We’ve taken two substantial trips on the tag along bike. I think Dad is chomping at the bit to describe the second trip, so I’ll outline the first trip.
I decided to bike in with Alice to day care, and 3/4 of the trip (or more) went great. Alice chattered at me and actually pedaled part of the time. The tag-along seemed easier to pull than the trailer. Then as we were approaching the day care along a residential street, I felt back and noticed the tag along bar seemed oddly rotated. I braked and shortly after Alice fell off.
Fortunately, she was wearing a helmet, so there was no lasting injury. The only visible mark was a scab on her upper lib. It made her kind of look like Hitler. Fortunately the scab came off this weekend.
Another biker caught up with us and said that he had noticed the tag along getting crooked, and he was trying to catch up and warn us. The problem was that I had not sufficiently tightened the mounting hardware on my bike. After a few stops at crossings with all of Alice’s weight pushing on the mount point, it must have shifted around.
I couldn’t get the mount point turned around. And I didn’t really want to chance it with Alice again, so we walked in the last couple blocks. Alice calmed down pretty quickly, and she was a good trooper about the whole ordeal. By the time we got to day care, she agreed that she wanted to try again.
Once home, I was able to reset the mount point and tighten it a lot (to the point of possible stripping one of the hex screws). I also stole the small set bag from Alan’s back and I’m hauling around a hex wrench set.
The next trip ultimately went much better. But I’ll let Dad take that story.