On your left! These three simple words are music to my ears when I’m walking my dog. Road bikes on paved trails in Colorado are my least favorite cyclists and my new nemeses. I miss the mountain bikers on trails in Chattanooga who not only use their voices to announce their presence and address you as the human that you are, but they ALSO announce when they are the last one to pass. The cyclists in Colorado have an unnerving sense of privilege, audacity, and entitlement. I’ve heard few people say, “on your left!” to me and they were, of course, all women. The vast majority of the cyclists I see are men. I’d like to think they don’t speak because they are so enraptured by my beauty or the cuteness of my dog that they are unable to form words, but that is definitely not the case. They cannot be bothered to speak, which actually isn’t the worst. Not to me. For me, the worst are those fucking bells!
I always walk on the right side of the trail. My dog walks on the right side of the trail. We are always in single file towards the edge. The most considerate trail walkers if I do say so myself. When these cyclists can be bothered to announce their presence, it’s the bells. And these bells are not the whimsical bells that you imagine on a beach cruiser with a basket. And not the funny horn of a clown. No, they are the bells that remind you of someone demanding service at a hotel reception desk. They ring it and if you do not respond (because you are already walking in a manner that makes it easy to pass AND because you are not clocked in to serve them), they will continue hitting that bell, as if they expect you to bow down on one knee off trail not making eye contact as the peasant pedestrian that you are.
If it’s not the shrill reverberating sound of those bells, it’s the flashing LED light blinding me from a mile away. I’m all about safety, but you are on a trail where there are no motorized vehicles and it’s daytime. Why are you blinding everyone and sending us into seizures? If you are going to use lights on your bike in the day time, set them to just be on, not flashing. And if it’s not the blinding lights, it’s cyclists that refuse to pass single file whether pedaling the same way or opposite of you. I have started drifting to the middle of the trail when bikers headed my way do not drop into a single file. How are you going to use flashing lights for safety but not drop to single file to pass a pedestrian? Oh, your comfort is more important than other’s safety, got it.
I will say, I have walked this trail at different times of the day. Last Sunday, we walked in the morning. And every single bike that passed us announced themselves with only one of the using the bell. Everyone else said on your left. I met a woman on the trail that was dog sitting and we let our pups visit. She told me to be careful as the bikers don’t say anything and I was excited to tell her that this morning they were! I realized maybe the morning bikers are more courteous than afternoon bikers. And then I thought maybe it’s just Sunday morning bikers. So we walked in the morning again Wednesday. I was passed by three bikers. The first was a woman who announced, “Two bikes passing on your left,” and they passed single file! An absolute saint! The next was a man that said, “On your left,” and immediately following him was another man banging on his stupid bell, and he kept banging on it as he proceeded to pass the courteous biker by zooming by on his e-bike WHILE the courteous biker was passing me. What an absolute asshole. I hope his battery dies and he gets a flat tire. And then we walked again on a Saturday morning, 5 cyclists passed us, 4 said nothing, and one rang his little bell incessantly when he was right beside us. He zoomed up silently on his ebike and then demanded attention after he was in my periphery after which he sped away. So, the jury is still out. But overall, I’m not a fan of cyclists.
We walk on this trail generally once a day, at different times. I let Puddin choose where she wants to walk and we walk 2-3 times every day. I would just avoid the trail to prevent myself from inevitably ending up in jail should anyone ever harm her in any way, but she likes all the smells from the other dogs. I’m not going to take away her simple pleasures because some privileged white men are behaving like privileged white men. Ultimately, it boils down to the fact that pedestrians have the right of way over bikes on any trail I have ever walked. If it’s a bike only trail, you won’t find me walking there. But the way (most) cyclists behave, you would think they paid for the trail construction out of their own pockets. It’s the entitlement that gets me and I don’t know if Colorado has more entitled people than the southeastern US or if there’s just so many more cyclists here in their overpriced gear looking like a joke. Either way, I’m tempted to start bringing my walking stick and you know what happens when you poke a stick into the spokes of a wheel. Weeeeeeeeeee! End rant.
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