The do's and don'ts of biking attire

I can honestly say this is a fashion topic that has never crossed my mind. Until today, that is. And it happened all of a sudden. Since it became clear that I wasn´t going to be able to buy a bike here, I registered for the City´s bicing scheme - they have bikes at metro stations and you pick them up from one station and drop them off at one near where you´re going. It´s great!

So today I was riding along, happy as can be; the sun shining down, wind in my face, humming along to Belle and Sebastian while admiring the gorgeous architecture of Barcelona, when suddenly my skirt blew up right into my face and the oncoming crowd got the shock of their lives! I nearly fell off my bike. Literally. So did they. Not literally.

I wasn´t in a quiet street. I was right by la Sagrada Familia. It´s 24 degress today. It´s May. It´s Barcelona. There were people everywhere! I started to look around. All the other bike riders were wearing trousers. There´s a girl! Yep, shorts. Another one, cargoes. Another - three-quarter length pants. Is this a rule that everyone knew except me? Why didn´t it occur to me that it wouldn't be a good idea to ride a bike in a skirt? I eventually spottted another girl in a skirt. She was also wearing boots and tights, which is not appropriate for this weather. I figured this may be her version of "leathers" and that she'd take them off when she got to her destination. Her skirt wasn´t blowing up in her face. It provided little consolation.

It took me a long time to get to school today. I tried everything. First I simply tried to sit on the skirt. Didn´t work - you do actually move around on that seat. Next I took my pony tail out and used the elastic to tie the front and back on my skirt together. The bundle was too big to sit on and before long I realised that to onlookers it looked like I had a "package" (at best; at worst it looked like I was riding along with a ... I don´t think I can write it in a public place). So I put my hair back up and rode slowly.

What should have been a 20-minute ride took me an hour. This was compounded by the fact I had no idea where I was going. I was sure I knew exactly where I was going. This is a bad combination. I rode for 20 minutes in the wrong direction before I smelled a rat. I didn´t understand - the route from class is so easy! My slow journey was further compounded by the fact that I made huge diversions in order not to veer off the bike paths and onto the road with the scary traffic. Luckily I anticipated there may be some directional problems and left myself quite a bit of time. I still got to class in time!