Left or Right?

Most of my winter rides tend to be close to home. I don't usually take the time to map out these rides since I know these roads so well and can easily make up the routes as I go. A couple of weeks ago I did an afternoon adhoc ride with Herb, Mary and George and decided to head to Englishtown. I had the route all mapped out in my head but was not really paying attention and ended up taking a slightly different route than I was planning. No problem I just recalculated the route in my head and mapped out new route to get me on track. Part of this re routing had me taking a Gravelhill Spotswood road which I hadn't been on in years so I was a little disoriented but knew the general direction I was heading was correct. I eventually found the road I wanted but made a left instead of a right and got totally turned around. What I ended up doing was an unintentional 8 mile circle that got me no closer to Englishtown. It's really embarrassing getting lost so close to home and the others deservedly harassed me the rest of the ride.

At this point George wanted some coffee and Englishtown was too far so I just headed to Roy's in Millstone and then we wandered around back to our starting point. We never did make it to Englishtown but still had a nice ride.

The next week we all went out again and this time I was determined to get to Englishtown so before the ride I actually created a ridesheet just to make sure I won't get turned around this time. Although Herb and George kept doubting my abilities to get them to Englishtown we did eventually make it. This is not a route I would do with a big group because there a couple of spots with a little traffic but it is a nice ride to do for a change of pace with a small group. The ridesheet is now on my NJ Road Biking site in the ridesheet page in case your interested in trying it out.