Tyler Park Loop

 Because Laura was off on a boondoggle in Bar Harbor for some "job related training" I ended up leading her Sunday Ride. I am mostly over my bronchitis so I decided to head to the hills and do something a little different. Since it is Sunday and the traffic would be a little lighter I decided to head to Tyler State Park from the Yardley Park and Ride. I was joined by Jim, Jack and Blake and did this route.

I have been to Tyler State Park in the winter but don't go there in the summer so I wanted to see it when it wasn't cold and icy. The ride to the park was a slow up hill grind. We entered the park through a residential neighborhood and then did a quick loop around the park with a stop at the boat house by the dam.

We then headed to the Schofield Covered Bridge and left the park along the gravel road. Except for the climb up the gravel steps the gravel was rideable

 

After we left the park we headed towards New Hope for a rest stop via the Van Sant covered bridge. We took a slight detour after the bridge to see Jacks old house.

After the break at Wawa we headed up slogged up hill then along ridge before finishing on river road. At the end we had 46 miles and about 3000 ft of climbing. I'm not sure if I would do the loop again to Tyler State Park but if felt good to be able to be back on the bike again.

Lazy Weekend

It was the perfect weekend to ride a bike yet I was stuck just looking out the window. My bronchitis is getting better but I am still coughing enough to know that any aerobic activity will set me back although it was really hard not to go out and ride.

So instead of another story of my bike adventures I wanted to post a review of the new pump I got. I currently have a Topeka Road Morph

Its a good pump and has the features of a floor pump, including a gauge. The pump is heavier than most bike pumps but is very reliable I and can get any tire up to 100 psi with out too much effort. Since I lead rides I use this pump a lot to pump up tires of anybody that gets a flat. After 3 years the pump was wearing out and I needed a replacement so I wanted to see if there was anything better out there.

I looked at three other pumps. This first one I looked at was Pro Bike Tool pump.

What I liked about this pump was that is was small and light but still had a hose to connect to the value and a gauge that was east to read. I decided not to get this one because although most people thought it was a quality pump most agreed that it was hard to get the pressure much over 80 psi. If this was a pump I used to get me home after a flat that would be fine but since I have to deal with flats on a regular basis with the people that ride with me I wanted something a little easier to pump and could get me to a higher pressure.

The second pump I looked at was the Lezyne Micro Drive HP Pump.

This thing is not only a compact floor pump it is also a work of art. Joe had this on his new new Soma Sans Marcos bike a few weeks ago and it looked great on his bike. This is a great pump but it is about twice as heavy as the current Road Morph I carry. I don't really care about the weight but it is also very bulky so it might be hard to find a good mounting place on my bikes for it. Although this would look great on my feather I went for something easier to carry.

The pump I chose was the Topeka Turbo Morph. This is essentially the same as the Road Morph but will a better gauge.

It also pumps at a higher volume. As you can see from the comparison below it is almost the same as the old Road Morph. There are some minor changes in the design. The head seems better built and the hose doesn't extend any more. I am hoping the internal parts a a little better to so that maybe this pump will last a little longer.

For me the Morph pumps are a good trade off between weight, size and function. When I or anybody I ride with have a flat I want a pump that I is almost as good as a floor pump so I know I have enough pressure in the tire and don't have to worry about pinch flats. 

Close Encounters on the way to Sandy Hook

There are a number of rides that I have done many times and Sandy Hook is one of them that I do at least once a year. The route that I use hasn't changed that much over the years but because of my high point exploring last year I found a couple of new roads and a way to get to Sandy Hook with a slightly more northern route. Here is a link the to route we actually took.

This route offers a little less traffic on the way to Sandy Hook and allowed me to check out the old Bell Labs office complex. This lab was once one of the leading research facilities in the world and was birthplace of radio astronomy, the transistor and the cellphone. Now it is an abandon campus that is going to turned into an office park and housing development.

One of the most unusual features of the property is the water tower that looks like a UFO. (BTW don't google Bell Labs and UFOs unless you want to see some posts from some dumb witted people who believe Bell Labs helped create today's technology by reverse engineering the wreckage from the Roswell UFO crash)

Contrary to the insane beliefs of the people who think the X-Files was a documentary series, the water tower is not from another planet. It is just an ugly water tower in the shape of a transistor. Now I am an electrical engineer and worked with a lot of transistors early in my career and that water tower doesn't look like any transistor I used.

So I guess it must be an artistic impression of one. 

Joining me on this ride was Laura, Jim, Ed and Jack. This was Jack's first real road ride since his fall and Ed had just got back from a trip down under. We made our usual stop at the Quick Check on Rt 36 before heading down to the beach.

The wind had started out brisk and was a lot stronger by the time we got to the beach. So much so that we were sand blasted a few times. It was blowing at least 20 mph with stronger gusts.  Instead of our normal ride out to the end of Sandy Hook and back we decided to just go to the first beach and turn around there because of the wind.

We went back home from Sandy Hook the normal way with a quick stop in Little Silver before the push home. Although we had head winds most of the way home there was enough cover to make it bearable although it wore me out a little. About 3 miles from the end I started cramping up but made it to the end with out having to stop to stretch it out.

We did have more traffic than normal on the way home because it was a warm sunny day and it is beach season. I will go back to Sandy Hook again and now have two ways to get there but probably would try to go there only in off season to avoid some traffic.

Although I quickly recovered from my cramps I felt pretty bad Sunday night and developed a dry cough. It turns out I caught a case of bronchitis so it will probably be a week or more before I can get back on the bike.

The Holy Kickstand

As promised before this weeks ride I performed a blessing of the bikes to try and get rid of the bad juju I have had on the past couple of rides. I brought with me the "Holy Kickstand". This is a non-denominational religious artifact. A normal kickstand helps prop the bike up and keep it from falling down. The Holy Kickstand is the spiritual version of a kickstand and helps keep the rider and bike upright at all times during the ride.

Using the Holy Kickstand I performed a traditional  Hawaiian hoʻoponopono blessing. Ho'oponopono is a mental cleansing where a person or group of people admit their problems and ask for forgiveness to appease the Ke Akua (creator). I then used the Brita water of purity to bless each bike similar to the asperges ritual performed by catholic priests.

Although I am not a trained kahuna I must have done a good enough job because the ride was trouble free. Laura, Jim, Bob and I did a ride around Round Valley. As it is most of the times we visit the Round Valley reservoir the weather was hot and overcast.

Unlike last week this ride had no drama just some good riding and interesting conversations. We ended up doing the reverse version of this route.  At the top of Lindbergh Laura peeled off as she had ridden in. Jim, Bob and I back to Griggstown. It was nice to finally have a ride with out any problems. Although I can't fully attribute the clean ride with blessing ceremony it didn't hurt so this blessing may become part of my normal pre-ride ritual. 

Evil Spirits

Before my next ride I plan to perform a blessing of the bikes ceremony. I'm not superstitious but after two major mechanical failures on rides I lead, this month, I want to do everything I can to get rid of the evil spirits.  

Today I lead a ride out of Frenchtown to Washington Township NJ. There are actually five townships named Washington in NJ. The one I went to was the one in Warren county. This was instead of going to Bloomsbury which no longer has a good rest stop. This gave me a chance to explore new roads.We did this route.

After doing flatter rides the last couple of weeks I wanted to do something hilly. Like my last group ride I only had a couple other people join me Laura, and Blake. For once there was no chance of rain and the temperature was warm enough to not have to think about needing a jacket or tights. In fact it felt more like a hot August morning than a late spring weekend.

As we headed up hill from Frenchtown we felt the fact that we weren't acclimated to hot weather yet. Although we had climbed up from the Frenchtown and across Rt 78 to Spruce run we really hadn't had any steep climbs yet until we went up Henderson Hill. It was a short climb but at just over 10% it hurt a little. Once at the top we road along some easier rolling hills on some new roads that were nice enough to explore again.

By the Musconetcong river there was a steep downhill. I was the first one down followed by Blake who took it slower. Then we waited for Laura who had stopped because she thought she had a flat. When she came down the hill she was walking next to the bike. She didn't have a flat but had somehow realized that the tire was coming off the rim. I suspect that hard breaking on a hot rim caused the tire to slip or flex enough to unseat the bead. When she took her front tire off it was easy to see the bulge where the tire was not seated correctly. Luckily the tube had not popped out the side.

We deflated the tire which reset it on the rim then pumped back up and continued on. A few miles later Laura was dragging behind and then stopped because the front tire had gone flat. I guess the tube got pinched when the tire got unseated. A quick change later we were on our way the rest stop.

I had decided to go to Washington township because it had a Duncan Donuts and a Deli/Bagel shop. We stopped at the Bagel shop to see if this could be good stop or not. However a block before we got to Bagel shop Blake stopped because he dropped a chain. Even after he put the chain back on the front derailleur was making a lot of noise. When we got to the Bagel shop we took a closer look at the the front derailleur which was behind the big ring and not at the correct angle. We tried to adjust it but could not get it aligned enough to get it to work. That meant we had to leave Blake at the Bagel shop and come back for him. There was a bike shop directly across the street but is was closed. Not closed for the weekend but out of business closed.

After getting something to eat and drink at the Bagel shop (which was average at best so we probably won't come back here) Laura and I set off back to Frenchtown. The way I design the ride was that most of the climbing was before the stop. The only real climb was getting out of Bloomsbury on Tunnel Rd. This is a two mile climb of about 600 feet. It a constant grade so although it is long its just a matter of finding a gear and grinding away. I was really feeling the heat at this point as it was over 90 degrees.

At the top of the hill we meet people from Michael H's ride and gave Blake a call. He was able to get in touch with his wife which meant that we didn't have to go back to get him.

The best part of climbing Tunnel Rd is that you have a three mile down hill on Sweet Hollow. Then mostly more downhill to get back to Milford before a straight run to Frenchtown. We got back to Frenchtown around 1:40 pm and spent some time talking to Michael and a few others before heading home.

I don't like rides when we all the people and bikes I start with don't come back in good shape. Luckily this time is was just a mechanical failure with no injuries. Logically I know these failures are caused by random chance but it still feels like I have some bad mojo going on.

Mansfield Metric

For the third week in a row I was on a ride where we were riding the opposite way of a large group ride. This week it was the Urban Promise Ride out of Tabernacle. We had started in Mansfield and were riding to Nixon's Deli and back on a metric ride in the pinelands.

For once it was a sunny date and warm in the low 70s. I expected a good turn out but the only people to show up were Joe and Jim. We did this route which is one of my better routes from the Road Biking NJ book.

For about 70% of the ride we were on the same roads as the Urban Promise Ride so we saw a constant stream of riders. The ride was one of the best marked ride I have ever seen. Not only was there arrows on the roads but signs in the grass announcing busy intersections and rough spots in the road. They also painted the large cracks and pot holes to make them easier to see.

This ride was different than my last ride in the pinelands. There were no bridges out, no riding on dirt and no bike problems of any kind. The only thing of note was the level of pollen. At the second rest stop we all noticed coating of yellow pollen on our body, bike and cloths.

All in all it was a good day on the bike.

Here Comes the Sun

The last 8 days have been bleak and blurry because of the lack of sunshine. It has been a very cold spring where it has been near or close to raining almost every day. I had to move/cancel 2 of my first 3 rides.

Today however we had glorious warm sunshine and I was off from work. I took today off in hopes of seeing the transit of Mercury. This is when Mercury goes across the sun when viewed from earth. This happens about once every 12 years although the time between transits varies a lot. You can see more details on Mercury transits here. Having a transit in May is rare and this particular transit was a very long one over 7 hours so there were a lot of opportunities to see it. It started at 7:12 am so I had to go out to a field to see it since the trees by my house block the sun until around 9am. I ended up on Herbert Road and with clear skies I was able to see the moment Mercury touched the edge of the sun which is the coolest part. When Mercury crosses into the sun it produces a teardrop affect which I saw clearly. I also got a picture of it although it is very bury because I don't have the equipment to get a clear picture at that magnification, trust me it was a lot clearer in though the eyepiece.

 Here is what is looked like in a good telescope in an observatory in the UK.

I am casually into astronomy so I don't have a lot invested. I bought a small telescope about 15 years ago and it allows me to see some of the easy things in the day and night sky.

I stayed at Herbert Rd for about an hour taking pictures. I took pictures with my IPod Touch using a special holder that I built that allows me to align it and attach it to the eyepiece of the telescope. This worked really well.

I was back home by 9 am and set up the telescope in the backyard to watch the rest of the transit. I went out every half hour to take a few pictures. You can see my full set of pictures here.

My clearest picture was near mid transit which is the one at the top.Unfortunately the clouds returned around noon so I wasn't able to see the end of the transit but it was nice to to be able to see most if it.  

Here is the last picture I got around 12:30 pm. You can see Mercury at the bottom right half of the sun. Its about 3/4 of the way across. The black spot in the middle is a sunspot.

 

Here is a close up clearly showing Mercury. Its easy to tell it apart from sunspots since it is perfectly round. 

For people who don't care about astronomy staring at a dot on the sun may not sound interesting but it was a fun day for me.