Riding Apart

Two months in to the pandemic and things are getting a little better. The parks have re-opened and the beaches will be opening next weekend for memorial day. There are still social distancing restrictions in place for people in these public areas but it is an attempt to give people a little more freedom.

I have taken advantage of the new freedom to actually drive to a park to do a ride instead of riding out of my house. Last week I drove over the Rocky Hill and parked across from the quarry. The parking lot was open but they had the back half of it blocked off I guess to reduce the number of people who could park here.

As we have been doing in some of the past weeks I let everybody know my plans in case they wanted to meet up for a few minutes to catch up. Ricky, Jack and Laura joined me for the ride out from Rocky Hill to the base of the Sourlands where we found Bob. Pete was suppose to be there too but didn't time it correctly.

A few of the gang followed me along most of the route, although at a distance. We all kept some where between 20 and to a couple hundred feet apart for the ride occasionally stopping for a break. The main advantage to this is that if one of us breaks down or has some accident or problem there is some one nearby to help.

It felt good to do some hills as I haven't been able to get to the Sourlands this year. I'm still not in as good as hill shape as I'm normally am this year but now that I can start rides from other locations I should be able to get to my normal fitness in another month.

This Saturday the weather was almost summer like so I planned a ride down to the Pinelands. This time I got most of the Insane bike posse to join me. We actually spread out into two different groups about 5 mins apart from each other.

Riding with other people 50 to 100 feet behind me feels more like and event ride that I'm riding by myself. Its still a very solitary experience but it is probably the only way to safely do a ride together until there is a vaccine.

I know the club is still not allowing club rides but are talking with other clubs about if and when to start them again and if they do how to do them safely. I will be interested to see any guidelines they come up with. Until then we will probably still be riding apart from each other even it we ride the same route.