Tuesday, November 01, 2011

Critical Mass Bicycle Ride

I went for the second Critical Mass ride last Friday. There were over 200 bicyclists! The ride started from the Parliament Building and went towards Dhanmandi where a group photo was taken at the Amphitheatre near the Road 8 bridge. Then we rode towards Panthopath, in front of Sonargaon hotel, and towards Tejgaon Industrial area, all the way to Gulshan 1 and 2. At Gulshan 2, it turned left and headed back towards the Parliament building.

It was great fun. Unfortunately I did not have a camera. But here is a video that someone posted on YouTube (Hat Tip: Anwar)

A few weeks ago, I was out bicycling during a hartal. I ran into a group of bicyclists in front of the National Museum and rode with them to Shahid Minar. Here are some photos from that day (this is much smaller than the Critical Mass ride):





There is an active and thriving recreational bicycling community in Dhaka. I know of at least two clubs, Royal Bengal Riders and BDCyclists, who organize rides on weekends. Some rides are short, others are longer and tougher. Both groups have Facebook pages where you can get more information.

4 comments:

PEACHY said...

this bicycle group, is it open to foreigners?

ulysses said...

Hi, Best to ask the groups directly. https://www.facebook.com/#!/royalbengalriders and https://www.facebook.com/#!/groups/bdcyclists/ - I met several English speaking Bangladeshis from both groups, so I would be very surprised if the answer is no.

ulysses said...

btw, there were over 20 foreigners in the Critical Mass ride.

Mozammel said...

It is open to all... foreigners, local. I'm the one who compiled the video from the Critical Mass rides. We have a youtube channel here:

http://youtube.com/bdcyclists

and our Facebook group is:

https://www.facebook.com/groups/bdcyclists/

Join the group, you will be notified about the events there.