What do ya'll think about this bike?

[xeney]

I am not much of a mountain biker but I can guess why that bike caught your eye ... it has the prettiest paint job I have ever seen on a bike. It catches my eye every time I go to REI. Even though I am not in the market for a mountain bike, I couldn't resist the lure of the pretty and I did pull it down and sit on it, which is when I discovered that it weighs 900 pounds.

Well, not really, but it is pretty heavy. Do you think you could push it up a hill?

I know REIs vary by region, but ours has a great bike shop and I know they provide plenty of mechanical support for as long as you own the bike. My neighbor bought a road bike there a year ago and he has had practically every swappable component swapped out of that bike at some point, and he's been really happy with the service. I don't think they did a very good job fitting him in the first place, but an LBS is unfortunately no guarantee against that problem. We don't own any REI bikes and we have lots of good bike mechanics handy, but we have gone to REI for some things where a local shop wouldn't make much money off the job ... an REI mechanic helped my husband file a PayPal claim against a bad eBay seller; he wrote up a great report detailing all the damage on the bike, and he did it for free. They carry a lot of bike parts that are hard to get locally, and there is always someone there to give advice. Ours, at least, is not like the usual big-box department store that will sell you a poorly assembled bike and then provide no support.