The Last of the High Point Rides: Cape May County Weekend

Lake Nummy at Bellplain State Forest 

31 October 2015

We're tired, more tired than we think we should be.  The route was flat. There wasn't a lot of wind.  There were a lot of breaks in those 66 miles.  But we're tired anyway.  I blame it on having to wear leggings this time of year.

I'm sitting on the floor, leaning against my sofa bed, in one of the rooms at Biscayne Suites in Ocean City. Snakehead is my roommate; he has the bedroom, where the wifi connection is stronger, so he can work on a grant application.

Tom and Jim are sharing another room down the hall. Jack H and Dorothy (who did her own ride today), are somewhere else on this floor. Unlike other trips, we're not all hanging out together in somebody's room.  Maybe because we're tired.

Anyway.

Tom met me at my house at 7:30 a.m. I drove, for a change.  We met up with the rest of the crew in Bordentown, and from there we drove to Belleplain State Forest.  On the way down, we passed Mizpah Road, so I can cross another location off the Garden State Stomp list.

We parked next to Lake Nummy (Nummystown is in the Stomp, so close enough).  Tom and I had been here before for an early fall century, years ago, so we knew the terrain and the scenery (flat, monotonous).

I told Jim, "You'll get bored before you get tired."

Lake Nummy picnic area:

Goose prints:

Lake Nummy:

Roots and moss:

Kermit's Halloween costume:

The sky above the picnic area:

Plastic flamingos, because whatever:

An osprey nest near the Maurice River:

The mouth of the Maurice River, with the Salem nuclear power power plant in the distance:

At Ed's request, I'd given him some of the Halloween candy meant for our neighborhood kids.  We figured we could hand it out to everyone we'd see.  At the mouth of the river, we met a kid who was admiring our bikes.  After Ed gave him gobs of candy, I asked if he had a bike.  He said he did, a couple of BMX bikes. When I asked if he could do tricks, he said he could: wheelies, spins, and back flips.  So cool. I'm terrible at guessing ages, but I'll guess that this kid might have been 8 or 9.

This isn't the kid.  This is a juvenile gull:

This is a lighthouse:

At 20 miles we had a break at a Wawa, where I finally had a chance to take pictures of Ed's bike.  He's trying to come up with a name for it.  I'm insisting that its name is Love Child.  I mean, seriously, I'm sitting here on the floor, looking into Ed's bedroom, and he's got the thing next to his bed.  He wants to give his daughters a chance to name the bike. For now, it's Love Child.

A handful of dirt bikers showed up at the same time we did, so we compared adventures and temperature limits. There was an 80-mile event going on, which explained why we were seeing so many dirt bikers on the road and in the woods. Of course, we forgot to hand candy to these guys.

Ross texted me while we were there: "Bike is ready." He was talking about the new Miss Piggy, who, by default, will still be wearing the old Miss Piggy's tires until the new ones arrive, but would have new bar tape to compliment her new colors.  No, I'm not going to tell you yet.

"Wow!  I'm in Cape May for the weekend.  Can you send a picture so I can show the guys?"

If the ride we have planned for tomorrow finishes early enough that I can get home in time, I could go pick it up...

Meanwhile, there was still the matter of getting to the Cape May County high point.  Before that, we encountered a dirt road, because of course we did.

Here, Tom and Jim consult their various GPS devices to find a way out:

This is quintessential Pinelands:

The way around was on Railroad.  True to its name, we crossed tracks and came upon a line of old diesel engines that two men were restoring.  We chatted with one of them while the other continued working. When the engines run again, the're sent back to active duty.  The cabooses, he told us, are used for parts. Nobody runs cabooses anymore.

We forgot to give our Halloween candy to these men too.

Buckshutem!  We rode through Buckshutem, which means I can cross another one off the Garden State Stomp list.

Buckshutem is near the Maurice River. We'd been over the same bridge in the morning, but now the light was better:

We went back to the same Wawa for our second break. By now, Ross had sent pictures, which I'm not going to show you yet. I did show Jim and Tom.  "Eh," Tom said. "Mine's prettier."  

"Hey," I reminded him, "Beggars can't be choosers.  Besides, this was free."   I relayed Tom's response to Ross, who wrote back, "Beauty is in the eye of the beholder." Or at least in the eye of the new owner.

We drove to the hotel in Ocean City, cleaned up, walked to an Italian restaurant for dinner. While we were waiting for our food, I got a text from Jack.  At 7:15, he'd already run out of candy and was wondering if we had anything more.  Whoops.  I wondered how much longer he'd have had if I hadn't taken some with us today.  We agreed it was time to turn off the porch light. Some years we get lots of kids; some years we don't.  Most years we're not even home until most of the youngest ones have come and gone.

After dinner we headed to the boardwalk.

After hours off-season might be the best time to be out here:

Every shop we'd passed so far was closed but one: a salt water taffy and fudge shop, the kind I was never allowed into as a kid. So, of course, we all went in and bought taffy, even though we all know it tastes like plastic.

Even on foot, we can't get away from this:

 This is the best I could do without a tripod nor a lot of time:

A sample of the boardwalk's tacky:

The best bike of the day:

Ed is laying out his clothes for tomorrow: full Kim's Bikes kit, with matching socks, and a jacket that matches Love Child.  He's making the rest of us look bad.

We'll have to remember to hand out our candy tomorrow.

Meanwhile, I'm going to sign off.  It's a rare event for me to get a blog post up before Jim.