Consider doing multi-day trips from your front door during the weekends (bikepacking).

I used to live in Denver and never understood why people would find the need to drive 10 miles to the nearest trails when you could just ride to them. Then I realized, once you're done with those initial 10 miles, you could link up routes that covered practically the entire rest of the state.

Now I'm writing a guidebook on those routes.

Bummer about buses not accepting bikes - that sounds crazy to me. They just don't have room underneath or a bike rack up front? I can hardly understand how that could be true!