Lying Bastard 2020

 

There is not much to really say about this years Lying Bastard ride expect is was another PERFECT ride. Yes it was overcast, the roads were wet and we did get drizzled on for about 10 mins but otherwise it was a great ride. 

This year Pete, Jim and Bob joined me. Laura bailed again to blow some glass. We sent here a picture that showed here that we missed her. 

I have updated the route for this ride each year to try to make it a little better. Here is the route we did this year. This is almost exactly the route we did last year. This is a hilly ride which starts out with an 8 mile grind up to the ridge where Lake Nockamixon is then it is a series of annoying rollers for most of the rest of the ride. This route is a little easier than a few years ago as I got rid of the short steep 15% plus climb that got us out of Perkasie and to the lake and was the reason I got the name lying bastard.

Now instead we go down to the south side of the lake for a quick break then head up around the hills of the north side. It is a scenic ride through some strange woods. There is a Greek temple and a few strange holistic healing centers tucked in along the way. Even through this ride is in Pennsylvania and an hour north of Philadelphia it feels a lot more like the deep south which is why I call this area Pennsyltucky. 

We did see some more strangeness a few miles from our rest stop at a Turkey Hill. There was a farm with some strange sculptures including a cow made out of a oil tank and a snail 

 

I'm guessing it must have been some art studio because there were a number of other art works decorating the lawn. 

After the break it was a quick 10 mile sprint back to the start. With the usual quick and deadly plunge down the Red Circle of Death road which we all made it down with no problems. 

This ride has a reputation for being a hard annoying ride. The truth is that it is really not much harder than some of our other hillier rides if you look at the facts. However as I have seen recently some people don't seem to believe in the facts so this ride will always be a bastard of a ride to some people. 

NJ Safari

 

Click HERE for more Pictures

Because of the pandemic we decided not to do any big vacations this year. We thought about spending a long weekend up in Cape Cod hanging out at the beach but a some of stuff we normally do wasn't opened and so we didn't think it would be worth the extra hassle. That means I have a lot of vacation days to use. I plan to use most of my vacation by taking four day weeks for the next few months.

This pass Monday I took a vacation day and my wife and I decided to go on a safari. This year Great Adventure made their safari park a separate attraction instead it being a included as part of the admission for their theme park. So if just want to go to the safari park you can now do that for a reasonable fee.

The safari park is a 5 mile loop with a number of different areas. There are a lot of deer, antelope, zebra and other grazing animals.

There are also some elephants and giraffes

And Lions and Bears who we saw get into some fights so we got a little show.

It wasn't like taking a real African safari but it was a good way to spend a couple of hours and enjoy a little local vacation

Southern Sojourn

 

Since everybody had enough hills last week I decided to do something much flatter this Saturday. I wanted to do something a little different so we headed a little further south than normal. This meant an hours drive south to Batsto Village. It was another good weather day with temps just below 70 and partly cloudy skies. I got Jack, Pete, and Bob to join me. Here is the route we did.

I like riding in this area because its easy riding and there are some interesting bridges and rivers mostly crossing the Mullica river. 

And of course there was a bridge out.

And it looks like the bridge is condemned because besides the barriers there were permanent guard rails across it. Of course that didn't stop us from getting over it and on to Smithville by the coast where we found a few ducks and geese. 

Then it was on to Oyster Creek for a view of the marshland along the bay. It's a nice scenic spot where you can see from the end of Long Beach Island to Atlantic City. The only problem is the green flies that attack you. However with the stiff north east wind we had today there were no flies around.

Once we left Oyster Creek we had a tail wind most of the way back. I made a few changes to the route to try and stay off the busier roads. This brought us through some retirement and residential neighborhoods as well as through empty roads named after German cities. 

When we got back to Batsto Village the parking lot was packed as after Labor Day there is no fee to park here and walk around the village and trails. There was even a bunch of MGs in the parking lot on their way to a car show. I got out of there and away from all kids running around as quick as I could. 

There are a lot of good places to ride in South Jersey so I may head down this way again if the weather stays warm.

I'm a Little Bit Off Today...

 

This Labor day weekend like everything this year didn't work out quite as planned. On Saturday I had planned to lead a ride from Cocoluxe in Gladstone. I hadn't lead a ride up that way this year because we all have been staying closer to home this year and because it was too hot this summer to do a ride this hilly. 

However Saturday was a cool low humidity day and would be perfect for the ride. I got a good turn out for the ride with Jim, Ricky, Jack, Pete and Sarah joining me. As I warmed up in the parking lot I had a problem with my right shifter. It would shift up but not down and on a ride this hilly I needed a way to get to the lower gears. We tried to find a way to fix it but it seemed the problem was not the cables or derailleur but something in the shifter itself so there was no quick fix that we could find.

That meant of course I could not lead the ride. Luckily Jim was there and had downloaded the route and led the ride(Thanks Jim). I was disappointed of course that I wasn't going to be able to ride, especially after driving an hour just to get to the start. The only saving grace was that I had headed up this way not only to do the ride but to also visit my father so the trip wasn't a total waste. 

Between driving up to the ride and up to my father's and then back home I spent a few hours in the car. Knowing this I had downloaded a bunch of new songs and created a new play list. I didn't realize until listening to the playlist that it was a lot of songs were filled with references to our current situation so I realized this is now my official pandemic play list. The first song on the list was Fly on the Wall by The Violent. Written at the beginning at the start of the lock down. Its a song about how isolation can surface some violent thoughts that can make you feel even more alone. The next song was from Five Finger Death Punch called A Little Bit Off. Its an angry anthem about how nothing feels right anymore. The video is actually a little funny because the lead singer is walking around an empty Las Vegas more or less showing how they couldn't make the video they actually wanted because of how fucked up everything is. The song has one of the better last lines.

During this pandemic almost all musicians are locked away and most of them are working on new music because they can't tours so what else they are going to do. I suspect there is going to be a surge in new music in the near future. I heard some new material from bands, like Green Day, and am amazed what these can do in their home studios. Even mixing different instruments and vocals across the interweb. 

There were a few songs on the play list that were more up lifting like Larkin Poe's Holy Ghost Fire which is a cool kick ass blues song. It has one of my favorite new song line "From your fingers to the frets, gonna testify" You also got to love a girl who can play a slide guitar while dancing around.

In any case I didn't get to do the ride but did have an good day seeing my father again and enjoying some new tunes.

Although I didn't get to do the Cocoluxe ride I was able to torture the posse from them just following my route. As Jim's write up shows there were a couple of rough milled roads and the two new roads I added to ride ended up a gate road that was a pain to get around. That's so me. I'm sorry I missed it. 

The weather was perfect this weekend so I did get out on Sunday for a ride in the Sourlands to get my hill work in. I had to take the Feather because the Synapse is in the shop. Luckily it is just some corrosion in the shifter so after a cleaning and tune up it should be good as new in about a week. 

On Monday I did get back with some of the posse to do a ride pass the Mansquan reservoir to end the weekend. It was a good ride and we did see some other free wheelers at Etra Park but this is usually the day of the all paces ride out of Mercer Parks so it felt a little off.