I wanted to experiment with my Flip camera by taking video while I was on my Saturday ride. Rather than attempt to video large chunks of time I took a tip from Leo Laporte and shot 5-10 second clips and then blended them together to form a collage of my ride route. When you watch the video do not be surprised by what sounds like jet engines. Those are cars passing me. The Flip camera audio pickup was much better than I expected.

I now have a better idea about how this will work for my next long ride. One of the problems I had was where to keep the Flip while I was not shooting. I ended up using the short cable that is attached to the camera and putting it on my wrist. This was handy but I am concerned about making sudden moves and the Flip getting caught on something on my bike or elsewhere. So after my ride I stopped by a Big Lots store to see what they had in cheap cellphone holsters and camera bags. I did not find a big enough cellphone holster so I settled for a small camera bag with a belt loop connector ($5.40) that I will attach to my Camelback shoulder strap. This should keep the Flip out of the way but handy enough for shooting.

Kingwood-Conroe-Kingwood

Now for the actual ride. I created a map at Bikely.com. (Click on the map image to go to the actual map at Bikely.com) While the route shows 60 miles it was actually 63.2 miles when I got to my house. Lately I have been trying to change up my routes even though I go on some of the same roads. This ride I rode in reverse of my typical direction. It is interesting that I saw some things that I did not remember from the other direction. Construction activity is almost gone. Last Saturday I saw many bikers on this route but this time I saw only one. There was a ride sponsored by Northwest Cycling so many of them may have went there. Most of the riders are probably from The Woodlands.

As you see in the video the road conditions are good and traffic was moderate and the weather was perfect, in my opinion. As I wrote earlier, this video is an experiment so there are times when you will see and hear some unexpected things. Right off you hear me clip into my pedals. There are a couple of sections where I show my bike computer for distance and such. I am not a threat to Hollywood, yet.