Bike Stolen Again, but this time, I was prepared
Hey y'all, just wanted to share a story from a while ago.
TL:DR: Bike got stolen. I got a new one. It got stolen again, except this time I had a tracker. Bike recovered after several weeks near the airport. Thief not found, but my bike is with me. Always keeping things inside from now on.
So, about a year and a half ago I posted a notice about my e-bike that had been stolen around Cloverdale area. It was really important to me cuz I used that bike to commute to work. Unfortunately, I never got it back. I'm not sure what the thief planned on doing to it since the battery is still with me.
I ended up getting a new one from FB Marketplace. This was barely used electric mountain bike. It's an absolute dream to ride.
Apparently, I didn't learn my lesson the first time to always bring it inside. One night, I was feeling extra lazy after coming home late from work and I just wanted to sleep. I didn't feel like hauling 80 lbs of bicyce up a flight of narrow stairs, so I was just like "Fuck it, the cops have been roaming around lately. Who's gonna be stupid enough to rob again right now?" Joke was on me, cuz the next morning my new bike was gone.
Except not completely, because this time, I was prepared. I bought one of those Tile tags from Best Buy and put it in a place that nobody could even look for: inside the bike itself.
I was ready. I saw the map: last location was somewhere on west Fairview. I called a cop and we started searching together. We searched for about an hour, only to be disappointed.
Of course the bike would be long gone by then, and I hadn't gotten any new pings. In the end I just went to bed deflated.
About 3 weeks go by and I get a ping from the Tile app: "Location update for object Bike". Washington Park. Went with a cop to drive around and see if I could get close enough to get an actual ping, but nothing. Wherever the bike was, it was too far from my phone to find so I had no choice but to go home disappointed again. Several more weeks go by without any activity.
It's 12am on a Friday, I'm just getting home from a late shift. I'm tired, sad, and frustrated, convinced I'll never see this bike again either. Suddenly, I get a new notification: "Location update for object Bike."
I'm in utter disbelief. I had given up on this bike and suddenly I got a location update. And not just one, but several location updates. The bike had ended up in an area with multiple Tile users, so I was getting pings every couple of minutes. Suddenly, I was very awake.
I hopped on my 20 year old car, called a cop and headed to the location where my bike was pinging. I don't even remember where it was, it was in some suburban area off Highway 80, near the airport.
I got there before the cop. I started driving around, hoping I could ping it, but nothing, and I had also stopped getting new pings. I was wondering if I had missed my chance, when suddenly, I see a blur on my left, and hear a ping from my phone. It's my precious bicycle, and I saw exactly which house it gad gone in.
At this point it was like, almost 1 or something. It was DARK, but it was like there was a moonbeam shining down directly on my ride. The cop finally got there and she heard my story and I showed her the Tile map. She managed to bring the bike outside, and I was able to ping the tracker inside and prove it was mine, and I finally took it home.
I feel bad for the kid that had gotten it though. He didn't seem to know it was stolen and had paid somebody else for it. A real shame.
From now on, I don't care how tired/drunk I am. I will never be hauling it upstairs every single time.
Thanks for taking the time to read this.