Lunar Eclipse

This past Thursday there was a partial lunar eclipse which means the shadow of the earth would cover part of the moon. However at the peak of the eclipse the shadow would cover 97% of the moon so it would be close to a total eclipse. Clouds and rain were in the forecast and it was cloudy for the beginning of the eclipse but it cleared up by 4am when it was peak and I was able to see the last part of it. 

Unlike a solar eclipse the moon doesn't go completely dark during a lunar eclipse but turns red. This is because the light from the sun get refracted by the earths atmosphere and lights up the moon. The color the moon turns depends on the clouds, dust and other particles in the atmosphere. Its different each time.

As the shadow recedes from the moon the color changes from red back to the normal gray. You can see the progression from the composite picture at the top of the post. I took those 7 close up pictures of the moon over the course of about 2 hours. 

Here is what it looked like out my front porch at 4am.

Luckily I was able to view the eclipse from my front yard. That let me go back inside and warm up between shots as it was cold and windy. Here is composite view up my street showing the approximate position of the moon over the two hours.

I'm getting a little better using GIMP to combine the close up moonshots with a landscape view. There is no way to take a single picture that will have the correct exposure for the landscape and a bright moon so you need take two more pictures and do a little photo editing to show how it looks to the human eye. 

On the evening of the eclipse I got a good shot of the moon rise. It seems our street sort of goes east to west so occasionally there is an opportunity to get a good shot of a sun or moon rise.

 

Lunar eclipses occur a lot more frequently than solar eclipse. The next one is May 15 2022 so expect to see some more picture here if the weather is good.

Constant Improvement

 

I try to do a variety of rides so that I'm not doing the same route over and over again. I try to switch between hilly and flat and don't mind driving a little if it means doing something a little different. I have been riding roads in this state for over 30 years so there are few places at this point I haven't been. Still there are always new was to do a certain set of roads and there are occasionally some new roads or paths to try. 

A couple of weeks ago I lead a ride to Roebling from Bordentown. Joe introduced me to this route many years ago and I have constantly refined it a little to add a few new roads and find ways to avoid some of the busier areas. This year as I was looking at the route I noticed that there was a new bike path added recently that allowed us to get into Roebling without having Cross Rt 130 on a busy road. The path took us to and along the river and was nice smooth path with good views of the river. I didn't stop for any pictures because it was a cold morning just above freezing but it warmed up as we headed along the river and through the different warehouses and industry along the river. 

Our southern most point was by the Burlington Bristol bridge where we stopped for a second to take in the view and get a picture of the eagle there. 

From there we headed out to the more familiar roads of Burlington County to make our way back. It was a cold but good ride and will definitely plan to do this ride again in some warmer weather so I can get some picture of the view along the river. 

In the middle of this week I took a day off to take advantage of the weather and enjoy another ride before the cold weather sets in. I decided to actually take out the mountain bike to check out Allaire State park. This park is only 7 miles away from where I live now and I always wanted to check out the trails. It has a few different types of paths. There is the Capital to Coast trail which is a paved path from Allaire that ends in Manasquan. There are also a few different single track trails of varying difficultly. I decided to try a little of both and first did the Pine Trail. It was a single track trail that was more or less a sandy path through the woods. It twisty and turny and did have some tree routes that you have to deal with but no major log jumping was required. It was a little steeper in spots than I was expecting but I did enjoy the challenge and never felt overwhelmed by the terrain. The path was well marked until it wasn't. There are 3 main courses but there are also a lot of extra trails crossing the main ones so there were a few times where I didn't know which way to go.

It wasn't really a problem as long as you pick a direction you will eventually run into one of the main trails. I ended up doing just over 5 miles of trails which was enough. After that I headed down the Capital to Coast trail to get a few more easy miles and made it to Manasquan and back. I think the Capital to Coast trail will be a good place for a ride during the winter. If it is too cold to be on the road I can head to Allaire and get to Manasqan  and ride along to boardwalk. 

This Saturday I did a solo ride as nobody posted a ride I wanted to do and I wanted to be home early because of some work I needed to do around the house. I also wanted to be home early because of the predicted wind and thunderstorm. I did a route to Clarksburg. I'm still getting use to living 15 east of where I use to live so I'm still experimenting with finding good routes from my house. Although I know most of the roads in this area I'm still finding a few new roads to try out. This week I found a new road that use to be dirt is now paved so I have another road to use when heading to Cassville. 

There were some good fall colors on my way back and I stopped to take a few pictures. The one at the top of the post is the street I live on. I like how all the trees turned at the same time. The weather is getting colder so I my rides will be getting shorter but I will keep looking for new roads and new routes to keep improving my rides.