Klunkerz: Billy Savage’s MTB flick goes DVD

Now on film: the bikes, parties and people that made mountain bike history

It’s not something you should watch by yourself, Klunkerz. The independently written and produced DVD by fat-tire aficionado Billy Savage recounts mountain biking’s California days in the ’70’s and takes you there so vividly — with tons of footage, still photos, and interviews with a bunch of guys (and a couple of girls) who drank beer, smoked pot and then got on their damned bikes — that you and your friends will want to join in.

Wendell, Karen, Ian, Paul, Andrew and I didn’t light up, but we did crack a few beers in my living room one Friday night as we gathered to watch Savage’s flick. Finally on disk, Klunkerz has sold out theatres, won awards, and no doubt brought tears to a few MTBer’s eyes as it screened in the film, bike and sport circuits.

Filmmaker Savage demonstrates a genuine knowledge of the bikes, and rapport with the people who first dragged their heavy ’40’s and ’50’s-era Schwinns up a San Francisco-area mountain for kicks. Not only do many of the Mount Tamalpais riders — Joe Breeze, Gary Fisher, Tom Ritchey et al. — do screen time, but they share their stories and video footage with him in a way that feels trusted and intimate.

Not just talking heads, the film lingers on the stuff us riders love: the bikes, the parties and the trails that made Marin County famous. You actually see the 1.8 miles of fire road that the riders ate up (or ate them up, as injuries were frequent), the grease smoke coming off the hubs, and the keg-parties that fuelled the whole thing.

The editing is so sharp that the riders practically finish each others’ sentences. You get a real sense of their excitement and you’re reminded that at mountain biking’s heart, the message is universal: riding a bike is super fun, and you ought to try it.

Our gang really picked up on that. In discussion afterwards, Ian was stoked to see how how fun — rather than equipment — created the scene. Wendell liked seeing the riders’ passion turn into something huge, and Paul (an MTB Hall-of-Famer himself) was impressed by the amount of history that the film dug up that he hadn’t heard before. And I felt affirmed by how writers and photographers like Wende Cragg, Jacquie Phelan and Dogtown’s Ray Flores can play an important part in recording a movement and spreading the word.

Visit the Klunkerz web site at www.klunkerz.com to chat with Savage and order your own copy. For more on the history, I recommend the Mountain Bike Hall of Fame web site.

Published in the May/June 2008 Momentum Magazine.

Gary Fisher: down from the mountain

Mountain biking scenester sees fun and profit in city cycling trend

It’s not unusual for a few of us at Momentum to gather around a table at Gastown’s Irish Heather, order some meat pies and Kilkennies, and brainstorm on cures for the common car. What made it unusual one rainy night last November was that the most fervent ideas came from Gary Fisher.

Fisher was in town for the weekend to help Cap’s Bicycle Shop celebrate their 75th birthday (they were the first shop in Canada to carry Gary Fisher’s fledgling line of mountain bikes back in 1980) and as he put it, “I picked up a copy of Momentum at a bike shop, read it, and went “wow!”

“It felt really good,” relates the bike industry veteran on why he requested a meet-up, “It was people who had the right attitude ~ and I thought I’d just try to investigate.” Being “investigated” by Gary Fisher is kind of like being offered a drink by a Sony Music A&R rep. The man’s talking your language and you’re charmed by the attention, but you kind of wonder where his hands have been.

Same place as yours, it turns out: wrapped around bicycle grips and bullhorns. Only, he’s Gary Fisher and he literally invented the term “mountain bike”. He’s very successfully sold the mountain bike lifestyle to the world-at-large, and now he says he’s wants to do the same for urban cycling.

“Okay,” you say as the waiter slides a fresh pint in front of you, “I’m listening.”

Joe Breeze: on naked bikes and self-propelling prophecies

MTB pioneer admits trail biking was a “diversion” from his real passion

It’s not even lunch time yet and Joe Breeze has already blown my mind. Breeze ~ who with Gary Fisher, Tom Ritchey, and other Mountain Bike Hall-of-Famers basically invented the sport ~ has just admitted over the phone that if he hadn’t been so distracted by that whole fat-tire repack thing, he might have gotten down to what he really wanted to do a whole lot sooner: design commuter bicycles.

“The off-road thing was a diversion from my plan,” admits the creator of Breezer Bikes from his Marin County work space, “It wasn’t part of the script. It just happened…like life.”

“My interest in city bikes came long before mountain bikes,” he explains. “My father commuted to his job in the 1950’s by bike, so I grew up aware of that aspect of bikes.” Breeze rode to school and around his neighbourhood as a kid, but it wasn’t until the 17-year-old bike-toured in Europe that his eyes opened to bike transportation culture.

Says Breeze, “Nowhere was this so pronounced as in Holland with their extensive bicycle thoroughfares, cloverleaf interchanges and bicycle traffic signals….I thought, ‘We’ve got to do this in America!’”

Joe returned home inspired, and got involved in the beginnings of the region’s bicycling infrastructure. Perhaps more significant to the history of cycling, he also paid five bucks for a beat-up 1941 Schwinn Excelsior and turned it into what would eventually be called a “mountain bike“.

Backyard Whale Watching

Vancouver operators guarantee sightings with departures right out of the city

Thinking of hauling your out-of-town visitors to Tofino for some whale-watching? Think again. This summer, four local tour operators are guaranteeing sightings with departures right out of the Lower Mainland.

Vancouver Whale Watch and Steveston Seabreeze Adventures (both departing from Steveston), Wild Whales Vancouver (from Granville Island), and Pier’s End Adventure Centre (from White Rock) are all offering boat tours across the Strait of Georgia and down to the Gulf and San Juan islands to watch the whale pods play.

Village Hostels on the Sunshine Coast

Three coastal “backpacker B&Bs” welcome budget travelers north of Vancouver

Marney and son Coulter of Up The Creek Backpacker's B&B in Roberts Creek

I used to sell panniers at Vancouver’s Bike Doctor and when novice cyclists would come in and say they were going to spend a “relaxing” weekend biking the Gulf Islands, I’d cringe. There’s got to be an easier way for these people to discover the simple joys of bike touring, I thought; a destination with less gravity-defying hills, a shorter ferry ride, comparable island cachet and cheaper accommodations.

Since then I’ve thrown my bike on the #257 Horseshoe Bay bus and confirmed that this place does exist but the catch is ~ it’s not an island; it’s the thirty or so kilometers between Gibsons Landing, Roberts Creek and Sechelt known as the Sunshine Coast.

Each of the three villages are spaced fairly evenly apart and are linked by the Georgia Strait coastline, the paved-shouldered Highway 101, and a bike-rack equipped Sunshine Coast Transit System. The curious traveller can sample a day’s worth of arts, eats and adventures by bike or bus, then settle into an cozy hostel-type accommodation when it gets dark.

Merridale Cidery in Cobble Hill, Vancouver Island

Family-run apple orchard grows, squishes, ferments and pours their own ciders

Terry and I were waiting on the corner of Granville and Broadway for the #601 bus to take us to the Tsawwassen ferry terminal, when a grey pony-tailed fellow in mirrored sunglasses rode up on a blue ten-speed with two shopping bags hanging from the handlebars. He said he was going to Jamaica.

“How are you going to get to Jamaica once you’ve run out of land?” I asked him, motioning to his bike. He looked at me hard. “What are you, writing a book?”

“Er, no,” I back-pedaled, “I was just wondering in case I want to try it myself.”

Our journey ’s motivation was much simpler: we’d take our bikes on the ferry to Vancouver Island, cross the Saanich Peninsula, jump on the Mill Bay ferry, and cycle the rolling hills and smooth blacktop around Cobble Hill’s Merridale Cidery.

The family-run cidery grows apples, cultivates honey, and squishes the two together to make a sweet, hi-test cider called Cyser. I wanted some, and I figured it was worth a weekend of camping and riding to get it.