I had some work to do today and instead of driving to the coffee shop by my house, I decided to take the beach cruiser. I also took the scenic route along the beach. This is common practice in Santa Cruz. If you live anywhere near a stretch of beach, an experience outside the house typically involves taking a look, whether it’s on the way or not.
The Perplexing Pigeon
Our local pigeon patrol looks for problematic birds on West Cliff Dr.
I was riding the cruiser along West Cliff Dr. when a pigeon swooped in, landed up ahead to my left and proceeded to slow hop right into the path of the bulky front tire of my oncoming bike. I slammed on the brakes and skidded to halt just a couple inches from the bird. It did not move, just looked up at me like I was the idiot in the situation.
I went around him.
Nearly rolling through this bird and making it one with the pavement, through no real fault of my own, reminded me of a similar experience, also on West Cliff, in nearly the exact same spot. In this instance, however, the bird was a human and the beach cruiser was a Toyota.
