Today Ben and Jerry’s Ice Cream shops gave free ice cream cones away to everyone. They do this once a year. There was no limit on the number of cones, and I saw a number of people standing in line for their next cone while they were crunching on their current cone.

In celebration of this sugary occasion, the Portland bike community arranged an Ice Cream cone ride. The idea was to ride to all four locations and get a cone at each one. We started at 5pm, and the free cones ended at 8pm.

It is really cool to ride in a group of bikes. You don’t have to worry about cars that much, because drivers respect a group of bikers more than an individual biker. People flowed back and forth, talking and heckling each other. Jamey got a high-five (while both parties were biking) for wearing rain chaps. I love bike geeks!

The route:

The stops:

At the downtown store, I had a half-baked cone. Wonderful chocolately goodness.

We headed to Mio Gelato by Powell’s Bookstore on Burnside, because someone had heard a rumor of free gelato. It wasn’t true, unfortunately.

Along the way, a woman’s front fender completely folded up under itself. It stopped her tire and made a horrible squeaking noise. She ended up removing it in frustration. It was only a little bent, but it was plastic so it couldn’t be easily fixed. Another rider took it to see if it would fit his mini-bike front wheel.

We moved on to the next stop, which was at SW 10th Ave. I had a “Coffee, Coffee, Buzz, Buzz” cone. By then I could feel the sugar kicking in, and I didn’t think about adding caffeine to the mix before I ordered the cone. Someone started complaining that the sugar was making them shake. “Could you be shaking because it’s, say, cold outside?” It was unusually cold for the end of April. Luckily, the rain and cold discouraged people from getting a free cone, and the lines were tolerable.

Next stop was the shop on 23rd Ave. I was tried of chocolate at that point, so I got the “Mango Mango Sorbet”. It was clearly a mistake. Sorbet is just not as good as ice cream; I miss the dairy part. I could never become a vegan because I love dairy products too much.

At that point, Jamey and I decided to break off from the group and go home. Going across the river and back wasn’t appealing, especially since Jamey had already done that today to get to work and back to the start of the ride. It was great fun over all. 🙂