Lost in the Wind

Winter is officially here now so we won't have many weekends, in the next few months when we will be able to get out on the road. When I saw that this Saturday's would have temperatures hovering in the mid 40s I decided to list a ride out of MCP. Although the temperature was in the mid 40s, the wind was 20 mph+ from the west. Because of the wind I decided to head across Rt 1 instead of getting blown around in the open fields to the east. You can see the actual route we took here.

I had a couple of new roads I want to explore and thought this would be a good time to do it since I didn't expect many people on ride. I was wrong about that as I got my usual people along with some of the normal Cranbury B riders. We were 12 in total as we started off into the wind. The first new road was really a trail, the Trolley Line Trail. This trail goes from Penn-Lyle Rd to Rabbit Hill Rd. This gives me another way to get to Plainsboro from MCP. The trail was a well paved smooth trail. The trail goes through West Windsor Community part where it splits up into a couple of different loops. It took me a few loops to get back on the right path. There was a little grumbling from the group to get back to the roads but I eventually got them back on the fucking road.

We then went through Plainsboro on our way to the canal in Rocky Hill. With all the rain we had I was a little concerned that there would be some flooding by the canal but there was only a few puddle on the road.

Our stop was the Bagel Barn on 206.I have been here a lot over the last few months because of attending some of Jim's ride. Its a good place to stop but I was a little cold when we started the ride again. I didn't take the normal way back. Because of that and a gear problem one of the guys on the ride headed back on his own. The group headed west on 518 then down Cherry Hill Rd. There was a little more climbing than I had promised in the ride description but most people know not to trust me anyway.

We then made our way through the backside of Princeton on Terhune Rd to Snowden which is one of the less crowded roads through town. Getting across Rt 1 is always a problem. My preferred crossing are New Rd, College Rd, or Alexander Rd. I chose none of the above and instead crossed a Harrison. While it is true that Harrison does actually cross Rt 1 that doesn't mean you can't use it to do so. Let me explain.

The driveway to the old Sarnoff labs is just across Rt 1 from Harrison. If you are willing to go around a locked gate which is usually a requirement for one of my rides then you can get across Rt 1. I had actually done this a few weeks ago with Steve and wanted to come back with my regular crew to show them the abandon toxic dump Sarnoff had become. This is where TV was created and the place of a lot of leading edge research was done. Now most of it is go and only a few buildings are used. There is some environmental clean up going on so I didn't want to hang around the place to long.

From Sarnoff we headed to and under the train station. This was the last little surprise I had to the group as I led them down the ramp and through the tunnel of the Princeton train station. I use to do this when commuting to work. Its the easiest and safest way to get to the back roads of West Windsor and back to MCP. I try to continually find slightly different ways to do the same routes and doing some slightly different and sometimes stupid things. This, I hope, make the rides a little more fun even though that draws some complaints.

After dropping the group back at the park I headed home. Laura and Ricky followed me part of the way as they had also road in. By the time I got home I had just over 52 miles. I hadn't ridden on the road in three weeks so I was a bit sort but am glad for the miles as my wife has been baking cookies for the holidays and it I needed some exercise to work them off.

December Get Away

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Going to a beach resort for a December vacation may seem strange but it has the advantage of cheap accommodations and lack of crowds. My wife and I weren't able to spend our early fall weekend up in Cape Cod so when I suggested a winter getaway we decided to see what Cape Cod looked like around Christmas.

Even though we knew we won't get any beach time because of the weather we did know that there were some festivals that might be interesting to see so we weren't concerned about being bored. Because it was off off-season we stayed a resort we normally couldn't afford. The hotel room was more like a condo and had an indoor pool as well as a beautiful beach view.

The weather wasn't great for the 4 days of the vacation. It was overcast almost all the time with a few hours of rain here and there. Since we weren't planning to sit on the beach anyway the weather didn't matter as much. We spent most of our time checking out the scenic beaches and our favorite shops.

Even though it wasn't bright and sunny the beaches were still very scenic. There was a fog coming in to one of our favorite beaches that made it hard to see where the water ended and the clouds began. I took a few pictures but it was really hard to capture how it really looked.

Of course one of the reasons we go to Cape Cod is for the food. Unfortunately our favorite place for clam chowder and our favorite place for breakfast was closed for the season so we had to try out some other places. Even though there isn't a lot open we did get our fill of chowder and found some good breakfast alternatives. Most of the places that are open are popular bars so I assume the locals do a lot of drinking in off season.

There are some special Christmas events and festivals so we did take in some of theses. The big one was Gardens Aglow. It sounded like it was a smaller version of the light festival that Longwood Gardens puts on. It ended up not living up to the hype. It was just too crowded with little kids running around and the displays were nothing special. I did manage to take a few decent pictures.

Before we did the Gardens Aglow we spent some time at the Sandwich Glass Museum where we not only got to see a large variety of interesting handmade glassware but also got a live demo.

Some of the towns on the Cape were highly decorated so we spend some time driving around at night taking in the sights.

I didn't get a lot of pictures of the light displays as it was hard to do while driving by but made it a nice way to spend the nights.

We have been up to Cape Cod many times over the years mostly in the summer and fall. The Cape is definitely must more desolate with less things to do in the winter but it was fun to see it during a different time of year.

'Tis the Season

There are only 17 days to Christmas and the joy and/or anxiety that it brings. The days are getting shorter and colder so it is becoming harder to get out and ride. Two weeks ago I did an off the books ride with the usual crowd. We did a my winter Englishtown loop. It was your barely 40 degree cloudy day. I had a 50 mile loop planned but at the rest stop we took the shorter way home and ended up with 44.

Last week I didn't feel like crossing over Rt 1 to go to Laura's ride so I decided to try the Cranbury C+ with Steve. Instead of doing a normal Cranbury route Steve decided to go across Rt 1 to Montgomery. We ended up stopping at the Bagel Barn on 206 so it felt a little like a Jim ride. The way back was on some busy roads that I would normally avoid but I did end up on two new roads I haven't been on before and might use one of them on a future ride.

This week it was too cold to get out on the road as the temperature barely went above freezing. I decide to post a ride on the Lawrence Hopewell Trail so I could get some riding in. I got a decent turn out for a cold day. Chris, Ricky, Pete, Andrew and Tim showed up. Jim and Laura were absent because they had other commitments.

It was just over 30 degrees when we started the ride but it was sunny so once we got riding it I didn't feel cold. We had to wait for Chris a few time because his fender was hitting his wheel. Eventually I told him to just take the fender off and stick it in his backpack.

We made our way through Lawrence and then eventually to the Mercer Meadows. There were a couple of puddles of ice here and there but the trail was actually in good shape and it didn't feel as soft going up the hill in Mercer Meadows as it usually does.

When we got to Rosedale Lake Pete had a brake problem and headed for home. At the top of Wargo Tim had some knee issues so slowed up a little. We made the usual stop on the bridge on Province Line for a couple of pictures.

It was then up the hill and into ETS. Andrew left us for home before we turn into ETS. The path into ETS was overgrown and a bit wet in places. There were even a couple of small logs across the path. I didn't have a problem getting over them but Ricky tried and failed to bunny hop over it. No damage done. I managed not to get lost in ETS this time and so we were back on the trail without me pulling out the map. We lost sight of Tim so I went back for him and found him fixing a flat. We were only a few miles from the end so once the tire was fixed we were quickly back at the start.

I will be away next weekend but we have officially entered the winter riding season so will get out for short rides on the road or trail, when I can, until warmer weather gets here.

Winter Forecasts

After spending a week on the beach with 70 degree temperatures it has been a little bit of a shock to come back to the cold November weather. Last Sunday I ended up doing Jims's Ride. And this week I lead a ride from Bordentown. On both rides the temps were in the low 40s. Jim's ride was a little colder and cloudier but both were normal fall rides. As long as you were dressed correctly you could stay warm. There is that annoyance factor of riding in the cold of having to decide what to wear so that you are neither too hot or too cold and then dealing with the either being a little too hot or too cold during the ride itself.

Some people stop riding when it gets too cold. Others go down to Florida but neither is an option for me. I will just ride through the cold winter weather as best I can and try to have some fun doing it. These cold rides got be looking at the long range winter forecasts and the outlook is not promising. Both the Farmers Almanac and NBC10s long range forecasts are the same. They both call for a cold and snowy winter. I don't put a lot of faith in these long range forecasts as the models are very complicated and not very accurate. In fact there are more ways their models could be wrong than right. However with that said all the predictions seem to be in agreement so I believe them a little more than I normally do(especially after getting 5 inches of snow this week).

Because of that and because is was sunny for most of the ride. I decided to extend Saturday's ride a few miles and go around Mirror Lake in Browns Mills. We stopped for a few pictures as we rarely go around the lake. We ended up with close to 50 miles. It was a little cold on the way back because of some clouds and a stiff wind. I'm glad we put in the extra miles because base on the long range forecast this may be the warmest and longest ride we do for a while. 

A Relaxing Week on the Grand Strand

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Because my wife was off from work and I had a few extra vacation days this year we decided to take a trip south to a beach to get a few more days of warm weather. We went to the Myrtle Beach area (also known as the Grand Strand). It was close enough to drive to but far enough to be 10-15 degrees warmer than home. Because we took our dog with us we decided to rent a house instead of a hotel room. The small house we rented was in an ocean side retirement community. The reason for renting in a retirement community was that it looked like a nice quiet place and it had an indoor pool we could go to if the weather wasn't warm enough to be outside.

This was meant to be a relaxing vacation to de-stress from our normal life. The house we rented ended up being your typical shore house. It was a little worn in spots but comfortable. The houses in the community are very close to each other but since these are vacation homes with mostly retired people it is one of the quietest places I have even been. About half the houses are empty and the people that are here aren't very active. Its so quiet that I could hear the ocean waves from the porch and the ocean is a couple of blocks away.

In this community everybody rides around on golf carts to get to the beach or the pool or the community center. It was very strange at first but our house came with its own electric golf cart and once we used it to get to the pool or beach it made total sense. It was just so much easier to jump on the cart and go some place. In fact at Myrtle Beach you can even take your golf cart on the beach.

The weather was actually sunny and warm enough to get some beach time and while we were sitting on the beach people were driving by in carts. The beach is very hard sand so it would actually be possible to ride a bike on the beach as long as you had wider tires.

Besides the beach there are a lot of attractions to keep people busy. There are amusements and rides an of course lots of shopping. On one of the cloudier days we spent a couple of hours at an outdoor mall walking around and visiting the local aquarium. It was small but had some interesting exhibits like some cool looking jelly fish.

They also had the usual large tank with sharks and stingrays which we enjoyed sitting around and staring at for a while.  The mall was built around a large lake which was filled with catfish that you could feed. They were well trained because if you looked over the railing you would see a bunch of catfish opening their mouths waiting for you to drop some pellets. It was actually a little scary looking at them and reminded me of a couple of horror movies that I had seen.

This place like all vacation spots is filled with places to eat. Being by the shore means there are a lot of seafood places. Being in the south means a lot of fried food. This included hush puppies which is fried cornbread. I have had hush puppies before but the ones in Myrtle Beach are the best I've ever had, especially went pair with cinnamon butter. I'm sure my arteries are a little more clogged than they were a week ago.

While driving around looking for a place to eat we found an interesting biker bar name Suck, Bang, Blow.

I know the name sounds like the plot to every porn movie but its actually referring to the internal combustion of a motorcycle engine (intake, combustion exhaust). I didn't have enough tattoos to stop in for a drink.

The weather for week ended up being better than expected as we had only one day where it rained. That let us get to the beach for a couple of hours most days. I also took a few hikes since there are not any good places to bike around here. The best hike I took was in Huntington State Park. This park is mostly marshland by the ocean and is filled with birds like egrets and storks. I spent a couple hours walking around the trails taking pictures of birds.

In New Jersey you are lucky if you get a fleeting glimpse of a heron. In Huntington State Park there are at least 10 or 20 egrets or storks in view most of the time along with a lot of other birds.

It was a good relaxing week that was a welcome break from the normal grind of life. We enjoyed our time in Myrtle Beach and at the retirement community. It's definitely a place we may come back to if we need to get away and relax a little.

 

This is My Happy Place

(sign on the door of my hotel bathroom)

There is a reason that I have done the Philly bike club trip to Gettysburg four times. It is just a great way to over indulge in biking and forget about everything else for a few days. This year over 230 of us bikers descended on the town of Hanover. This is unlike any other bike gathering or tour. There is no set routes or regimented ride organization. It's more of a temporary bike commune where nothing else matters but riding, eating and having some fun.

This year I only was able to get Jack an Dorthy to join me on the trip but I know enough people in the Philly club to not worry about finding other people to ride with. I got to the hotel at 11:30 am on Friday and Jack and Dorthy were only 10 mins behind me. Once they got there Jack and I decided to go on a ride around Lake Marburg. It was a hilly 27 mile ride that was reasonable scenic. The weather was mostly sunny in the 60s so all I needed was arm warmers. Unfortunately the leaves haven't started turning yet otherwise we would seen some spectacular vistas.

After the ride I checked into the hotel room to clean up then went down to the conference to socialize with the rest of the bikers.  I decided to lead a ride on Saturday and put it on white board in the conference room to let everyone know.

Saturday morning was in the mid 50s. It had rained overnight but the sun was coming out so the roads were slowly drying.I end up getting 10 people to join me on my ride to Loganville to visit a farmers market (think Delicious Orchards only in the hills). Besides Jack I didn't know any of the other riders although I had talked to a few the night before. They all seem not to be afraid of the hills or the fact that I had modified the route to not exactly follow the queue sheet. I had done a slightly shorter version of this ride a few years ago but the farmers market was closed and I had always wanted to go back.

The first part of the ride headed past Lake Marburg again although we got there quicker with less hills. After that we broke off the queue sheet onto the modified part. I modified the route to head up to the top of the hills to get some views of the surrounding valleys and have a couple of fun downhills. This was unexplored territory for me. I had checked it out on google maps as best I could be I did not really know what I would encounter. The group spread out on the climbs but nobody really complained (much). The roads were quiet with almost no traffic and the views where good.

We did run into bridge out because Tom can lead for different clubs in different states but you can't get rid of the Tom-ness from a ride.

This bridge out was a slight challenge as the original bridge was gone and they only had the cement beams and steel plates of the new one laid down. We had to go through some gravel, climb up onto the foundation then up on the beam and walk across. Although this was not my normal group of insane riders we quickly scoped out the situation and I got a couple of people set up to hand the bikes up and down from the bridge beams and help everybody across.

After that we were on our way to buffalo valley. Now there were never buffaloes here and there weren't even many cows around so I have no idea how it got is name but I came along here mostly because of the name of the road  and the fact that it offered a two miles of downhill fun.

The view at the top was as nice as expected. I want to come back here someday when the leaves are at their peak.The downhill was worth the climbing and detour to get to it(At least I thought so). After that we had a few miles of flat before some more climbing to get to the actual farmers market. Because of a new development that was added in Loginville we couldn't find a couple or roads but figure it out and made it to the farmers market which is at the top of a hill.

The market itself is very much like Delicious Orchards with a bit of a country flair. They had a full deli, bakery and coffee shop. Jack was looking for some donuts but they only sold then in boxes of 6.

At the break 2 people on the ride meet some of their friends who got there with a different group and decided to go back with them. I forgot their names. In fact I didn't know anybodies name on the ride. I ended up referring to people by the color of their jacket or some other distinguishing feature. So Mr Italy (he had an Italian racing shirt on) and his buddy, blue jacket, stayed back while Jack, Dave orange, yellow, backpack guy, tall guy and blue number 2 came back with me. Even though I didn't know any of them besides Jack and Dave before the ride they ended being a good group of people to ride with.

The profile looked less hilly on the way back and was more wooded along some lakes and streams. As soon as we made a turn off the main road to head down toward the first lake there was yet another bridge out sign. This was the rare two bridge out Tom ride. Since I really didn't know how to detour we took our chances again. This time it wasn't a bridge that was out but an entire DAM.

Luckily the actual bridge across the dam was bikable so they must have been working underneath it. As part of working on the dam they drained the reservoir to make it easier to fix. We stopped for a couple of pictures and then moved on.

After the dam we road next to the rail trail before heading uphill again. There were a couple long climbs that weren't that steep but the group got spread out and so I stopped a few times to gather them up. Even though the profile shows less climbing on the second half of the the ride if felt worst than the first part.

The last part of the ride was through some back roads pass a haunted Halloween village and then a couple of miles over some rollers on a semi busy road. I'm going to modify the last part of the route if I do it again to see if I can find a way to stay off the 2 miles on Hanover Rd. It wasn't dangerous but I think there are better back roads that we could take.

I had one last surprise a half mile before the end of  the ride. I made a short detour for some ice cream. Half the group followed me the other half went back to the hotel. After 50 miles and 3500 feet of climbing the ice cream was well deserved. It was good home made ice cream and Jack talked about coming back after dinner(which we didn't end up doing).

After getting back to the hotel and cleaning up I attended a talk, at the hotel, given by Daniel de Visé, a Pulitzer price winning Washington Post writer who just wrote a book about Greg LeMond "The Comeback Kid". He talked for 40 minutes about bike racing and Greg LeMond. It was a very interesting talk. Although I do not follow bike racing the story of Greg LeMond is an amazing story so I will probably get the book soon.

Saturday night was the usual dinner with at a restaurant with the whole group. We sat next to a tandem couple who had done some interesting trips. The one from Pittsburgh to DC sounded like a must do so now it is on my list of possible bike trips.

Sunday turned colder and was 40 degrees and windy when I stepped out the door before breakfast. Not ideal riding weather but Jack and I still planed to do a shorter flatter ride since we were here.

We did the Horse Farm loop. Its a 35 mile loop around the horse farms in the area and relatively flat. It would have been a perfect way to end the trip if it wasn't for the WIND!!.  The cold wasn't bad once we got started but between mile 8-17 there were a lot of times that we were straight into a 25mph+ wind. During this stretch I sometimes was having a hard time maintain 10mph on a flat road and I'm thinking to myself am I really enjoying this or do I just enjoy the suffering.

Once we turned around at mile 20 it became a lot easier and I started enjoying the ride. I would like to do this Horse Farm ride again in better conditions as it would be a lot more fun. Although I was sore from three days of riding I actually felt OK by the end. Its rare I ride two days in the row so I'm always concerned about these multi-day trips but what I have learned that is as long as I follow a certain recovery routine I can usually ride the next day and only be sore for the first few miles.

Despite the cold windy condition on the last day I still enjoyed this trip and will do it again. Linda and the Philly bike club really know how to create the perfect environment for a group of bikers to relax and enjoy themselves. This trip always makes me happy and it is a place I know I will return to again. Hopefully next time I can get a few more of the insane posse to join me.

Following Their Lead

I lead four rides in September and two of those were actually official PFW rides. I don't mine leading but I thought I would give some others a chance to lead. The first weekend in Oct I went on Laura's ride from Twin Pines. We did this route to Sergeantsville Even though there was no rain in the forecast it ended up misting and semi raining during most of the ride.

During the ride Jack was telling me of some roads he wanted to do in the area and I told him I was taking the day off on Wednesday so let's do a ride. I asked him to just send me the roads he want to do and I would put a route together. After a few email exchanges Jack decided he would lead the ride. We started in the middle of Ewing and did some urban riding as Jack took us through the neighborhood he grew up in while telling us stories of him riding his Stingray bike. Since this was the first time any of us (Me, Jim, and Ricky) could remember Jack leading we gave him a lot of shit about the route and leading in general because that is what we do. (The hard part of leading is not creating the route but dealing with all the jerks on the ride.) During the ride we decided we were Jack's Jerks since every ride leader needs a name for the people that follow them.

We eventually ended up on the normal roads out of Pennington and made our way over Goat Hill into Lambertville. Here is the route we did. Instead of stopping in Lambertville we stopped in Ringos at the Carousel Deli. The bathroom is a little dirty but they have a good outdoor porch to sit on and decent food and drinks so its not a bad place to stop in this area.

We had 30 miles by the time we got to the stop. Jack didn't really have a clue how much longer the ride would be but guessed in might be close to 60. Jack didn't really plan the route he was old school and just had a piece of paper with hand written direction on it.

From the stop we ended up heading over the Sourlands and back towards Pennington. Jack tried to take a slightly different way back to Pennington that involved two perilous crossing of Rt 31 but because of a road closed we ended riding on 518 for a while and then going back the normal way.

There was a little more urban riding involved to get back to our starting point in Ewing but nothing dangerous. We ended up with 57 miles and I was a little tired at the end especially since it was 85 and humid. It was a different type of ride and not a bad route. I may follow Jack if he decides to lead again.

This Saturday was a rain out. I was suppose to head down to the shore to meet my wife for lunch but decided to do Jum's ride on Sunday instead. The temperature had taken a nose dive over the last couple of days so when I started from Rocky Hill to get a few more miles it was 45 degrees. As I drove up to Rocky Hill I saw Pete and Andrew riding on Canal Rd so I told them to wait for me and the three of us ended up riding to Blackwell Mills together.

Jim's lead his usual ride at a slow B pace with a stop at the Bagel place on 206. It was a nice relaxing ride although I wished it would have warmed up a little more than it did as I was cold after the stop.

Laura, I and Ricky broke off a the Griggstown causeway and I decided to do Coppermine to get another hill in. Ricky decided not to do the hill and Laura took off at the top to head home and maybe get in a metric. . By the time I got back I ended up with just over 43 miles.

I will be with the Philadelphia bike club next weekend for their trip to to Gettysburg so I may not end up leading any rides this month but that is okay as long as I can follow other people on interesting rides.