Cold Front Metric

 

Hill Road

27 March 2022

As Saturday got closer, the forecast got worse. We were facing a chance of showers all morning, with a stiff west wind and a higher probability of rain as the day wore on. 

He started from Mercer County Park, which meant that I might be able to get a metric out of the deal if I rode over from home. 

Everywhere were hints of spring. There was a red tint to the tips of the roadside trees. Cherry and magnolia blossoms were out. The forsythia were in peak bloom. There were daffodils lining front yards. And here I was in long pants, long sleeves, a jacket, heavy gloves, shoe covers, and toe warmers.

There were nine of us on the ride. We went south to New Egypt, mostly in a crosswind, and stayed dry. The trouble started on the way back.

From the southern end of Hill Road, we could see the cold front moving in from the southwest.

We were almost back to the park when we started to ride over wet pavement. We got rained on a little too, a weak effort by the clouds. 

If I take the long way in from home, it's almost 8 miles to the East Picnic Area of MCP. When we got back there, I had almost 50 miles. I'd have to find five more to get a metric, and stay dry if I could. 

The sun was out as we stood there, having our typical post-ride gab-fest. I tried to get Jack H to join me, but he doesn't have enough screws loose yet for that.

So I rode home in the wind by myself, taking the long way around on Old Trenton Road instead of going through the park. I kept an eye on the clouds. A mile from home, I turned north for a three-mile detour. That's when the wind kicked up and the rain started to come down in a more deliberate fashion.

I reached my neighborhood with close to 61 miles. In the wind and sometimes rain, I went in circles around the development until my computer registered 63 miles. If my neighbors think I'm crazy they're not wrong.

Jim's C+ Sunday ride was the perfect recovery ride. Most of his aggressive regulars weren't there; instead, I got to talk to some people I hadn't seen in a while. 

Wind is a great equalizer. We had a lot of equalizer. The route Jim had picked was, coincidentally, into the wind most of the way out.

The rest stop was at the Blawenburg Bistro, one of Jim's favorite places. As we were about to turn in, Pete called out, "I hear they're closing!" Jim's heart stopped for the three seconds it took for Pete to burst out laughing. The bistro survived the pandemic. My uneducated guess is that, if they survived the pandemic, they'll be okay.

The wind blew us back to the Claremont Elementary School.

Roebling, Hopewell

 

Mountain Road at Rocktown Road

20 March 2022

I: Roebling

I never got around to blogging about Tom's Roebling Ride back on March 5. We started from Bordentown and he had a decent-sized group, which is to say, something more than 5 and less than 10. 

We had some wind to contend with. It wasn't warm, but it wasn't intolerably cold either. The terrain was mostly flat. We hugged the Delaware River, which means that there were some rollers where the tributary streams cut in. 

Somewhere near Roebling, we passed a rail yard. I pulled over to get pictures of some magnificent graffiti:

If you don't think graffiti is art, you are wrong.

Something seemed hazily familiar about this marina in Burlington City. 

Turns out the southern stretch of the towpath from Trenton to Burlington cuts through here, and we'd passed through on the Longest Short Ride Ever.

This oversized eagle is not blurry:

To the south was the Burlington-Bristol Bridge:

Racer Pete had himself a relaxing moment by the water's edge:

Tom's plan was to stop at the Jacksonville deli, but it was closed. We ended up stopping in Columbus instead. Somehow, Tom managed to keep us away from closed roads. We did have to jiggle our way across a milled surface on White Pine. That stretch used to be a dirt road. If the plan is to return it to dirt, they're well on their way. 

II: Hopewell

I've been feeling a bit grumpy about leading group rides lately. Do I have enough of a following to sustain my irregular leading schedule? If it rains on a Saturday and I decide to lead on a Sunday, will I get enough people now that Jim is pulling in several dozen? Am I slowing down too much to ride with people I like? Did my indoor winter training do me any good? Did it wreck me?

Having seen rain forecasted for Saturday all week long, I didn't list a ride. Instead, I slept in, and awoke to sunny skies. I figured I ought to go out on my own, and was puttering about the house in my bike clothes, trying to figure out where to go, and if I even wanted to, when a text came through from glassblowing class. I was the only one around who could fill in for an absent classmate. Out of the bike clothes into the glassblowing clothes. Problem solved.

I had a ride listed for Sunday anyway, once again impinging on Plain Jim's territory. It would be Pete's first group ride with his new knee. I sifted through my routes and found one that meandered about the Sourland Mountain, never getting too far from home. It would be perfect for him if he needed to bail.

The route was from March 2016. I didn't really look at it until late Saturday night, at which point I realized why I hadn't repeated this in six years. It was an asshole route, throwing hills in willy-nilly, before and after the break, including Province Line northbound all the way up the mountain ten miles in, and Van Dyke right after the rest stop.

There were seven of us, which is a perfect number of riders: it's an easy number to keep track of without having to take my eyes off the road.

Pete, Rickety, and Blob were there, and Heddy too. There was a new guy, Mike, and a fellow named Tony who, apparently, we'd met when we'd stopped in Sergeantsville on one of my rides a few weeks ago. 

Tony is from Bucks County, so I figured he'd have no trouble climbing. He was riding a 1980s-vintage steel bike that would have set Jim to drooling. 

It was an American-Made Nobilette from 1982. It had bar-end shifters and a microscopic cassette.

(I can hear Jim exclaiming, "Oh, my stars!" as he sees these photos.)

Like me, Tony is a big fan of steel bikes. He has 8, he told me. "I had a new Pinarello," he said, but he hated it. "I guess I'm used to riding junk." I asked him which of his steel bikes was the most precious to him. "This one," he said. Despite having no teeth on his rear cog, he was motoring up the hills mightily. It wasn't until the ride was over that I found out he had a triple in front to help him along.

Anyway, Pete and his new knee rode with us for the first ten miles, which included the Province Line Road climb. 

He was the first one up.

Pete split off where Hopewell-Amwell Road comes in. We continued up the short, sharp shocks on Lindbergh and made our way west across Ridge Road. Then we plummeted down Rileyville into Hopewell. We stopped at Boro Bean. I loaded my pockets with muffins.

On our way up Van Dyke, Heddy said she wanted to steal them. "You'll hafta catch me first," I said. Which she could do with one leg tied behind her back. 

After that, we were on roads I usually take when we're making our way to Lambertville or Sergeantsville, including Mountain Road and Rocktown.

The sky was looking dramatic at that corner, so I stopped for pictures.

We stayed on Rocktown across Route 31, and then turned south on Harbourton-Mount Airy to climb Dinosaur Hill.

The wind, which was forecast to pick up, picked up. It was out of the west, so we got a bit of a push on our way back to Pennington.

I felt much better about the whole biking thing after the ride was over. I managed to keep up with everyone, my back didn't hurt, and we climbed some big hills for March.