BREAZE

Imagine my excitement on turning up at the BREAZE Birthday Bash in November last year and seeing two cargo bikes parked inside. One of the musicians who played for us at the party, Kristen Rule, has just done her "Slow Ride Album Launch" where she creates music using a cello and a loopstation. How does she carry all her gear?

On a cargo bike of course!

She had ridden down from Castlemaine that day. The owner of the other bike, Andy, makes the solar trailers that they use. These give the bikes an extra boost if they need it going up hills for instance, as well as powering Kristen's loopstation and PA when she plays
concerts where there is no power available.

Kristen has travelled to many concerts around Victoria on her cargo bike. She has a number of trips planned this year, one where she will be travelling in a loop up to Mildura. She also has plans to travel interstate on her push bike.

I love that Kristen is dispelling a couple of common assumptions. That you need a vehicle to carry large or bulky items, and that you need a vehicle to travel long distances.

Push bikes seem to me to be such a timeless invention that it always surprises me that they are in fact a relatively recent one, bikes as we recognise them have only been around for just over 100 years. And derailleurs, enabling you to change gears as you ride, only about 60 years. So many cool cargo bikes are being developed and are becoming available now. Bikes with "long tails" such as Kristen's, bikes with three wheels and large baskets and even standard bikes with trailers. There's so many options for using bikes to carry cellos, shopping, passengers, ladders, canoes, a whole range of things..

And one of the things I like the best - you can always get a park out the front..

Kristen has a website here: http://www.theunconventionalcellist.com/

Have a listen to her music, and if you can see one of her concerts, she's a
brilliant musician and composer.