On Your Bike!

In honour of World Bicycle Day which just happened on 3rd June, it’s time to dust off your bike and helmet and get peddling around Manchester.

Cycling is increasing in popularity as a means of transport due to its health benefits and low carbon footprint. Getting out and about on a bike is a fun way to pass a weekend that can include the whole family, but it’s important to do your research and plot your route beforehand to ensure you’re not biting off more than you can chew.

Cycle and Stride for Active Lives is an initiative from Transport for Greater Manchester designed to encourage people in Greater Manchester to become more active through cycling. The initiative is working with over 60 different communities, charities, faith groups and schools over the next three years to improve access to both cycling and walking through grants, training, online support, activities, and events. The scheme also has some great resources on its website to help you plan cycling routes around the Greater Manchester area, including a section which allows you to plan 15 minute routes around your neighbourhood, if you want to get cycling but aren’t looking for anything too intense. Want to take part but don’t have a bike of your own? Not to worry! On the website you can also find a directory of bike libraries, which will allow you to borrow a bike, much like a book, to try out. Or if you want your very own, you can also find out which bike shops are near you. Beeactive.tfgm.com

Top Route Planning Tips

1. Make use of online tools. There are a plethora of online tools available which can help you to plot your route. Google Maps, Strava, or dedicated cycling apps offer directions and often consider bikefriendly paths, dedicated cycling lanes, and areas with less traffic.

2. Consider road conditions. Bike lanes or shared paths are much safer and more enjoyable than cycling on the road. It’s also best to avoid busy roads or areas with heavy traffic if possible and consider any steep hills you might face along the way.

3. Don’t be afraid to ask for advice. Maybe ask a friend who cycles frequently if they have any favourite routes or reach out to local cycling clubs or online groups to see if they are able to offer any wisdom.

You might be surprised to hear, but most of my summer memories don’t involve the Sea of Galilee or an AC set to 16 degrees, on the contrary – they feature me, wearing a button-down shirt that makes my back itch, bruises, and scratches on my legs, sweaty, tired, exhausted, hoarse but with a smile that never leaves my face for a moment.

Before Passover, the work begins, and from each moshav, several teens are selected to join the leading teams of the camp. Those kids will work day and night for months, travel between the ends of the country, hold long meetings, and become young leaders for hundreds of children – youth who will take part in the camp.

The official goal is to get the trophy, the real goal is education. A whole week where children and youth from all over the country gather in one place and the rest of the world freezes.

When you’re 15 at a summer camp, for the first time in your life, you’ve been given a really big responsibility to discover for the