#34

Round Valley Reservoir

15 June 2013

"It's hard to write about biking and make it interesting." 

Cheryl, Erin, and Lori agree.  We're taking turns using the porta-potty by the canal on the Griggstown Causeway.  "I try to tell a story."

I'd come up Canal Road a little ways earlier, but not this far, in my attempt to get at least 15 miles from home under me before the planned 70-miler began.  If I can keep my shit together I'm aiming for my first hilly century, the first and last pieces on my own terms, at my own speed.  Hilly sort of, I guess.  Most of the climbing will be in the first half.  Maybe it doesn't count for real randonneurs, but I have to start somewhere.

The Griggstown Causeway is closed.

But, as with any ride in which Tom and I are present, something as small as a "road closed" sign doesn't stop us.

"It's good to know you're all flexible," I remark after all eleven of us have passed through.

The first big hill is Dutchtown-Zion.  "I hate you," Tom says.  I opt for Pin Oak at the top.  Today's not the day to navigate a dirt road.

The second big hill is Stanton Mountain Road, because I want to see where the gas pipeline went in.  It's been something close to half a dozen years since I last took a group up this road.  It's not as bad as it was; we can see where it's been patched for yards at a time.  It's still bad, though, bad enough for me to tell Tom, "Jim would not like this road," and for Tom to say at the bottom, "Scratch that one off the list."

Three are stuck at the top, three climb back to find out what's wrong, a driver stops to tell us there are two flat tires up there, and I pull out my camera.

This is how I see it through my polarized sunglasses, more or less:

My camera can't see the contrast in the cloud:

We're stopped again at the curve at the top of the reservoir.  Erin calls.  They've lost Glenn.  Lori is on the phone with him.  He turned into the main entrance.  We wait.

 The Cokesbury Ridge to the north

Ed, why do I have my hand up? I'm not waving.

Tom is antsy to get home.  So is Cheryl.  There's nothing I can do about this but remind people that on a long ride with a group this big, delays are bound to happen.

Glenn pulls up.  "I didn't see anyone," he explains.  "You said you were going to Round Valley, so I turned in.  Sorry." 

"I always wait at turns," I reassure him.

Maybe I'm not going to take pictures. I wanted to.

Eddie "The Shoulder" pulls off before the descent.  He has his camera out.  I pull off too.  "There's a hole in the fence here," he says:

 

Ed's view of the northern berm

My view of the northern berm

 

 This one came out OK, lens up against the fence

I look down the hill and see nobody.  I hope they turned on Old Mountain like I told them to.  "Next right," I tell Ed as he pulls away.

He's pedaling hard, building up speed for the descent.  "RIGHT TURN!  ED!  RIGHT TURN!"  He blows past it.

I turn.  I see nobody.

Fine.  They all wanna go ahead and ditch the ride leader, fine.  I'll do this damn thing by myself.  

I think I see a couple of bikes at the top of the rise.  I'm gonna regret pedaling hard to catch them.  It's Ron and Lori.  The rest have gone ahead.

I don't know what they did, but we turn on Mountain Road because I like going over the railroad bridge.

Everybody is at Jerry's Diner already, even Ed.  "That wasn't cool," I grumble, "ditching the ride leader."

Half the group wants to stop to eat.  Tom takes the other half with him.  I'm left with Ron (who graciously buys my coffee, which I pour into my water bottle), Not the Uusal Jim, and three Anchor House riders.  "I'm outclassed,"  I tell the Anchor Housers, Glenn, Erin, and Lori, as they hurry through their sandwiches.

"I can tell this part is going to go much faster."  Glenn and I are up front, chugging along at a decent pace, on that low-grade downhill that is every route out of Whitehouse Station towards home.

We're headed towards Raritan on Old York Road.  The river, brown like milk chocolate, is on our right.  If I've been here before it's been so long as not to count anymore.

We cross over in the center of Raritan, on the new bridge, and double back on River Road, the Raritan to our right again.  Beekman is more rural than I remember it being; it's been that long.  New Amwell and Auten have wide bike lanes.  Were they there before?

We put up with the traffic across 206, then follow the brown canal all the way back to Rocky Hill.  They've got 70 miles; I'm up to 86 and change.  I can make 13-ish from here to home one way or another.

I sit at a picnic table, eat a Mojo bar, and drink my coffee-water.  Al pulls in.  We're confused.  "I had to make it 4000 feet of climbing," he explains, "So I went up 518 and down Old Georgetown."  

I feel less crazy all of a sudden.

I need to take a picture of Glenn and his VW Microbus, '70s vintage.  One more year and it'll have antique plates.  "It has 250,000 miles," he says.  He's considering a party, with motor oil in wine glasses.  "I don't drive it much," he says, "Less than 2000 miles a year."  He does the math to figure out how much longer he'd have to live to get the car to 500,000 miles.  "150 years," he says. 

Al says I'm like Mary, turning rides into centuries.  Uh-oh.

It takes some noodling about -- turning down Prospect, pedaling up to the end of the seminary entrance, taking the back roads south of Sprindale and making a wrong turn, making one extra loop down a side street in my neighborhood -- but I get the miles I was aiming for.

I have to take a picture and email it to Plain Jim.  The subject line is, "Because if I don't brag it doesn't count."

Boo-yah!  Miss Piggy does her first century.

After I wash away the grime (always a good tan until it runs down the drain), do some PT, and stuff some food in my face, I play with Gimp while I wait for Eddie The Shoulder to send his photos.

 I didn't feel like this today, honest.  I had a lot of coffee.

Sean and Dale will be here any minute.  We're going to eat spaghetti in Pennington.