Living Car Free - Fun for people who have no car

What do you all do for fun? What do you think are good ideas for things to do with your free time? And, out of curiosity, what age range do you think the activities would be good for and/or how old are you?

Sometimes I spend too much time doing anti-social stuff... the combination of reading, computer, and TV can get excessive. One of the good sides of this is that these things cost very little so I don't feel like I'm much participating in consumerism. (I will never sign myself up for cable TV service... though I do live with people who have cable.)

Sometimes I play board games, card games, etc. Sometimes these make me a little too competitive, but they are definitely fun.

Sometimes I play sports. Sometimes I can't find people to play sports with.

Do you have some great ideas on fun things to do that could, or do, fit in with your values and lifestyle?

Well, obviously, we ride bikes for fun!

I think photography is a great hobby to mix with biking.

Seriously, I like other outdoor activities for fun: hiking, rowing, canoeing. Indoors, I like to cook, read, play cards, watch TV (not too popular on this subforum :)). But really and truly, I will drop any of those activities to ride my bike.

Going for a bike ride

Being able to go to downtown Sunnyvale during lunch hour without worrying about parking - same goes for evening, weekends, etc.

Going for a nice bike ride

Doing all the same stuff I did before when I had a car, go the same places, except for some reason there seems to be less of my life taken up with transportation. How do I describe this..... I used to feel I was spending an hour or two just driving a day, I'm spending less time than that in 'required' transporation, yet I'm still getting everything done I need to get done. And still doing the things for fun I did, the library, the book store, etc. So maybe time in a car just felt longer. I'm a member of a bike club now and that's great fun. If this weekend weren't all booked up already I'd take the train with my bike up to SF and go explore around, I may decide to do that during the week though. I'd say I'm exploring more than I did when I had a car.

I'm 18 I love biking, hiking, canoeing, canoe tripping, backpacking. Getting together with good friends, cooking and then eating good food, smoking good pot.
I like to enjoy the simple thing's in life. Sometimes I play that there xbox, but my usage has dwindled in the past few month's and it's starting to get dusty :) . Something about the feeling when your done playing doesn't apeal to me, see I'm pretty hardcore with everything I do so I do get a bit of an adrenalin rush from some of my intense games, but the thing is after I'm done I feel like **** because I've got all this adrenalin bombing around my system but doing nothing, I don't think that's healthy either, more fun to go for an intense bike ride, and healthier :D

besides cycling everywhere....

i read alot (3-4 books a week), watch movies, listen to music, occasionally attempt to make my own music, garden, cook and bake, brew, walk around (usually with my wife and the two dogs), construct things around the homestead, destory things around the homestead, meditate, practice tai chi, stare into space, etc.

there's plenty to do. oh, and i go to work too -- but i try to avoid thinking about that when not absolutely necessary.

i like used bookstores, and go out for drinks with friends on weekends, but some nights also colleges and museums around my area have really cool stuff, like science lectures on antarctica, i watched a live feed of the mars explorer landing, and my local paper lists a lot of them too

http://www.denverpost.com/search/ci_2999659

i also like going to book readings, some of my favorite authors like barbara ehrenreich
and david sedaris often do lectures and readings near me

i also work on my townhouse, and i'm lucky i have an ace hardware right around the corner for me, so don't always have to go to home depot.

cycling yeah that one would be a given.

i like sporting events and am a fan of pretty much every Northern California team, with exception being i can't stand the Golden State Warriors, middle finger to that sorry organization. so i enjoy going to games/events, sports bars and watching, or with just friends wherever...even watching some of my friends play softball, some of these games are priceless :D

then theres more live music and dj sets/bars than you can ever possibly take in, more medical marijuana clubs than you can ever possibly visit.


the girlfriend loves to hike, i really can't stand it...so you know what that means, we hike all the time, well it seems like all the time to me. several large parks, lakes, trails everywhere around northern california and the coastline for walks along the beach...

we (girlfriend & i) love gardening. she has a garden at the school she teaches, myself it depends on what project i'm working on :D

lets see ya i ride my bike, i try to run a buisness, which is why im still at work at 8 but its a fun buisness.kayaking is good. i dont know i just go where the wind takes me if im having fun i stay if it sucks i leave. i dont like to make plans to do fun things that takes half the fun out of it. i guess im kinda lame next fun thing i do ill let you know

I think photography is a great hobby to mix with biking.

Me too!

wait what the hell?my pedicab, now thats good fun and i get paid. man nothing like drunk people to make laugh.

Swapmeet tomorrow, buy buy buy, then after that, take trailerload of junque home then I'm going to go over to the computer museum since they have a computer chess exhibit I want to look at, planning to buy a couple of t-shirts too, I had a black one and lost it, compy museum has great fitting t's. I might do some random riding around after the compy museum around Mtn view and go through Bookbuyers and see if there are any used books I need. Then supposed to meet up with a guy buying a seat from me, doing net stuff, etc then Zzzzz........

I recently heard about a really fun event for bicyclists. "Bike-In at the Bell" was unfortunately a little too far away for me to attend. As I understand it, it was a like a drive-in movie, except for bicycles. There was live music, bicycle-related film screenings and other neat stuff. You can read all about it in this entry from "Nathan's 'Blog" (http://oat5tout.blogspot.com/2005/07/bike-in-at-bell-august-20.html)

I'm going to talk to some people next week about organizing something similar (but smaller scale) in my town.

For about the cost of two tanks of gas, I have an annual membership at the Chicago Art Institute -- and it's much more pleasant to bike to the museum semi-regularly, and look around for 45-60 minutes than it is to try to make an entire afternoon of it like many museum goers do. That way, on any given visit, I can focus on a few of artwork and not have to get the museum fatigue which besets many visitors.

In the City, there are a number of free events -- concerts, lectures, performances, etc. that become pretty effortless to go to if you're already cycling in the area.

Also, on a bicycle, I take the time to stop and really look at the architecture. Many people find it difficult to really look at architecture, because it's hard to look at things that don't move. People who easily watch a two hour movie may find it difficult to look at the exterior of a masterpiece building for 5 minutes. (I once considered taking up formal meditation but found that I would rather struggle to learn to focus on a building or a painting than on my breathing. As a cyclist, I just let my breathing take care of itself.)

Architecture rules! Read John Howard Kunstler especially his blog (try to ignore the pro-war bits) and you can have a great time "dating" houses simply by the placement of the garage. Old-old ones generally don't have a garage, newer ones will have the garage at the end of a long skinny driveway tucked in back, newer still will have the garage on the side, present-day architectural taste, er, "taste" calls for the "snout house" where the garage is right in front, like a snout. In this case it's the front door that's almost an afterthought, it's easy to tell cars live there, hard to tell people live there.

I am forcibly carless now, due to drinking too much one night in Boulder late last year. Fortunately for me, I was already a cyclist, so I have had no problem adjusting. I am now in my eighth month of suspension, and loving every minute of it. I think I'll go carless for good now.
for fun, I listen to new music, read a lot, probably more inside than outside, but on the weekends I am spending most (expect for now) of my time outside on a ride. I am a recently converted fixed-head, and love the ease of maintenance on a minimalist bike. I also am looking for a backpack sax case, to take my horn on the road!

Love the site, cabana, I'll be posting a pic right after I get my new stickers!

I ride to libraries, grocery stores, around the lake, and sometimes in the middle of a busy lane just to piss off motorists. That's fun!