It is Balloon!!!

If you are a defensive driver you are always on the look out for possible accident situation with other cars, pedestrians, deer, etc. Being hit by a hot air balloon while driving a car, however, is really not something you are prepared for or even consider until it actually comes close to happening.

This Saturday I lead a ride to Schooley's Mountain from Raritan Valley College. This Saturday was also the annual Solberg Balloon festival. At the balloon festival there are over a hundred balloons so it is not uncommon to see them in the sky especially early in the morning when the winds are calm. There is no way to control a balloons flight path so it goes where the wind takes and lands where it can find some open space.

So as I drove along the main road in Raritan Valley College I saw a balloon in the parking lot to the right of me. I assumed it was getting set up to take off from there but then ahead of me I saw another balloon about to land, 50 feet ahead of me in the road. As I stopped to avoid the balloon I looked further to my left and saw other balloons approaching. Apparently these balloons had taken off from the festival and this is where they decided to land. The road was filled support vehicles that had chased the balloons and people who had stopped to take picture. It took me a while to thread my way around the balloons and people to get to the parking lot where we started the ride. I saw a few more balloons land before we actually started the ride. The parking lot and fields aren't that big so I was surprised that so many balloons were able to land in such a small area. It probably helped that there was almost no wind.

As for the ride I ended up with a good crowd despite competing with the popular Belmar ride that Joe had. Ron, Cheryl, Al, Blake,Tommy, Michael B and myself headed up to Schooley's Mountain and back. Here is the route we took. It's about 4000 ft of climbing (Al had 3750 ft to be exact) but there are a couple of steep climbs that make if feel harder than it is. Ron, Blake and I did a 4000ft of climbing a couple of weeks ago through the covered bridges and that was a much easier ride so total elevation is not an exact measure of how hard a ride is.

The other part of the Schooley's Mountain that is deceiving is that a lot of the climbing is after you get down off the mountain so just when you least expect it you make a turn and there is yet another hill. Of course there are some cool roads here that we normally don't get to do that often. Rockaway Rd is one of the easiest and nicest 300 ft climbs in the state. Middle Valley is also an interesting decent which was made a little harder by the fact that they had just stoned the road. Lastly you can't beat the view while coming down Fox Hill.

I have been doing a lot of hills over the past month so I think I'm in good hill shape and will probably do some flatter rides over the next couple of weeks.

Some Times You Gotta Go Around

I have a reputation for ignoring "Bridge Out"  and "Road Closed"signs and tend to use some cyclocross moves to get around the construction. Usually there is a walkway the workmen use so it is usually not dangerous or hard. Other times like a couple of weeks ago the bridge was totally out, on Sweet Hollow, with no walkway so we forded a stream. It was a little extreme but doable and nobody objected. It beat climbing all the way back up the hill.

This week Blake, Ron and I did a Covered Bridge ride out of Bulls Island. This involves crossing the Delaware climbing up the PA side then coming back the NJ side. The first climb is a half mile into the ride so I tend to take the easiest way up which is Fleecy Dale. In the email exchange before the ride I heard that FleecyDale was closed so I planned an alternate route. Laura teased me that I was wimping out because I usually laugh at "Road Closed" signs but the truth is if I know about a road closure before a ride I usually plan to avoid it.

I did some research about the construction on Fleecy Dale and found out they were replacing the retaining wall by Fritz Mill so I thought the road would be passable because I assumed the retaining wall was to keep the dirt from the hillside from sliding on to the road. But to be safe I decided on taking the alternate route up Green Lane. Curiosity got the best of us thought because we decided to try Fleecy Dale any way. The worst case we would just turn around and come back down hill.

So up Fleecy Dale we went and went past one construction zone and thought we were home free until we got near Fritz Mill then the road disappeared. It turns out the retaining wall they are building is to keep the next road they build from sliding into the river.  If you click on the picture above you can see there full scope of the construction. The first shovel tractor you see is actually at the bottom of Fritz Mill and the road was missing as far as we could see. There was no way we were going any further so we went down hill and back up Green Lane to continue the ride.

The roads were wet but not sloppy. The clouds looked threatening and we went through some mist but never got rained on. We went through two more construction zones one by the Loux Mill bridge which was just some shoulder work and the bridge out on Bridgeton Rd which has a temporary pedestrian bridge to use. So no problem there.

The NJ side was much dryer. We took the easy way up to the ridge (Javis to Rummel) and wound our way back to Bulls Island finishing with a nice fast stretch down Federal Twist.

One of the covered bridges we went through today Loux Mill was built in 1874 after a young man name Reed Meyers drown while trying to cross the stream. Although I do have a tendency to push the limits when getting around road construction I won't take any big risks or do anything unsafe. So some times you gotta go around.