Back in my college days, shortly after I had broken up with my boyfriend at the time, I found myself without a car and needing to get to work. And while I didn’t have a bike that I could ride to work at the time, I did have my rollerblades. Thankfully, too, I lived along Lake Ontario, so I strapped on my blades and trekked the 14 kilometers along the lake to work.  

Present day, I live a good 15 kilometers from my current job and I have a pretty decent hybrid bicycle that gets just about no use. So I thought it would be a fantastic idea to ride my bike to work one day (so it ended up on my 28×29 list!).  

I faced two challenges: 

1. Waking up early enough
2. Choosing a route that was safe enough

The waking up early was just going to take sheer willpower. The route took a little more research. I normally take two main highways to work and there was no way I was riding on those. There’s a township road that runs right along the highway, so I opted to take that way – not the most direct route, but it would do.  

I roped my co-worker who lives around my neighbourhood to come with me. Needless to say, I was late in the morning so we ended up going along some neighbourhood streets and took the smaller of the two highways for a small stretch. Overall a good 10km ride.  

On the ride home we took the township road. It was so beautiful – farmland everywhere. So peaceful. A way nicer commute than the highway speeds and cars all around. The only downfall was the air quality was a tad bad because of the smoke moving in from the wildfires in BC. This route was definitely longer at 15km but by far the better option.  

I’m hoping the weather stays nice for a little while longer so I can get some more rides in! 

Have you ever taken an alternate method of transportation to work?