Chocolate Bunny Ride

Southbound on Province Line Road

7 April 2012

Dang! Here I thought I was being fast by getting a ride blogged on the same day it happened, with pictures and all. But nooooo. Good ol' Plain Jim beat me to it.

So, yeah, there were sixteen of us to start.  That's about ten more than I'm used to getting.  That we stuck together almost to the end is something short of a miracle.

Joe, Chris, and I rode to the ride start from my house.  We were aiming for 100 km.  Thinking that the bag of chocolate bunnies I was carrying might melt during the ride, I handed them off to Chris.  He was carrying a huge handlebar pack.  I told him he could have all the leftovers.

The traditional route is one that Cheryl and I came up with about a decade ago.  Back then neither of us had climbing gears.  We were still shy about hills.  We didn't have the climbing skills nor the lightweight bikes we have today.  So, the route goes into the Sourlands pretty gently and bypasses them on the way home.  The thing is, despite the route being relatively flat for a Hills Slugs ride, it's not easy.  The second half is slightly uphill almost all the way, and then I go and throw in a couple of real hills five miles from the end.  Today we had a stiff head- and crosswind for most of the trip back.  20-mph gusts didn't help the tired folks any.

The rest stop was at the Bagel Bistro in Hillsborough, on Amwell Road just west of 206.  The roads aren't ideal getting there nor away, but tradition is tradition, and, besides, we can trust a bagel place to be open when we do this ride on Easter Sunday.

The payback for dragging everyone through Hillsborough is that we get to ride on Canal Road from the top almost to the bottom.  Ever since a Spring Fling ride I led along the canal years ago, I've been keeping my eye out for turtles.  There were loads of them that day, sunning themselves on rocks and branches in the water by the edge.  Today I only saw two.  (Back then, we were calling out, "Turtle!" every time we saw one.  The little ones were "turtellini."  Credit goes to the original Jeff Lippincott for that one.)

The day started off chilly.  We had a couple of strip breaks.  One was at the Griggstown Causeway, over the Delaware and Raritan Canal.  I don't know why it's called a causeway.  It's just about two lanes wide, and one could throw a stone from one end to the other.

I wound up with most of my upper body's clothing in my pockets.  While other people stripped, I took a couple of pictures.

The two hills at the end are on Province Line Road.  One is a slow ascent that doesn't look like much.  The second looks worse than it is but it's still work, especially at the end of a long and windy ride.  I've never had much luck being able to capture the grade of a hill.  Today I did a little better.  In this picture, I'm at the top of the first hill, looking towards the second.

Tom took some pictures too. Check his blog to see if he posts any.

The bag of bunnies was perfectly preserved at the end of the ride.  The chocolates weren't even a little bit warm.  Chris showed us why:  Out of his bag, which also contained a sandwich, he pulled an ice pack.