View from the top of Bridgeton Hill Road
16 August 2015
I ceded the routing to Tom, who wants to get us ready for the final NJ hilly high points next weekend. So far, only Tom, Snakehead and his daughter, and I have made the commitment, but that didn't stop five other people (Jack H, Marc, Mark, Jim, and Blake) from showing up in Lambertville this morning. Tom's route included Tumble Falls, which is on my Fuck-It List.
I felt fine on the NJ side as we got into the hills to avoid Route 29 between Lambertville and Stockton. The road is chewed up around there, and the shoulders, are almost nonexistent. We came back down above Stockton, where the shoulders are wide enough for a car.
At Bulls Island we crossed into Pennsylvania.
I have, like, a bazillion pictures of the Delaware River. That didn't stop me from making it a bazillion and two.
A bazillion and three.
You never photograph the same river twice, after all.
After a few more flat miles, the real hills began, and so did the aches all over my body. I said to Jim, "This is one of those rides where everything hurts." I'd have been okay with that if the nausea hadn't come along somewhere around mile 24. "I'm not feeling well," I told Marc, as I slowed far off the back of the group.
I knew that the second half of the ride would be on the NJ side, and that, if I really needed to, I could return to Lambertville via the flat Route 29. But I really wanted to climb Tumble Falls, a road that, like the proverbial fish, gets longer with every retelling. I needed to see it for myself. So I shifted into my granny gear, picked a big rear cog, and took the next series of hills without going anaerobic.
I was well off the back at this point, but the guys waited for me. I told them they could go ahead, but they didn't. "We're at the top anyway," Tom said. And, Jim added, waiting for me would make them feel chivalrous. I was feeling too barfy to blow a raspberry at that one.
"A mocha smoothie is in my future," I said to Blake as we pushed off again.
On a quiet, wooded road, Marc said to Jim, "Did you know your rear wheel is wobbling?" He'd broken a spoke, and within minutes had the wheel trued enough to continue on to the rest stop.
We were headed to Homestead General Store. At the top of Bridgeton Hill Road, I stopped for pictures. A white pickup truck rolled coal at a couple of the Slugs. I'm sure his penis grew bigger when he did that.
Marc
Jim
house
At the store, Jim made some more adjustments, and a work of art. Still, to err on the side of safety, he told us he'd continue along Route 29 when the rest of us would turn onto Tumble Falls.
art
I went into the store and asked for a mocha smoothie. I watched as they used coffee ice cubes and java ice cream. When I brought it outside, Blake said, "That'll either help you or hurt you."
"We'll find out," I said. "Sugar, fat, and caffeine." Fast burn, slow burn, and, um, let's go with analgesic. The guys allowed me extra time to recover, too.
At the base of the Milford Bridge, as I put on my cleat covers (one must walk across all Delaware River bridges north of Trenton), Tom chided, "Always waiting for Laura."
"Hey," I said. "It's my ride and I'll barf if I want to." He couldn't argue with that. I was still feeling shaky as we began to hammer down Route 29, but each mile felt better than the one before. I even got close enough to Jim's rear wheel to notice that he'd trued it so well that I couldn't even tell he'd broken a spoke.
As we approached Tumble Falls, I was almost feeling okay again. I dropped into the middle ring as we turned, and then the granny as we hit the hill.
The first quarter mile of Tumble Falls felt steepest. I kept shifting down until I'd bottomed out. Tom bottomed out, too. Still, I was keeping a good cadence. "Think of Virginia," I said to Tom. Our climb up Whitetop Mountain was much longer than this. I passed one person and then another, and even shifted up a gear or two. I wasn't last.
The road levels off halfway through. I found the middle ring again and caught up to Blake. "I guess you're feeling better," he said.
"All hail Homestead General Store!"
After that, it was just back to achy all over, which I put up with, because we were almost home.
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