So I looked around for other options, and came across electric assisted bikes, or to be more precise, tricycles as my balance hasn't allowed me on a two wheel bicycle for many a year. I priced them up, got myself all excited with images of a carefree free-spirit me gliding along the the local roads with the wind in my hair like some dodgy 80s shampoo or female sanitary item commercial (complete with the romantically blurred images), and after many false starts and dead ends, actually tracked one down that I could test ride. Only problem was, when it came to it, I couldn't ride it ... I was too high up, my balance kept telling me I was falling over when I wasn't, my hands didn't like operating the twist grip, and a top speed of 15mph just downright scared me.
So, I went back to the drawing board. Through my hunt for the trike, and my daydreams, I'd come to realise that transport was no longer a like, it was a need. A scooter it would have to be.
I ended up with one at the upper end of the small scooter price range, because it does what I need it to do. It's a TGA Minimo, and it folds up in one single piece to about the size of a suitcase so that it can be taken onto public transport and the such. There are other scooters like this on the market, most notably the Luggie, and I did test ride one of these too.
My main reason for choosing the Minimo was its one-operation collapse. The Luggie, whilst maybe being even smaller and more portable once folded, and having slightly different, and for some people easier, tiller controls (using fingers, not thumbs, on the levers), has a folding operation of several actions, some of which require bending, which wasn't for me.
I've only had my little scooter a week, but already it's worth its weight. It's not made for yomping through the fields, it's got a fairly low ground clearance and a 4mph top speed, but it handles the rough pavements round here pretty well, there's only been one (badly laid) drop kerb it couldn't handle, and unlike some three-wheelers I've seen around, it doesn't try to tip over at every chance.
Earlier in the week, I got to the local shops in the village, and back again, in the time a one way journey would take on the bus, and with far less pain and fatigue, let alone fear and worry about whether I'd actually get home or not. I've been able to book a long weekend at the seaside knowing I won't have to let the kids down halfway through because my legs wouldn't carry on. And I've just now got home from a nice summers evening at the local park.
As the famous advert goes ... Walking stick £15, electric scooter £1500, being able to take your kids to the park for the first time in over three years, priceless.
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