Today I resumed my quest to ride to the highpoint of every county in NJ. The goal today was the highpoint of Hunterdon county. It just so happens that the highpoint was along my normal Schooley's Mountain route. This is a ride I have done 4 or 5 times so there are no surprises with the route but as with all ride in for the club you never know who going to show up.
With a hilly ride such as this and start an hour away I don't expect many people but I had 10 people today. Barry, Jim, Ed, Marc, Cheryl, Lynn, Bill, JeffX, Jack and myself. It was good to see Lynn as I haven't ridden with her yet this year. It was a big group with a lot of different abilities so I knew it would be a little tough keeping the group together. The
planned route was hilly with 3 or 4 tough climbs but was one of the easier Schooley's mountain with only 3500 ft of climbing.
Everything was going well until we got into Califon where Jack broke a spoke at the bottom of Hoffman Corner Rd which had just been newly paved. Jim managed to get it true enough to ride after about 10 mins of work. When you break a spoke on a wheel it compromises its whole integrity you may be able to limp home but there is also a good chance it will turn into a pretzel that is unridable. With 35 miles to go I wasn't sure it would make it.
Right after Califon was the climb to the highpoint up Slicker road which is the toughest climb of the ride. We got spread out but everybody made it up. One person did have to stop to grab something to eat and another looked really spent by the time he got to the top. I wanted everyone to gather just after the turn on to Pleasant Grove Rd to take the high point picture but they just kept riding as I stopped to take a picture of the GPS at the high point spot and gather the stragglers. The actual high point picture was taken about a mile away in Morris instead of Hunterdon county but the GPS reading is at the actual high point on the road which is 1016 feet. The real high point was in the field to the left of the road and is 1060 feet so we got pretty close and this was the first high point we got to that was over 1000 ft.
We then road along the ridge to our rest stop which is the a general store on Schooley's mountain.
This food here is OK not great. My muffin was a powdery dry piece of saw dust with a few blueberries in it. It is however the only place to stop. They don't allow us to use the bathroom so we had to stop at a park on our way.
As we rode along the ridge we got spread out some more and had to occasionally wait for a person to catch up. I think he was just was not up for this kind of ride today. But I don't leave anybody behind even if they say they can get back on their own. If I see somebody come on my ride who I know can't keep up the pace I will ask them to not come on the ride but if a person comes on my ride that can usually kept up with the pace and they have a bad day then I deal with it as best I can and either slow the ride down or shorten the route.
The ride down off Schooley's mountain is usually a cool down hill. I tried a new road this time because I wanted a route that was less steep so I went down river road which according to NJBikeMap was scenic. Well it was a gentle decline and probably was scenic as we descended next to a river but the road was a little rough and the traffic was moderate with a sprinkling of angry drivers. I was glad when we got off it and one to less traveled roads.
This unfortunately lead to a few more hills people were not expecting even though I had provided the route in advance. This lead to a few complains. By the time we got to Hacklebarney park a couple people looked really haggered and we stopped for a brief rest. The rest of the ride was down Black River Rd which although still a little beat up is ridable. I had not been on this road until last year because it was more pot holes then road but they have fixed most of it and so it is back on the list of roads to ride.
We managed to limp back to the starting point. The good part is that everybody made it back and the repair on Jack's wheel held. Leading these types of rides are a bit stressful since I am constantly trying to make good decisions to kept everybody safe as problems occur. I am also thinking about contingency plans if more things go wrong like Jack's wheel becomes a pretzel or some one can't finish the ride. This takes away from the enjoyment of the ride but is just part of what I signed up for when I lead a ride. I tend to try and use these challenges to improve my leadership skills so I can deal with these types of situations better in the future. I am however glad I don't have any more rides to lead this month.
