$500 · Coolest bike you'll ever ride, and the only one on the island.

It started in a tennis court, on a ten speed Norco. I was twelve, and it was my first bike. We lived at the top of a huge hill and that's how long it took for my mom to insist we learn to ride bicycles, not just motorbikes. Eventually letting go of the back of my seat, my dad sat in the centre of the tennis court. Around. Around. "Go the other way, you're making me dizzy." Boredom evident. My younger sister and I took them camping, to friends houses, but never up the driveway. Too steep. You pushed it up, and flew down the hill, just about everyone else lived at the bottom. Mom would pick you up. Nearly twenty years later, with a few bikes in between, along came a pearl yellow beach cruiser. Heavy, long, and I wasn't even sure I liked it at first. I bought it because I felt bad for the 100lb. "kid" (20) who took Skytrain and wet roads to get to me in Kits. He was soaking wet and "Couldn't afford to keep it". She's one of three in BC. We road tripped to San Diego, Palm Springs and eventually Victoria. Spent time in storage, locked to a flagpole at the marina one summer, was pecked at by birds, and is often photographed. She's started more conversations than you'd believe. Then I moved to a city without a seawall, and met a man with a dozen bikes. He looks sheepishly away if you ask him, and doesn't count the ones in the garage. One summer day his son, a competitive road and track cyclist, says "Dad let's weigh it." A laughing teenager confirmed it. Forty-five pounds, single-speed, and I'd been lugging her up stairs and riding up huge hills. Then I fell in love. And bought another bike. And another. We went cycling in Europe and back into storage she went while we rented our home for a year. She's brought more joy than anything I've owned, but where we live is just not flat enough to get her out as much as she deserves. She needs to be free. $500 OBO, but don't even think about sending me a lowball offer. She has her pride, please have yours. She only welcomes friendly riders. I'm serious. No meanies. If you try to buy her, and I say, "You know what? I'm not ready. I'm sorry, but she's not for sale anymore.", know that I'm sorry, and I tried. And that you can leave with a bottle of wine for your trouble.