re going to give her a complex you know!
As a biker, I really appreciate the “bike” angle on every story. In fact, if a Blogtown story isn’t bike-related (which it always should be), I just replace the headline nouns with bike/biker/bikers and breathe a little easier.
“Christian Singing BIKERS at a State BIKERversity Votes to Kick Gay BIKER Out”
Now I get it!