Brompton Ride Along the Ara Waterway to Jeongseojin

Daily · Published 10/23/2022 ·

I made plans to go for a ride on a holiday afternoon.

The friend I rode with is someone who commutes to work every day on his Brompton.

I wanted to take him somewhere other than his usual route, so this time I picked the Ara Waterway course.

I started out from the north end of the Haengju Bridge.

Our meeting point was the Pangaemok rest area.

My Brompton is a P Line, and I’ve tinkered with it a bit.

Nothing major — I removed the mudguards, swapped the pedals, and switched to a 21T chainring.

Here I am waiting for my buddy at the Pangaemok rest area.

He showed up soon enough, and we set off down the Ara Waterway.

This is the Ara artificial waterfall.

It was around 20 degrees when we started, but the temperature dropped sharply.

It got a little chilly.

It may be man-made, but it’s a really stunning sight.

We took a quick break — under five minutes — at the rest area across the way.

After that we rode straight on and arrived at Jeongseojin.

I’d been here once before on my road bike, and coming by Brompton wasn’t really a problem either.

That said, the average speed, moving speed, and top speed were all lower than on the road bike, of course.

I tried hanging it up on the bike “clothesline.”

As expected, the Brompton just doesn’t make for a great clothesline shot — the angles never quite work out.

Here’s a middle-aged guy smiling away, with no idea his friend had tricked him into setting a new distance record today.

We grabbed a bowl of jjamppong at a nearby place.

The taste was so-so.

After the meal, I stepped out and shot the sunset.

Luckily I caught the magic hour and got some pretty photos.

Measured from the north end of the Haengju Bridge, it came to 45km round trip.

It goes without saying, but it’s slower than a road bike.

Maybe some folks with a great engine can keep up a similar pace.

But put that same effort into a road bike and you’d be far more efficient.

A minivelo has its own kind of charm. Like today — parking the car somewhere, pulling the bike out of the trunk, riding, and then heading back to the car. That concept lets you plan your energy budget reasonably well, and you can skip the stretches you don’t feel like riding. The minivelo has a lot going for it. ^^

Tuning does boost the performance, but I recently came to realize it really doesn’t make sense from a bang-for-buck standpoint.

I think I’m better off keeping it more or less stock and just enjoying it.

#브롬튼 #브롬톤 #브롬튼P라인 #아라뱃길자전거 #정서진 #정서진자전거 #행주대교자전거

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