A new bike and some delivery woes

It was only a matter of time till I bought a road bike, but I didn’t expect actually getting hold of it would be quite so traumatic …

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I love my hybrid – Millicent has been there for me through all weathers and on all terrains, on short rides and long(ish). But I’ve been hankering for a road bike for a while, ever since I got back on a bike really, so it was only a matter of time till I gave in to that desire.

I’ve been sporadically checking out the ladies’ road bikes on Wiggle, searching for one I like the look of. I didn’t want to spend too much – certainly not as much as £1,000 – which cut down my options quite considerably. There was a 2013 model Bianchi bike (the Women's C2C Nirone 7 Dama Sora), but that was £800, and I decided that my limit was £700. The bike was beautiful, but I wasn’t about to break my budget.

This was back in January and I’d been looking for something as lovely ever since. In March I came across the Felt Women’s ZW100 2014. Metallic grey with hot pink highlights, this had to be the bike for me. Even better it only cost £599 – a whole £100 under my upper spend limit. What’s more, my brother (The Cyclist) receives a 12% discount from Wiggle, so ordering it through his account saved me just under £72!

Metallic grey with hot pink highlights, the Felt Women’s ZW100 2014 had to be the bike for me

Unfortunately I then had to wait till the end of April for the bike to be delivered. I don’t know why it took so long. The other frame size was just a couple of weeks, so I’m guessing that the size I needed had completely sold out and Wiggle was waiting for more to be manufactured.

So I waited for the rest of March and throughout April, until I received an exciting text from Wiggle saying the bike would be delivered on 18 April. This confused me somewhat as that was Good Friday, a bank holiday. But I figured that courier companies don’t necessarily stop work because it’s Easter, and even if the office staff weren’t in the drivers might still be out and about.

And that's when everything started to go wrong. It's quite a long tale, and I'm going to recount it exactly as it happened so you can draw your own conclusions. If you're in a hurry, though, you might want to skip to the end.

You had one job
Good Friday had been designated gardening day, so we plugged the doorbell ringer in the kitchen so we’d hear it and went about our business. By 6pm nothing had arrived and I sadly had to accept that I wasn’t going to get my bike in time to ride it over the Easter break. I emailed the courier company, UK Mail, hoping there might be someone in on the Saturday to answer it. No such luck.

My brother then received an email from Wiggle saying the bike would be delivered on Tuesday 22 April. Great – except that there wouldn’t be anyone at home that day. In fact there wouldn’t be anyone at home till the following Friday. But of course I could just go online and change the delivery date using the consignment number that Wiggle had provided. Except I couldn’t. UK Mail still had the delivery date as the 18th and wouldn’t let me change it to the 25th.

I emailed them again, asking for the delivery date to be changed. No response. The delivery driver phoned on the 22nd saying he couldn’t deliver the bike. He put a card through the door and went away. Which meant I could now use the card number to rearrange delivery for Friday. That evening I happily went online, entered the card number into UK Mail’s automated system and … it still had the delivery date as 18th, and I still couldn’t change it.

By this time I was pretty pissed off, and I contacted Wiggle asking if they could sort something out. I also tweeted a couple of quite angry comments to UK Mail’s Twitter account. The following morning I got up early to phone UK Mail as soon as they opened. I spoke to a lady there who, after a couple of attempts – her system crashed every time she tried to do something; not exactly confidence inspiring – said delivery had been rearranged for Friday. I went off to work happy that everything was sorted. I even considered contacting Wiggle again to tell them it was all OK.

Mid-morning, however, I got call from a chap at Wiggle, who was very apologetic. He'd phoned UK Mail and it turned out that the bike was down for delivery that day – Wednesday, not Friday after all. He'd managed to get it changed to the 25th. Come Friday I wasn't convinced the bike would turn up so I asked The Chap for photographic evidence when (if) it did. And at 12.52 the image below arrived.

What could be in the box? A bike, obvs.

Friday evening was dedicated to giant box opening and attaching pedals and handlebars to Florence. The rest of weekend was dedicated to stroking and testing out Florence. I never did receive a reply to my emails from UK Mail.

Ladies and gentlemen, meet Florence. 

Review: Muc-Off Bike Care Essentials Kit

Winter rain makes keeping your bike clean essential. Find out what I thought of this kit from Muc-Off

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As an all-weather, all-seasons cyclist, my bike tends to get pretty mucky, and obviously I want to keep it as clean and shiny as possible. I had been using just soap and water, but this wasn’t really up to the job. Roads in winter tend to be quite oily and it wasn’t easy to get the layer of black off my bike, especially the wheels.

The kit in full. Cleaner, protector, brush, sponge and tote
bag to keep it all together. Photo by Idoru Knits.

That’s where Muc-off’s Bike Care Essentials Kit comes in. The package includes a sponge, a wheel and component brush, a Nano Tech bike cleaner and an after-clean bike spray, which protects and shines, and it comes with a tote bag to keep it all together. This all represents the first two parts of a three-part programme; the third, lube, is sold separately, and all elements in the kit can be bought separately too.

It’s much less labour intensive than soap and water and the end result is cleaner and shinier

It’s really easy to use, especially if you have a garden hose. Just wet your bike, spray it all over with the cleaner and then leave for a few minutes. Give it a good going over with the brush and sponge and rinse it all off with the hose again. Then spray with the bike spray to get rid of excess water and help protect against grease.

It works, too. It’s much less labour intensive than soap and water and the end result is cleaner and shinier. The bike spray really does help keep your bike clean between washes. You do use an awful lot of the cleaner, though. About a quarter of the bottle each time, so just four uses until you need a replacement, costing £8.50. There are various other kits to buy, however, which might save you some money.

My only real criticism is the sponge, which after just two uses has started to fall apart, with bits coming off. This is because I used it on the wheel spokes, so possibly my own fault, but I would have expected a sponge meant for cleaning bikes to hold up when attending to the spokes.

The sponge has unfortunately already started to fall apart.
Photo by Idoru Knits.

Cost: £25
Available from: Muc-Off
Disclaimer: this product was bought and paid for by me

New bike alert

I’m looking to upgrade, and this is what I want

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I think it’s safe to say that in just a short time I’ve become something of a cycling convert. I’ve had an awful lot of use out of my little hybrid. Commuting to work most days as well as heading out for rides on Sundays, through rain or shine (mostly rain!).

When The Chap bought me this bike we deliberately went for a cheap model as I had no idea if I’d carry on cycling – we didn’t want to spend hundreds of pounds just for the bike to end up in the shed for the next two years before getting Freegled. I also particularly wanted a hybrid so that I could use it for both commuting and for cycling along the River Lea towpath if I so wished.

At £599 this is apparently an entry-level road bike, although 600 quid sounds quite expensive to me

But now I feel it’s time to move on. I’ve always loved road bikes, or racers as I called them when I was a kid. After doing some research and trying out some bikes, including the very lovely Bianchi Women's C2C Nirone 7 Dama Sora, I have made my decision: the Felt Women’s ZW100. At £599 this is apparently an entry-level road bike, although 600 quid sounds quite expensive to me.

The bike has been specially designed for female riders and made for comfort, with a ‘relaxed geometry’, which allows a more upright riding position than some road bikes. This means it should be ideal for regular commuting.

I’ll be ordering the bike after payday (end of the month!), and will of course blog about it when it arrives.

The Felt Women's ZW100

How it all began

Why I got back in the saddle, having not even sat on a bike for 20 years

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I’d been thinking of getting a bike for some time, but a few things were putting me off. First, the cost. I didn’t know how much I would have to spend, which was closely linked to the second problem: which bike? Cycle technology had moved on a long way since I was last on a bike more than 20 years ago.

Then there was when I would be able to get out on a bike. At the time I was within walking distance of work, so commuting was somewhat pointless, leaving only weekends, and I didn’t want to spend a lot of money to only use a bike once or twice a week. Finally, where to keep it? I was living in a small flat with no indoor space for a bike, not to mention the fact I was on the first floor and would have to get the thing up a narrow flight of stairs.

My bike, just before being cleaned.
Photo by The Happy Commuter.

All change
All of this changed in May of this year when my boyfriend asked me to move in with him. My new gaff is a very cyclable five miles away from the office, and it’s got plenty of shed and hallway space for storing bikes. Plus, as I couldn’t walk to work any more I’d have to pay for travel – getting a bike would actually save me money. So in July, as an early birthday present, my boyfriend bought me a bike.

I had three goals: to get fit, lose some weight and save money

I didn’t want anything too fancy – something that would get me to work but I could also take cross country at the weekends. Nothing expensive as for all I knew I’d use it once and then hide it away in the shed. With a little advice from the salesman at Halfords, I chose the Apollo Cosmo.

I’ve been cycling most days ever since, clocking up more than 50 miles a week. I had three goals: to get fit, lose some weight and save money. And hopefully enjoy myself. How have I have I been doing? You’ll find out in forthcoming posts!