Coffee Carrying Happiness

[7rider]

Well, after 5 years as a coffee drinking bike commuter, I think I have finally hit upon a bottle/holder combination that works for me.

Generally, I'd use a basic coffee flask in a basic alloy bottle cage. I'd wrap the flask in an old sock to keep it from rattling. It worked okay, but lately, my flask has been growing some creeping crud in the opening that no amount of scrubbing could un-do. Time to retire it and get something new/better. But what?

Browsing through my local REI (always bad as we invariably come away with much more than we went in to buy. "Did you find everything you need?" a sales associate would ask. "Why yes...and a whole lot more stuff we didn't even know we needed!"), I came across this little gem - the Topeak Modular Java Cage. I paired it up with a new 16 oz. flask and this morning's ride was blissfully silent of rattling coffee flasks. The cage is adjustable so it will fit just about anything I need in there - those travel mugs, tumblers or even my vacuum flask. The flask doesn't have that pop-top to pour, so it should (hopefully) avoid the creeping crud issues of other types. So...all of this should in theory last me a long time - much longer than the cost outlay (Thank You MIL for the b'day gift!) if I were buying a daily cuppa joe at the coffee shop across the street.

Yay. Happy coffee drinking time!