Rojo's to Rojo's Ride

 Jack H captures the spirit of the ride

21 September 2013

Today's ride is all about coffee.  Readers of this blog might ask, and rightfully so, "How is that different from every other ride?"

Well, first, I haven't had any caffeine before the ride.

Second, it's Cheryl's birthday, so I'm riding the mile from my house to hers with two bags of beans hanging from a Rojo's bag on my left wrist.

Third, we're going to have two rest stops in less than 50 miles.

There are nine of us in a strung-out line on Princeton Pike.  I'm in commuter mode.  Somebody has to shout to slow me down.  I'm not on my way to work with Gonzo; I'm on Miss Piggy, leading what is supposed to be a mellow ride.  Oops.

The Princeton Rojo's opened a few weeks ago.  It's a small space, with only two tables and no bathroom. "We're riding from here to the Lambertville Rojo's," I tell the woman who rings me up.

"How cool!"  she exclaims, and she appears to mean it.

A corner of Palmer Square looks almost European.

Getting out of Princeton and back into our usual territory the most direct way takes us down Rosedale, through ETS, up Carter, and over to Crusher.

Morning haze over the Hopewell Valley

This house is for sale.

We pause here for a diversion into FreeWheeler history.  Bagel Hill Barry is on the ride today.  It's time for me to get the story from the man himself, as we finish climbing Stony Brook Road.  When I ask if the Bagel Hills were, indeed, named after his ritual of feeding his riders, he says, "Yep.  That's me.  But it's not the hills everyone thinks.  It's not the ones in Roosevelt."  The real Bagel Hills are the Sweetmans Lane rollers.  Now that we've cleared that up, we return to the ride.

Getting to and from Princeton eats up too many miles for me to take us on anything other than our usual roads.  Fortunately, we have unusual things to look at, like a freaky four-way, truck style, exiting Route 202 onto Queen Road:

They're attached to each other, a 40-wheel caterpillar.

The rest of the group is waiting for me at Alexauken Creek Road.  "I stopped to get a picture of those trucks."

"We figured you would," Cheryl says.

Alexauken Creek Road remains one of my favorites.  Taken top to bottom, any season, the road is beautiful, with the stream and its forest on the right; and horse pastures, barns, and woods on the left.

Jack H is behind me.  In my mirror I see a stalk of foxtail grass hanging from his mouth.  "That's perfect!"  I tell him.  "It's the true embodiment of today's ride.  I need to get a picture.  It'll be the cover photo for the blog."

Jack laughs, keeping the stalk between his teeth.  "I'd be honored," he says.

David, the owner of Rojo's, is milling about the Lambertville shop when we arrive.  I tell him what we're up to.  He's pleased.  "Are you FreeWheelers?" he asks.  When I tell him we are, he says, "That explains it. You're hard-core."

I'm putting my water bottle back into my bottle cage when he comes out, carrying a big bag of bags of beans and several boxes of filters towards his car.  He stops to admire our line of bikes and asks about my wacky gearing.

Back inside we get chatting about which beans he'll have available when, and what's going into what blend.  After I buy my coffee and a biscotti, I notice the jar of brownie bites.  "Just baked," he says.  They look like tiny muffins.

"Can I trade this biscotti for one of those?"

"Nope," he says, and hands me a brownie bite.

I take it to the low, round, metal table near the front where most of the Slugs are seated.  David wanders past and asks about the unpainted titanium bike outside.  "Mine!"  Jim says with glee, and they get talking.  As he's walking away, I've just tasted the brownie, passing the bottom to Cheryl.  "Tell him these brownie bites are awesome," I call out to Jim.  He calls over to David, who comes back and  lists the ingredients, a long list of addictive substances that one would not put into a brownie.  Like bourbon.

Next to me, John K whispers, "Hash."

Cheryl hears him.  "You've been quiet the whole ride.  Now you're nothing but jokes."

There's a headwind taunting us up Quarry and Rocktown.  We crawl up Dinosaur Hill, cross 518, and go straight to 579.  A few landscaping trucks need to get around us at the corner, so we let them pass.  While we wait I catch a reflection in a window:

We turn up Woosamonsa and get spread out again.  When everyone arrives we're still talking.  Cheryl is telling us a story about a pair of hikers at Glacier National Park, married 8 days.  Seems the wife decided she didn't want to be married and pushed her husband off a cliff.  John suggests that's where Cheryl ought to have taken her ex.  I suggest they call it "Black Widow Trail."

John looks over at me and says, "I heard about it on the web."

"Ouch.  You know, bad jokes have a way of showing up on my blog."

not a black widow web

I shocked my arm on the electrified fence to get this photo.  You're welcome.

A few miles from home, Jack H says he's beat.  I've been able to keep up with him, mostly, today.  It must be the fit.  Then he explains why he's beat:  he gave blood yesterday.

"Now I know how to keep you in check," I tell him.  "You show up for a ride, I show up with a bag.  And a needle."

When we get back to her house, Cheryl has bananas and juice and muffins and two little dogs that need to be walked.

You can get one of these magnets for yourself here.

By the way, Miss Piggy's Guru gets an A+ too.  Last Saturday was just one of those bad days.