OK, so I live in the high desert of Idaho, where rain is usually a rarity this time of year, but we now feel as though we are the new Seattle. Not more than 1 sunny day in a row in weeks… really. I haven’t even been able to get out on my scooter for 2 weeks.

This morning finally dawned sunny, so I geared up to take the scooter 5 miles to the gym for my usual Saturday “monster” workout (Zumba class, circuit weight training and 30 minutes on the various cardio machines). Got the jeans on over my workout clothes, got the helmet and gloves on, got the jacket on, opened the garage door, back walked the scooter out and then down to the end of the driveway, hopped on, put the key in, pushed the electric starter button and… wait for it… FAIL.

No juice, nothing. I left the key in the ignition a couple weeks ago during a garage cleaning project (had to move the scooter out of the way temporarily). That must have drained the battery. So, no scooter ride today… boo.

Lessons learned… don’t leave the key in the ignition… if you do, check the battery and re-charge if necessary.

Here’s hoping there will be another sunny day within the next decade when I can actually get out and ride again… :(

If you follow my blog, you may remember that I play a sort of game with my scooter… I get a charge out of seeing how much stuff I can haul on it. You see, my scoot IS my main vehicle. My hubby owns a smart car and a pickup truck, but I sold my personal vehicle ( a minivan left over from the days of hauling kids) when I left NJ in 2005. I haven’t owned a car of my own since… but I didn’t really need one, because I work from home. And in 2007, I took ownership of my mom’s Olds, which I used only rarely and ended up giving to my daughter when she fell on some hard times.

So, in the fall of 2007 I got my scooter, more because I fell in love with the idea of riding a scooter than because I needed a vehicle of my own. Still, I do love that I have my own wheels now that are only mine. :)

But I digress… so since I got the scoot, I’ve been using it to go everywhere I need to go, including many of my weekly grocery/pharmacy trips. I love that it is not just a fun mobile; it’s also a functional mobile as well.

Today I did it again… I hauled a week’s worth of groceries on and in my scooter! See?

See what I fit in my scooter?

How much stuff have you fit in/on your scooter?

Spring scootering is alive and well in Boise, Idaho… at last!

My Beautiful Boise Foothills

If you’ve been following my posts, you know of my frustrations this spring with getting restarted on scootering. Perhaps you’re dealing with your own set of frustrations… it’s been a brutal weather year in many areas of the United States. When I first moved to Boise, 3 years ago, they told me, “It rarely rains here, the weather is generally balmy (or hot in the summer) and it’s a great place for scootering…” And for the most part, that’s been my experience too.

Sure, we have our rainy season every early spring, but over the 2.5 years since I bought my scooter, I’ve been able to get a lot of scooter time in. The last few months, though, have been one endless set of rainy, cloudy days, with temps all over the place. Every time I thought spring was here for sure, the rains started dripping, wind started whipping, clouds massed over the sun for days on end and the temps plummeted… and so did my mood.

But now, at last, it appears that spring may finally be here for good. Thank heavens!

We’ve been seeing mostly sun for a few days now, the winds have died down a bit and the temps are averaging in the high 60s/low 70s much of the afternoons and evenings. Flowers are in bloom, trees are greening, the river is rising… and spring has truly sprung this time!

The pictures on this page were taken from a foothills hiking trail only 10 minutes from my home… the glories of living in the mountain west… the nearest mountain (or at least foothill) is never more than a few minutes ride from your door… or at least that’s the way it is here in Boise. From this particular trail, I can enjoy aerial views of “downtown” Boise in one direction, contrasted with a vista of snowswept mountain slopes in the other direction. Along the trail are all sorts of interesting vegetation, including delicate wildflowers, fragrant sagebrush and more. For me, it’s pretty darn close to paradise… especially when I can use my scooter to get there!

By the way, look for an announcement pretty soon about the revival of our “virtual group scooter rides“, an idea that never quite got off the starting blocks last fall.

Boise Foothills Wildflowers

March was a great month for scootering here in Boise, Idaho. Spring arrived (or so we thought), with fairly mild days in the 50s and every once in a while in the 60s. Not that sunny most of the time, but not really raining or snowing either. Windy, but the wind wasn’t too cold most of the time.

I was riding my Buddy to the gym and the bank and whatnot at least a couple of times a week. Yahoo! And enjoying every minute of it… even if my face was a little cold at times, along with my hands (even in gloves) and my knees. In fact, I was falling in love with scootering all over again…

I even rode to the Boise foothills to take a midday hike a couple of times.

And then… it all came crashing in last week! Back to winter! It snowed 3 times… darnit. Now, I love snow, but we hadn’t had a snowfall since December and in April I’m ready for spring. Done with snow weather. Too late, Mother Nature. It only stayed on the ground once and even then only for a few hours, but the rest of the week, it was cold, rainy, windy, you name it. Definitely not the weather to be taking my beloved Buddy out.

This week isn’t shaping up much better… yet… but I hear it could be 60 by Thursday, so we’ll see.

Anyone else out there riding yet?

I just got back from a short scooter ride to the bank to deposit a check. It’s a wonderfully sunny day here in Boise… the first whole day of full sun we’ve had in weeks… no lie. We have been living in gloom for so long, I’d almost forgotten what the sun looks like.

While much of the rest of the nation has been repeatedly buried in snowstorm after snowstorm, we  here in the Rocky Mountains have had NO snow. I don’t think I’ve seen more than a flake or two of snow since early December… and I love snow. But since we’re not having snow, then I would much prefer the sun shine… at least a couple days a week. Too much to ask?

But, getting back to my ride… I’ve actually managed to get out on the scooter every 7 to 10 days throughout the winter, which is good for the scooter… and for me. It’s really been too cold for me to ride comfortably… even 50 degrees feels pretty cold when you’re in the open, with the wind blowing in your face. Today it was in the low 40s and that’s really frosty.

So I can’t say I’m totally enjoying these rides. But at least I am back on my two-wheeler. And to be perfectly honest, it keeps me from having to drive my husband’s pickup truck, which has never been comfortable for me. Now if I had a small car at my disposal, I might have kept the scooter in mothballs for the past 3 months! But, as it is, the scooter IS my main vehicle and so I ride…

How about my readers? Do you ride during the winter? If so, how much and how far? What do you do to keep from getting chilled? Please leave your comments…

C’mon spring! I long for those balmy scooter rides where you feel pleasantly warm air surrounding you and the birds singing and the bees buzzing… I guess I have spring fever.