And, as we told her, the best was yet to come. Charkes and I had mapped out the six-day journey so as to tour the countryside first and the oceanfront last.
``It will be better for the kids," I had told Charkes. ``That way they'll have something to look forward to."
In fact, after a couple days of riding past farm after farm, we six adults were as ecstatic on reaching the beach as were the four youngsters. It was hard to believe that deeply rural areas were so close to a series of populated beaches, from Rehoboth Beach down to Assateague Island in Maryland.
This was the sixth kid-friendly bicycle tour Charkes has organized for friends, starting when Olivia was 18 months old. She also leads rides for Adventure Cycling Association. All her trips are self-contained, meaning no vehicles are involved. We carried all our gear, camped, and usually cooked.
My husband and I were the only ones on single bicycles. Barb Walsh, 47, of East Dover, Vt., captained a tandem ably stoked by her son Ren Chock, 10. She and her husband own Brattleboro Bicycle Shop, and her mechanical skills came in quite handy.
Then there were our showstoppers, the Skerrett family from Fairfax, Vt.: Will, 41; Jennifer, 38; and their daughters, Elizabeth, 9, and Anna, 6. They rode a bicycle built for four and pulled gear behind them in a Burley trailer. (The ``quad" was custom-made by Santana Cycles in Southern California and purchased through Belmont Wheelworks in Belmont, Mass., the closest shop that could handle the order.) This was the family's first self-contained tour. They are planning a cross-country adventure for summer 2009.
Dad rode in front, Mom in the back, and the girls in the middle, their feet resting on pedals a foot higher than their parents'. To start, their feet would move into formation when Will Skerrett would call ``Pedal up! . . . ``One, two, three . . . go!" he would shout, and they would slowly move forward.
