Where's Herb?

The Pineland Cruise ride that I do out of Bordentown always draws a bit of a crowd. It's easy flat 65ish mile ride that is always fun. Being one of the hottest days of an already hot year I thought that only a few die hard people would show up but I ended up with 14 people crazy enough to think that riding in 95+ degree heat was a good idea.

Because of the heat I started the ride at 8:00am and cut the ride to just over 50 miles. I tried to kept the pace easy so we would have something left for the end of the ride. Our first rest stop is a Wawa in Brownsmills and always has some interesting local characters going in and out.

It was hot but the riding wasn't too bad and everybody keep cruising along. Right before Vincetown Big Joe had a flat caused by a cut in his tire. We will probably be busting Joe for a few years about this since the cut in his tire wasn't new and for the fact that 4 miles later it blew again. Then a few miles later at the rest stop we put in yet another tube. Joe has these Campy rims that are almost impossible to get the tire off of and it was only with the help of Laura's super strong metal reiforced levels that we were able to get the tire on and off 3TIMES.

At the second rest stop Herb ended up leaving a few minutes early to get some Gatoraid at a deli a few miles up the road. Because of the 3rd change of Joes tire it was around 30 minutes before we headed out of the second rest stop to meet up with Herb. When we got to the deli we didn't see any sign of Herb so we figured that he gave up on us and headed back to the start. But when I got back to the start there was no sign of Herb. Crap, since I drove Herb to the start I need to find him because I didn't know how to tell his wife that I lost him.

I waited at the school in Bordentown for about 15 mins before heading out, by car, on the road to try and find him. I though that he might have gotten back to Bordentown and saw that we were not back and then decided to ride home. I knew which way he would have headed home but before I was going to drive that route I decided to retrace the roads back to the deli where he should have been. By the time I got to Chesterfield I saw Herb on Chesterfield Road and picked him up.

It turned out Herb was in the bathroom in the deli when we went by there which was unexpected because they never let us use the bathroom there. It as a strange coincident that caused us to miss each other. Herb ended up doubling back to the second rest stop to find us then realized we missed each other and headed back to Bordentown and would have ridden home if I he had to. Luckly we have ridden a lot together and know how each other thinks so I knew one way or the other I would find him or he would make it home.

At the end of the day despite the heat, flat tires, and loosing Herb it was still a good ride that gave us another interesting story to tell.

Schooley's Mountain

The ride up Schooley's mountain is one of the hillier rides we do and definitely a challenge. I always wait a few months into the season to do this ride so I can get some hill training in. Originally this ride was suppose to be Saturday but we finally got some rain so I postpone the ride to Sunday. This meant that I had a small group just me Laura, Mike M and Jeff which was fine with me.

As we headed towards our climb up Rockaway Rd. Mike stopped to check his rear derailleur because he was having problems shifting to his lowers gears. When we got to the top of Rockaway Mike checked his gears again and found the problem. His rear derailleur cable was broken at his shift lever. We tried to see if we could fix it but there was no easy fix with out a new cable so we tied the cable off to one of the cable guides so that Mike was stuck in his next to lowest gear. This meant that he went from 27 speeds to just three. He could basically only shift his front derailleur. We thought about finding a bike shop but couldn't find one that was close and open.

Even with a slightly disabled bike Mike keep powering up the hills. I actually felt a little guilty every time I made a shift.

We slowly made our way mostly uphill to Califon where I took a few new roads to get around the backside of town and started the last climb up to Schooley's Mountain.

Once on top of Schooley's we cruised a few miles to our rest stop in Long Valley. There is an old general stop and post office with a nice picnic table that make a good place for a break.

After the break, single gear Mike took off to Hackettstown to meet his wife and the rest of us headed down hill back to the start. We did have a good down hill on Four Bridges Rd. and a few other places but was disappointed with the downhill on Black River Rd. Black River Rd use to be one of my favoritesa couple of years ago but the road has become so rough and strewn with potholes that it's not much fun.

Of course it wasn't all downhill. We climbed over 1500 feet on our way back to the start. The climbs on the way back weren't as bad as the climbs up to Schooley's Mountain but it was a hot and humid day and we were getting tired. On the bottom part of Four Bridges just before we got to Tanners Brook there is a tough little climb that had Laura telling how much she hated me.

We did get a few nice views on the way back and stopped to take the picture at the top of this post at the corner of Doolittle and Hackelbarney(You gotta love the road names in NJ). You can see more picturesfor the ride here. By the time we got back to the start we were pretty tired but were still glad we did the ride. This is definitely one of the tougher rides we do and but it is good to occasionally push yourself close to your limits to keep improving. I have included a profile of the ride with some stats to show how much climbing we did. Jeff had a Garmin and sent me the stats after the ride. His stats were about 100 feet lower than mine but its still close so it's good to have independent conformation that my legs have a right to feet bad after climbing over 4000 feet.

Click on the profile below to get see a larger view

Belmar and Back

I haven't been to Belmar this year so when the Joe's led a ride there this Saturday I decided tag along. The Belmar ride is one of the more popular long distance rides we do. From Etra park it is at least an 70 mile round trip so you have to be prepare a 4 or 5 hours in the saddle. There are lots of variations to the route so it is never the same twice. The weather also plays a role so if you have a stiff west wind or hit and unexpected storm your going to have a tough ride back.

Saturday was a great day weather wise with light winds, sunny skies and relatively cool temperatures. George was planning to turn around when we got to Farmingdale but the riding was easy so he decided to go all the Belmar and back.

Even though it was the holiday weekend it wasn't as crowded as I expected. Yes there weren't any open parking spots and the beaches were full of people but Ocean avenue was rideable. After the stop in Belmar I split from the group and headed to the next town north, Avon, to visit with my niece who was on the beach there.

I only stopped for about a half hour at Avon then made my way back home. The wind was light so I didn't mind not having anybody to block the wind on the way home although it was a bit of a lonely ride. Because I rode from my house to Etra park the whole trip ended up being 80 miles and I was a little tired when I got home. It was my longest ride of the year and I was glad I made the trip since it was probably coolest day we are going to have for a while.