Signs of Hope

You know things are bad when you are excited to see toilet paper at the supermarket. We are able to get most of what we need to at the supermarket, except flour. Sometimes we can't get the brand we want but each week we are finding the shelves a little more stocked. We even found some hand sanitizer this week.

 Now it was from some local distillery and smelled like some horrible bath tub gin (which is more or less what it is) but we put it in a spray bottle and can use it to wipe down surfaces we have to do now after they have been contaminated from something coming from the outside world.

Things are far from normal and even when they do return to normal it is going to be a different type of normal. As to when we will be able to ride in groups again who knows so for now all my rides are solo rides from my house.

Since traffic is low I have be doing rides across Rt 1 on roads I'm usually a little reluctant to ride. Although it is spring the weather hasn't been great. I have gotten rained on during my last three rides and yesterday when I went out it was a little cold and really windy. I am known for a certain ride signature. My rides start with some climb close the beginning of the ride and somewhere along the way there is usually a bridge out. When I'm leading rides I get a lot of complaints about the hills and the bridge outs. When I'm riding solo there are also lots of complaint (mostly in my head). I would change my ride signature but I got to be me.

Yesterday's ride went from my house across some open farm fields and up New Rd to the canal. The first 20 miles of the ride was painful as I'm not in great shape yet and I was fighting a 20 mph headwind most of the way. At Blackwells Mill I ran into Jack and road a few miles together.

My ride took me through the middle of Princeton on Nassau Street. I normally won't ride on Nassau Street but knew there would be light traffic and wanted to see what the town looked like with things shut down. There are some cafes and restaurants open, for take out, and one of them smelled amazing. Princeton is quiet but has not reached ghost town status yet.

The purpose of going through Princeton was to check out the bridge on Alexander Rd that is being replace. It has been a while since I went passed a bridge out sign so it felt like something I needed to do. I headed pass multiple signs and barriers and checked out the bridge.

It looks like they have the bridges finished and paved and are just working on the curbs and walls surrounding the bridge. Even though it was Saturday there was some construction workers working on the bridge. I approached one of them and asked if the bridge was passable. He said yes but that there was a lot of construction with heavy equipment going on at the other end. He said he was glad I asked because a few people and even a car drove right through and pissed off the guys at the other end. From what he said I implied that he was saying only assholes would try to go over the bridge while they were working on it. I'm willing to walk through water, mud and take the risk to go over partially finished bridges but don't want to be an asshole about it so I turned around and took Washington Street back over Rt 1.

Alexander Rd will probably be finished in another month or so. It is probably safe to go over on Sundays and nights when no work is going on but should be avoided otherwise.