Bicycling The Villages

Added: 2026-05-30

[00:00:12]All right, we are out for a morning ride.

[00:00:16]10:00 a.m.

[00:00:21]77° right now and it's way up to 91 today.

[00:00:25]Right now, absolutely perfect.

[00:00:29]Riding through the neighborhood of Dunedin.

[00:00:33]North of 44.

[00:00:42]This neighborhood was built in 2015.

[00:00:46]Our home was actually built in December of 2015.

[00:00:52]We moved into it in December of 2018, so it was right almost 3 years old when we moved in.

[00:01:01]Look at that beautiful pineapple palm.

[00:01:07]Going to take you on a ride down to Brownwood.

[00:01:12]Talk about the sights and sounds we see on the way.

[00:01:16]There's a gentleman cutting his own grass.

[00:01:24]I don't know what the percentage would be of people that cut their own grass, maybe 40%? 30%?

[00:01:33]And here's some folks that are having some renovations done. You see the Porta Potty in the driveway.

[00:01:39]You're required by some companies to provide that and they will tack that onto your bill.

[00:01:49]One thing you can notice here in a designer home neighborhood like this is that there are fewer cars parked in the driveway, which as you know, if you watch, I absolutely love that.

[00:02:03]Cuz this is your biggest investment ever.

[00:02:10]You want it to look good.

[00:02:13]You can see people here take care of their yards.

[00:02:26]Now, just like every other day, I'm recording this ride.

[00:02:33]Sorry if my handlebars wiggle wiggle around a little bit.

[00:02:37]I'm trying to get some exercise while I'm doing this.

[00:02:41]And uh the more I strain, the probably the shakier the picture is. Sorry about that.

[00:02:46]But, we're on a 360 camera today, so we're actually going to give you a look at more of what I'm seeing.

[00:02:59]This is my old Ride 1Up e-bike.

[00:03:03]I've had it for probably 6 years.

[00:03:06]And uh it's a beauty.

[00:03:10]I love it.

[00:03:19]Nope, we're not sponsored by Ride 1Up.

[00:03:24]Speaking of sponsorships, I had a critical email today from someone that said, "You're having too many sponsorships." Well, I'm sorry to say that YouTube has gone down to a point where if we don't have sponsors, we don't have a channel.

[00:03:41]So, if you companies have reached out and we are so pleased and proud to work with the companies that we refer you to because we truly believe in them. If we didn't, we would not recommend them. I promise you that.

[00:03:58]There's a really cute little golf cart.

[00:04:01]Did you see that?

[00:04:03]That was sweet.

[00:04:07]I'm adjusting my mirror a little bit on the on the bike because I I'm a wholehearted believer in having a mirror.

[00:04:16]You got to see what's sneaking up on you.

[00:04:18]There was a bad wreck yesterday where an elderly driver, 91 years old I believe, I read this in the newspaper, came up behind a bike rider and and evidently the sun was in the driver's eyes and they ran into the back of the bicyclists and uh everybody went to the hospital. I sure hope everybody's okay.

[00:04:43]You see a lot of walkers out in the morning.

[00:04:46]Now here's a a situation where it's a little hairy because I'm hoping that car sees me and doesn't pull out.

[00:04:54]Here comes some golf carts. They want to pass me.

[00:04:59]And I'm glad they are instead of running into my rear end.

[00:05:08]Now that cart is not going to wait for those other carts.

[00:05:13]They're not going fast enough.

[00:05:15]Now I'm going 15.3 right now. So they're going about 20 maybe and he's going faster than that.

[00:05:21]And that's a no-no. 20 is the maximum you're allowed to drive in a golf cart on these special use lanes that we're in.

[00:05:33]Riding on Hillsborough Trail, passing the Manatee Recreation Center.

[00:05:42]That has a family pool. You can bring your grandkids here. we do.

[00:05:50]Look at that cart.

[00:06:01]Again, I'm sorry if your camera's moving, but hey, I'm moving the pedals.

[00:06:15]May sure comes fast, doesn't it?

[00:06:19]Seems like it was just January.

[00:06:23]It's already the fifth month of the year.

[00:06:29]There's an old golf cart for sale right there. We've watched them bring the price down from $5,000 to $3,900, now it's at $3,350.

[00:06:39]So, that's a pretty good price if that cart runs.

[00:06:53]This is what you might call one of the main drags in the Villages.

[00:06:57]It connects Buena Vista to Morse Boulevard.

[00:07:05]Passing Boozy Run.

[00:07:09]We have some friends that live back that way.

[00:07:22]Some folks playing golf over to our left.

[00:07:26]That's the beauty of the 360 camera, right?

[00:07:36]When you come to the end of this special use trail, like right here, you want to signal and merge.

[00:07:43]Check that mirror first every time.

[00:07:46]Don't assume.

[00:07:48]You know what happens when you assume.

[00:07:55]E-bike sure makes pedaling easier.

[00:07:58]I noticed gentleman up ahead of me.

[00:08:01]He's probably doing it legit, no e-bike.

[00:08:05]Getting more exercise than me and probably having less fun than me.

[00:08:10]And look at this yucca plant over here.

[00:08:12]It's actually an agave. It's probably in the yucca family. You see that beast?

[00:08:17]That's one of the largest of plants of that kind I've ever seen in my life.

[00:08:22]Valiant Court.

[00:08:26]You know whose stomping grounds we're in right now, don't you?

[00:08:30]Don Wiley.

[00:08:32]Commissioner.

[00:08:34]Great guy, friend of our channel.

[00:08:38]Very knowledgeable and helpful man. We appreciate him.

[00:08:46]I'm going to signal and go around my friend here.

[00:08:52]Good morning. Good morning.

[00:08:59]I'm going to stay out here in the main lane because I'm going to turn left up here.

[00:09:05]Remember, bicycles are allowed on the main roads.

[00:09:10]But not with this driver.

[00:09:12]Because I'm scared to get on all those main roads on a bicycle.

[00:09:21]So, we'll stick to the multi-modal.

[00:09:24]And what a nice, green, beautiful, shady ride it is.

[00:09:36]That cart had numbers on the front of it. That's probably a rental from The Villages Golf Cars.

[00:09:51]Good morning. Hello.

[00:10:02]Riding along Buena Vista now. We're actually heading westbound.

[00:10:07]Southwest, I believe.

[00:10:11]That guy, I don't know. I'm directionally challenged, to tell you the truth.

[00:10:15]Don't tell anybody.

[00:10:24]But it's a pretty ride. It's uh it's nice.

[00:10:27]This multi-modal is is so nice right through here.

[00:10:33]It's kind of a wilderness area on our left on the other side of that fence, Linda.

[00:10:37]I've had to stop her several times from climbing over that fence. She wants to check it out.

[00:10:55]If you're wondering what neighborhood we're near, we're near the neighborhood of Collier.

[00:11:00]Collier's a great neighborhood. It's way over there on the right.

[00:11:06]We have dear friends that live in the neighborhood of Collier.

[00:11:11]In fact, we looked at a house there.

[00:11:13]Didn't buy it.

[00:11:15]And wish we had.

[00:11:18]Although uh in all honesty, we absolutely love our home and our neighborhood right now. So, see the bicyclist out there on Buena Vista?

[00:11:30]Uh he's no rookie. He's got the riding clothes on.

[00:11:34]I just got a black t-shirt and a pair of my regular shorts.

[00:11:41]Some of you may wonder why I don't come to a complete stop at some of the stop signs.

[00:11:47]And that's because I'm too lazy cuz you have to stop and put your feet down.

[00:11:51]But believe me, I make sure everything's fine, so don't turn me in.

[00:11:57]That's Eisenhower wreck on the right.

[00:12:00]And the wood shop is on our left behind that fence.

[00:12:06]Right under that water tower. You see the water tower near Brownwood?

[00:12:10]That's where the wood shop is, right underneath it.

[00:12:13]You also know you're near Eisenhower.

[00:12:17]Now when you stop on an e-bike, if you don't want to go through all the force of pedaling, you just hit that throttle a little bit and it'll get you back up to speed where the pedaling's easier.

[00:12:31]Now here we're going to go down into this tunnel.

[00:12:35]There are two tunnels in quick succession here.

[00:12:39]We're going to ride through them.

[00:12:41]Wonderful infrastructure here in The Villages.

[00:12:44]My microphone is clear in that tunnel by about a foot and a half, so we're all good.

[00:12:51]Now when you come out the other side, this is a hill, so I'm definitely hitting that accelerator.

[00:12:56]And I'm still pedaling, but it's easy and no problem at all.

[00:13:01]But as soon as I get up here and feel good about getting out of that tunnel, guess what?

[00:13:06]We have another tunnel.

[00:13:10]There we are.

[00:13:14]Tunnel B27 going under Buena Vista.

[00:13:18]It's a nice tunnel.

[00:13:22]And right here we're going to come to the top of this hill with a little assist.

[00:13:27]And we're going to come to one of the few roundabouts just for golf carts in The Villages.

[00:13:33]And for bicycles.

[00:13:35]You can see it here. Look at that. Isn't that pretty?

[00:13:39]Where else are you going to find that, ladies and gentlemen?

[00:13:48]See, the sign said Brownwood Paddock Square. That's the way I'm going.

[00:13:54]Now we're right here looking straight ahead. You might see some apartments up there.

[00:13:59]Those are the lofts.

[00:14:01]You can actually rent an apartment there. I heard there's a waiting list, but they open up from time to time. And that beautiful lake that used to be the home of Larry, the big gator, that now lives at Gatorland.

[00:14:16]Gatorland in Orlando is a wonderful little amusement park, much less expensive than some of the bigger theme parks with mice and stuff.

[00:14:29]But we're approaching Brownwood right now.

[00:14:32]We're not going to make this a long ride today. It's going to be a rather short ride, but we're sure glad you came along. Let us know in the comments what you thought of the ride, please. Comments boost the algorithm, and YouTube likes that. And if enough people like the ride, they will actually boost it on YouTube, which we appreciate.

[00:14:59]Shady Nook Drive, or it might be a lane, who knows? Lane, drive, street, avenue, circle, loop.

[00:15:06]But it will go over the Brownwood bridge if we wanted to keep going that way.

[00:15:10]You guys like bridges. Maybe we'll take you over that bridge on today's ride, and that's where we'll end our show.

[00:15:16]Right now we're at West Torch Lake Drive.

[00:15:19]So, The Villages golf cars over there on the left. Hello. Hey.

[00:15:25]And right ahead is the Villages Sales Center. Do you see it there?

[00:15:29]Sales and information. That's a beautiful building. If you get a chance to go in there, go in and look at it.

[00:15:34]Pops Golf Shop on the left. That's a new business.

[00:15:39]City Fire on the left. And now we're at the town square.

[00:15:43]We're down here where all the action happens.

[00:15:46]And I might have to actually put my foot down here.

[00:15:49]I don't think I will, though.

[00:15:52]World of Beer. Burger Mondays there.

[00:15:55]Go there and get you a hamburger on Mondays at a reduced price. And you can see the square on our left. I'll take a couple loops around the square for you.

[00:16:04]Five Guys Burgers and Fries. Hello.

[00:16:09]See, they have it blocked off here.

[00:16:11]Let's see.

[00:16:13]Probably going to be a car show or something this evening.

[00:16:16]Prima Italian Steakhouse.

[00:16:20]On the left here is Harvest. That's a beautiful restaurant and one of our favorites right there, Bluefin.

[00:16:27]Now, this used to be a movie theater straight ahead.

[00:16:30]The Barnstorm Theater. No longer a movie theater because, you know why? Cuz you guys are streaming everything.

[00:16:36]That's why we don't have movies here anymore. Thanks a lot.

[00:16:40]Scoops.

[00:16:42]Who doesn't like Scoops?

[00:16:44]Milkshakes.

[00:16:45]Nope, they're not a sponsor. We tell you everything, ladies and gentlemen.

[00:16:50]We share everything. All the good stuff.

[00:16:53]Scoops is awesome.

[00:16:54]All the They have lunch.

[00:16:56]They have uh beautiful beautiful sandwiches.

[00:17:02]Around the square one more time.

[00:17:05]See if any of there's anything that you didn't see the first time.

[00:17:09]This is the square called Brownwood Paddock Square. It has the water tower, the windmill.

[00:17:14]It has covered seating. They have bleachers.

[00:17:21]All right, we're going to go over that bridge for you and then we're going to call it a day.

[00:17:24]Now, I'm not tired. I'm going on my e-bike.

[00:17:28]We're going to turn right here with my arm signal.

[00:17:32]And there we go.

[00:17:36]We're on Meggison Road. This goes all the way down into the new area.

[00:17:41]It's one of the major thoroughfares.

[00:17:42]Wolfgang Bakery and Grooming Gizmo's favorite place in The Villages.

[00:17:49]Gators Dockside.

[00:17:53]And you know what? Straight ahead is Cody's.

[00:17:55]One of my favorite places in The Villages.

[00:17:59]We're going to turn here and head back over to Shady Nook. Look at that Mustang right ahead.

[00:18:04]I used to have a Mustang, but it was one of the really ugly ones. Not the ones that anybody wants.

[00:18:15]I actually ran out of oil in that Mustang and the engine locked up on me.

[00:18:19]That's back when I was young and inexperienced and irresponsible.

[00:18:25]How about that little egret there?

[00:18:28]Okay, here's Shady Nook. See all the rental carts over there? If you need a cart, they've got one today.

[00:18:34]They can hook you up on today's ride.

[00:18:38]Okay, we'll come down here. It's hard to see the uh the entrance to the bridge, but that's it straight ahead. It has one Is that a stanchion or a baluster or what is that thing?

[00:18:49]I don't know.

[00:18:50]But look at this beautiful ironwork. I mention it all the time. You just have to get used to it.

[00:18:55]Let me mention that that is.

[00:18:58]Slow curve ahead.

[00:19:02]Got to keep it rolling.

[00:19:08]This is one of two bridges we're going to go over. Look at this beauty.

[00:19:12]Isn't that sweet?

[00:19:14]Over this lovely little pond that I cannot fish in.

[00:19:20]And up we go under the bridge.

[00:19:23]As you can see, it's uphill, so Jerry is going to add some uh artificial power here.

[00:19:31]And right up this bridge, and we'll be on the bridge in just a minute, and this bridge goes over County Road 44.

[00:19:41]That goes all the way up to Crystal River one way and all the way to Tavares and points east on the other way.

[00:19:51]And The Villages sign is up on both sides of this bridge, so you can't mistake that it you know, it's not Ocala's sign. It's not Leesburg's sign. That's The Villages.

[00:20:02]They don't want to get anybody confused as to whose bridge that is.

[00:20:06]Look at all these blocks. I'm glad I didn't have to lay these blocks.

[00:20:11]But now we're on the other side of the bridge.

[00:20:13]I'm going to go down here and turn around, and that'll be my ride for today.

[00:20:17]Do you want me to take you over the bridge once again and show you the bridge again? I bet you do.

[00:20:23]I'll do that. Let me get to where I can turn around safely here. We've got a golf cart behind me.

[00:20:28]Leaning into the turn like a motocross racer.

[00:20:35]Yeah. I'm going to ride right into that grass at the end of the road. I'm just going to ride right up in it and then turn around.

[00:20:45]Of course, that golf cart didn't know that.

[00:20:48]There's a little bumpety bump.

[00:20:50]Boom!

[00:20:54]And I'm turning around.

[00:20:57]And around I go, and back the way I came.

[00:21:02]That was very skillful turn. Let me slow down here a second because my camera has turned up there and I actually have to reach up and turn it back.

[00:21:16]I hope that's better for you.

[00:21:22]And back I go. That's where assist comes in handy.

[00:21:25]You don't have to stand up on your pedals. You ever done that riding a bike?

[00:21:28]You stand up on your pedals.

[00:21:30]And that's a Peloton there.

[00:21:34]And he like Peloton.

[00:21:38]They're out having fun.

[00:21:43]All right, one last look at this bridge and that's where we will sign off for today's ride. Linda couldn't be with me. She's working today.

[00:21:51]She She donates her time to charity.

[00:21:55]And she absolutely loves it.

[00:22:04]I'm still pedaling. Don't worry.

[00:22:07]My legs are feeling the burn. I feel the burn, ladies and gentlemen.

[00:22:13]And here we are going over the bridge.

[00:22:23]These people are heading down toward Richmond, St. John's, uh Marsh Bend, Deluna and all points south.

[00:22:34]And there we are over the bridge looking at that gorgeous pond down there.

[00:22:39]And that lovely little bridge that I went over earlier.

[00:22:43]And that's going to do it for this ride.

[00:22:44]Remember what Linda says to please subscribe. It means so much.

[00:22:54]And uh we'll see you around the villages. Until then, see you when you get here.

[00:23:01]Now there's a racer, huh?

[00:23:05]No helmet though, so she's going to be fit when she goes to the hospital.

[00:23:13]Famous last words, right?

[00:23:16]Anyway, I already told you I signed off, so what are you waiting for? Let's get out of here.

[00:23:27]>> [music]