Should I Really Ride in this Weather?

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As fall turns to winter and the days get shorter and colder we bikers are always looking for weather good enough to ride in. We each have some predefined temperatures and conditions that need to be meet before we ride. But as weeks go by and the weather doesn't let us ride we tend to relax our conditions take any chance we get to ride.

December has been colder and windier than normal and I have only been able to get out a couple of times. I don't go out if the temperature is below 35 degrees especially if it is windy. This pass weekend right after Christmas we had a couple of days with record warmth so it was a no brainer to go out this past Sunday when the temperature was 65. Yes the roads were wet and there was a steady 15mph wind gusting to 25 but you don't get many 65 degree days in the winter so deal with the wet and the wind and enjoy a warm ride.

This pass Tuesday was a much harder decision. I was off from work and it was 40 degrees and sunny this usually means I'm going for a ride. The problem was the wind. The long range forecast had the winds between 10 and 15mph but on Tuesday the winds turn out being forecast to be 20 to 25 mph with gust to 40mph. The people that were going to join me on the ride starting dropping out and questioning if going for a ride was really a good idea. They were right of course riding in this kind of wind is stupid but I went any way mostly because I would rather ride in this wind than sit at home on a sunny day and regret not riding.

Luckily Mike B was stupid enough to join me. Chris and Mike M bailed and did some wet mountain biking instead. So as Mike said there were three of us on the ride (Me, Mike and the WIND). We ended up going to the canal and back. The wind was bad but manageable. Our speed was slow but it ended up being a steady wind and the gusts weren't too bad. The worst part was just getting the boat house. Even on a good day riding into the park from Old Trenton Road requires going through that bizarre wind vortex on park road heading to the boat house. Today the vortex almost blew me off the road a few times.

I ended up with just over 50 miles and was really tired at the end. We got some tail winds at the end of the ride but it really didn't feel that good. I don't regret going out in these conditions but I accept the fact that it really wasn't the smartest decision that I have made. This had made me realized, again, that I am addicted to biking and will go against logic and reason in order to get my fix of riding.

Tucker's Island Lighthouse

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New Jersey Bike Map lists 15 different lighthouses in New Jersey. I have visited at least 10 of them during my bike rides but there are still a few I haven't seen.

On Saturday, during a trip with my wife, I visited one I haven't been to yet, The Tucker's Island Lighthouse. It's on Route 9 in Tuckerton which is about 30 miles north of Atlantic City. Click here for a picture of the lighthouse.

The actual lighthouse is more house than light. If somebody hadn't told me is was a lighthouse I won't have known it. It also seem to be a strange place for a lighthouse because its at least two miles from the ocean. The truth is that the Tucker's Island Lighthouse that is on Route 9 is a recreation of the original one which was actually located 6 miles east of the current one. The original one was destroyed, in 1927, by erosion as the sea slowly took the island back piece by piece.

Tucker's Island no longer exists today and the area that is now Tuckerton is mainly low lying wetlands bordering the ocean. There is a lot of marinas around here and its suppose to be a good place for fishing, clamming and crabbing.

After the visit to the lighthouse we took a ride to the ocean just to look around. There wasn't much to see especially since it's the off season but the dock where we parked had a nice view of the ocean and there were a lot of seagulls. Seagulls are basically pigeons that live by the ocean and aren't the prettiest of birds but if you get them in the right setting it makes a good picture. I had my camera with me so I took a lot of pictures and ended up with a few good ones.

On our way back home we stopped at Smithville which is about 10 miles south of Tuckerton. I rode past Smithville last year as part of my Basto River Cruise. This time I got a chance to walk around Smithville and had a really good lunch at the Smithville inn. There is a small lake that the village surrounds. It the summer the lake is filled with people in paddle boats but in the winter it was empty except for a few very strange ducks. These ducks move there necks as they paddle in a really strange way. There is no way to describe it so take a look at the video here.