It was a beau­ti­ful Sun­day in Welling­ton today. The air was crisp and cool but the sun was bright and the first signs of spring were vis­i­ble. For exam­ple, as I wheeled along the water­front prom­e­nade this after­noon, a few brave young men and women were in sleeve­less tops or short shorts, antic­i­pat­ing tem­per­a­tures that must sure­ly be a month or two away.

A prom­e­nade it cer­tain­ly is. I under­stand that in cer­tain for­eign parts it is the cus­tom to walk in the plaza or the esplanade every Sun­day to see and be seen, and it seems that we are devel­op­ing our own prom­e­nade tra­di­tion here, albeit in a sad­ly under-dressed form. There were a few clothes hors­es amid the usu­al crowed of strollers, a gag­gle of cos­play­ers, a chap in a top hat that rather suit­ed him, but the gen­er­al impres­sion was thor­ough­ly casu­al.

I did my bit for the atmos­phere by rid­ing my most beau­ti­ful bicy­cle at the slow­est pos­si­ble speed. It’s a game I play. I hope to con­vey max­i­mum non­cha­lance on two wheels, glid­ing calm­ly, serene­ly even, not just look­ing where I’m going but look­ing around and soak­ing in the peo­ple as well as the scenery. I saw an old mate com­ing the oth­er way and I was able to briefly clasp hands with­out stop­ping.

My most beau­ti­ful bicy­cle

I’m afraid there were a lot of out-of-con­trol inline skaters and wor­ry­ing­ly fast cyclists loose in the crowd. I over­heard a man com­plain to his part­ner about wheeled vehi­cles as a bike voomed past a bit too close and I can’t say I blame him. How much bet­ter it was to hear a few 100 metres on, “what a nice bike.”

I think where peo­ple are going wrong on wheels is in see­ing the Sun­day after­noon water­front as a place to exer­cise. Instead, why not see it as a place to relax, chill out, watch oth­er peo­ple and pro­vide some­thing for them to look at? The eyes of a mem­ber of the appro­pri­ate sex will not linger if you’re going faster than walk­ing pace. Leave the sweat and joy­less­ness to the jog­gers.

Ladies and gen­tle­men, we have had Slow Food. We all know the plea­sure of slow­ing down and enjoy­ing the ride. Let me pro­pose SLOW CYCLING. There’s a time and a place: Sun­day after­noon, by the water.