“First Person” by Tim McMahon
With the annual awesome Elliot’s Ride for Everyone fast approaching, I’m thinking about the joys of car-free adventures – every day! We can ditch the stresses of traffic congestion and parking and enjoy the fresh air and freedom of biking and walking in the City by the Sea any day of the year. When we do, we’re not just having fun, we’re contributing to a better experience for everyone!
Did you know that Conde Nast once named Newport the best walking city in the country? Newport is magical, and even more so at a human scale. So leave your car behind and experience Newport up close and personal. You and everyone else will have more fun with fewer cars – plan to walk, shuttle, and ride your bicycle! There are lots of streets on the outskirts where you can leave your car and pop on your wheels to explore. Or use the Park & Bike, located at the Newport County YMCA. You can download the local bike map and recommended routes here. If you don’t have a bike, stop by Bike Newport and pick up a rental. If you use the free Hop-on, Hop Off Trolley, you can park your car for just $5 at the Newport Transportation Center.
Whether you walk, ride a bike or take the trolley, you’re off to enjoy the day in the most delightful way – perhaps to see the largest stock of revolutionary homes in America, the oldest lending library, the synagogue supported by some of the most important words ever rendered by George Washington, the nation’s oldest Quaker Meeting House, a revolutionary African burial ground with stories on the tombstones, or just an ice cream cone on Thames Street. And did you know that the British pronounced “Thames” the same way we do here in Newport until its Germanic King had changed things?
Be sure to take a bicycle ride around the “Ocean Drive” and feel the ocean breeze while smartly balanced atop your two (or three!) wheeler. There’s the magnificent glide – as you quietly propel yourself through the fresh air, past spectacular ocean scenery. Inside your head the little voice says, ‘“this looks like the perfect place to stop and take a photo.” You take a quick glance over at the cars waiting for someone to abandon a scarce parking spot, but that’s not something to worry about. Pulling over to the side of Newport’s iconic drive, you hop off the amazing balancing conveyor, climb down to the beach and onto the rocks and take out the picnic lunch you picked up on the way. After soaking up some sun, you cruise past Jay Leno’s pad and the “cottages” of Bellevue Avenue.
You’ve watched HBO’s “The Gilded Age”, and it dawns on you that you are seeing all of these magnificent wonders on a bicycle. It is as if you have time-traveled back to 1880, when Kirk Munroe and Charles Pratt, some of the original American cyclists, founded the League of American Wheelmen right here in Newport. So, stop on by to enjoy Newport for a while, as the Italians would say, “senza la machina.”
Ditch your car, your carbon emissions, and your stress – and enjoy Newport up close and personal!
Tim McMahon (pictured above) is Bike Newport’s part-time greeter and educator. Would you like to contribute a “First Person” essay? We’d love to hear from you – please email Gina Loveless.
Bike Newport