Big Red Bike Tour Stage 1: Chilling With Chooks

28 August 2025

Chooks and geegees played an unexpectedly pleasant role as the Big Red Bike Tour Stage 1 got underway.

Unsure where to go and uneasy to leave the ailing Dino the rosy faced lovebird alone for too long, I decided to enlist the aid of Mrs. Kangaeroo.

Mrs. Kangaeroo is a great horse rider and had a session planned.

Back in the day I often used to ride by Gocoo Horse Village, the corral where she rides frequently, but I haven’t been there for many years. Nestled in the mountains, Gocoo was a cool option to beat the heat.

Leaving almost an hour after Mrs. Kangaeroo, I was surprised to arrive well ahead of her at the village well upstream on the Tama River.

That afforded me time to watch the free-range chooks wandering around the farm. I also got to delight in the chabo, or Japanese bantams, at the farm.

I was sorely tempted to get some bantams running around the garden at home as these little fellers were absolutely adorable.

But then I started thinking, as a kangae-roo is supposed to, and realized the neighbors would be horrified, and even more horrible would be the likeliood of condemning the poor birds to a torturous death if keeping them outside considering our home is shared by creatures such as rats and masked palm civets who would gladly feast on them.

That only left time for this jiji, the Japanese word for old man pronounced geegee, to enjoy the geegees that the farm is famous for. Gocoo provides trained horses for film and television, and its steeds were a delight to be around. But my steed also did a fine job on the first stage of her redefined tour.