Tom's Heat Wave Raritan Ramble

Neshanic Station Bridge 

30 June 2016

Nine days after its official start, summer made up for its late arrival. Tom didn't want a big crowd nor to get caught in the mid-day, 90-something-degree heat when he invited the usual suspects to an 8:00 a.m. start from the D&R Canal parking lot in Rocky Hill.

Comprising Tom's Insane Bike Posse today were Tom, Jack H, Ricky, Plain Jim, Bob, Pete G, and me.

When I left the house on Miss Piggy at 7:10 a.m. it was only 71 degrees. I'd pumped up my tires the night before. As I made my way up Princeton Pike I noticed that my front tire looked the slightest bit low. I gave it a squeeze at a red light; it felt fine.

It was 77 when I reached Rocky Hill at 7:50 a.m. Pete, Jim, and Bob had also ridden in from home.

"I don't like to tell people what to do," Jack H said, "But."

"There's always a 'but'," Tom said.

Jack continued, "Drink twice as much as you normally would."

Sound advice.

The route Tom chose to get us to and over the Sourland Mountain was, for the most part, shady.

Pete, who leaves for upstate New York tomorrow, begged off early and left us at the top of Hollow Road.

I kept my camera in my pocket until we arrived at Neshanic Station. The best view of the bridge is, I think, from River Road, north of the bridge. We were coming from the south. I took pictures from Elm Street instead.

Most of our climbing was behind us. We were in the rolling hills of the Raritan River valley. After the annoyingly steep but mercifully short hill over the railway was the view I always stop for. I wasn't planning on it this time, but when Tom and I saw the purple flowers we both pulled over.

We stopped at the Wawa on Route 202 and Old York Road. The newer stores no longer have a water option on their soda machines. I made do with ice, not thinking to refill it at the end of our time there so that I could get more water in.

Bob, burdened by family obligations, for which we non-breeders chided him, had to leave us at this point.

"Then there were five," Jim said as we left the parking lot.

Within a few miles my front bottle was nearly empty and my rear one was halfway there. The temperature had gone up another ten degrees. Tom suggested a stop at the northern end of East Mountain Road, where there was a pizza shop.

Which was closed. Jim gave me some water from his bottle.

Fortunately the mini-mart at the gas station at the corner of Mountain View and 206 had plenty of water for sale. "Where are you going?" the clerk asked me.

"Lawrence Township," I said.

I topped off Jim's bottle and mine, and we were back on our way.

Nobody else noticed the turkey vulture perched on the steeple on River Road. Jim stopped with me and Tom waited ahead.  There's a metaphor for right-wing American Christianity in here somewhere.

"Too many power lines," I said. Maybe Jim got better pictures.

Jim left us when we turned onto Willow Road. Tom was counting down the miles. Even though Canal Road was shady we were feeling the heat.

I didn't stay long in the parking lot. With 12 miles to go I'd be at nearly 72 by the time I got home.

On Route 27 between Kingston and the center of Princeton my front tire was making more noise than it should have. There was gunk stuck to it but I didn't want to stop. I was getting tired. My back was beginning to hurt.  I got through the traffic on Nassau Street and turned onto Mercer, back to my regular commuting route.

It should have felt like nothing at that point. The descent down the battlefield hill was easy enough, but the next five miles were work. I was riding into a 93-degree headwind and thinking about orange juice.

When I turned the final corner onto my street is when I noticed that the front tire was definitely low. I was coaching myself to take it easy on the sharp turn into my driveway. The tire wasn't having any of that and I stopped on the curb. It was a well-timed slow leak, and at least it was the front wheel. I'll fix the flat tonight I guess.

Jim has a recovery ride on the calendar for tomorrow. It's the same route as two weeks ago. If I can get out of bed early enough I'll pack Rowlf into the car. Maybe I'll take a nap now. Moxie is asleep on the far end of the sofa. He looks as if he could use some company.

So This is Pittstown (I Wanna Go Home)

Pittstown Road

24 June 2018

"Where's Pittstown?" Andrew asked.

"Go to the middle of nowhere and hang a left," I told him. 

If you were to put your finger in the center of Hunterdon County you'd only have to scooch over a little to your upper left to land on Pittstown.

Why Pittstown? Because we got wind that a new coffee stop has opened up in an old house at the intersection of Pittstown and Everittstown Roads, the center of town, as it were.

I'd come up with a less than inspiring route out of Lambertville. It spanned a narrow band along the ridge between the river and Flemington. Somehow I found nearly 3000 feet of climbing in the 54 miles it would take for us to get there and back. There would be two unknown ascents: Leffler Hill on the way up and White Bridge Road on the way back. Both, it turned out, would suck.

I was leading the regular crowd: Tom, Jim, Jack, Pete G, and Andrew; and two newcomers, Pete R and Brad. Brad is a new ride leader whose first Saturday listing sounded as if Tom or I had written it. Over email we decided to join forces this weekend after his ride was rained out.

As strong as I'd been feeling all season, last weekend's century took a toll. Or, rather, the fact that I didn't rest after the century took a toll. I was trashed by the end of the week. Despite two days off the bike I didn't feel as if I were running on full power today either. 

To get from Sergeantsville to the top of the ridge near Flemington there are a handful of choices. Last time we were up here I picked the half mile of torture where Routes 579 and 523 meet, Croton Road. This time we went farther north on 523, turning up Leffler Hill instead. The ascent was longer but not as steep. What made it suck was the patchwork of patches and cracks in the blacktop the entire way up. 

The route took us past my favorite dilapidated barn at the corner of 579 and Boars Head. Jim called it "classic Adirondack Sag," a term of art he'd learned while living in upstate New York. For that I had to doctor the photo with a sepia filter. It seemed only fitting.

Eventually, after some needless zigging and worthless zagging to add distance and be on some of my favorite road names and intersections (Whiskey and Boars Head; Stone Signpost; Senator Stout and Hog Hollow), we arrived in Pittstown.

Here, in a historic house, sits Brew 362. There was already a large group of cyclists milling about. They were Team Ox, training for the MS City to Shore charity ride. They cleared out as we settled in.

I hadn't even stepped inside yet (I'd been pulled away by Team Ox to take their picture) when Jim asked, "Can we come back here?"

The staff at Brew 362 went out of their way for us. They filled each of our water bottles from a sink in a back room. They served Homestead coffee, hot or iced (cold brew, Americano, nitro, or with coconut milk). There was a small selection of pastries. There was plenty of room to sit, indoors and out. Erica, one of the owners, encouraged us to take pictures.

The sign behind the counter, hanging in the window, says "So this is Pittstown." It's for sale.

There are several rooms with giant fireplaces.

Against a wall, next to another giant fireplace and out of the way of a row of tables, was this bench carved from wood:

Against the far wall are packages of pancake mix and Homestead coffee for sale:

The bathroom is off of the kitchen:

Erica said that within a week this room will be ready for their make-your-own grilled cheese customers.

Outside, the Slugs were in no hurry to leave.

Andrew and Brad

Brad, Andrew, Tom, Jim, and Pete R

The entrance to Brew 362 is on Pittstown Road. The exit is on Everittstown Road.

We'd come in through the out door, as Pete G said, and we left through the in door.  Tom and Jim decided to take a more direct route back to Lambertville. They missed the climb up White Bridge. Lucky them.

We stayed up on the ridge from Quakertown to Raritan. 

I noodled about a little more so that we could be on the intersection of Rake Factory and Goose Island.

Then we took the steep descent on Croton Road to 523. I stopped where 579 splits off again. This is one of my favorite scenic places and I try to take pictures of it every time we pass. We'd gone by in the morning too, but there had been too much haze to make a stop worthwhile. Now I had plenty of time because Andrew had a flat. He turned down 579 and into a driveway to fix it.  I took a few pictures from the intersection.

Then I coasted down to the driveway and took one of Jack H, who, not ever wanting to stop, circled down then up again.

Andrew didn't want any help. He was taking a long time working by himself. Some of us were getting impatient. I suggested he forego his hand pump for a CO2 cartridge. I handed one to Pete R, who inflated Andrew's tube. We got rolling again.

In my rear view mirror I saw Andrew pull off to the side, then turn back towards the driveway. Ricky and Brad were with him. The two Petes, Jack H, and I waited down the road. "If someone offers you help fixing a flat," we agreed, "take it."

Eventually Ricky came coasting down with orders from Andrew and Brad for us to be on our way without them. So we did.

"Laura, I'm tired," Pete G complained.

"Me too."

"I wanna go home."

I started singing the chorus from Sloop John B, which I haven't heard in decades. (Here's the song's backstory.)

So hoist up the John B's sail

See how the main sail sets

Call for the Captain ashore

Let me go home, let me go home

I want to go home, yeah yeah

Well I feel so broke up

I want to go home

Great song and all that, but it's not a good earworm to have when your legs are starting to hurt.

Fortunately we came across a small herd of longhorn cattle on Lambert Road so that I could stop for a few pictures. Imagine having to carry that rack around all the time. Makes a 54-mile hilly bike ride in 90-degree heat seem like nothing. Thanks for the pep talk, cow.

"This is the last of the hills," I said as we turned onto Seabrook Road from Brookville Hollow. "I think. Never trust the ride leader."

Ricky laughed because he didn't believe me anyway.

"It's the last one until the next one," I said.  There were, in fact, at least two more next ones until, at the intersection with Lambertville Headquarters, it really was all downhill from there.

Even Jack H, who has been overly cautious on descents since his crash on Federal Twist, let loose. I was happy to see him fly past me. He was too.

I took my time loading the car and then wandered into CVS in search of a drink. Nothing there looked worthwhile and I wandered out again. Everyone else had left. As I was pulling out onto Route 29 Brad and Andrew were rolling in. "Everything okay?" I asked. They called back that they were fine, and I went on my way.

So, we have a new rest stop. I need to figure out a less brutal route to and from Pittstown that doesn't involve driving an hour to a starting point. Jim posted the route he and Tom took home. They shaved off 8 miles and a few hundred feet of ascent. Now that I've got the county maps back on the wall I can stare at Hunterdon again while I brush my teeth. I'll figure something out. We'll be back.

Map Geek

23 June 2018

Aesthetics be damned. I put the maps back up. Without them my bike rides lack creativity.

A collage of NJBikemaps, c. 2001

Trenton (west) to Freehold (east),

Millstone (north) to Four Mile (south)

Mercer (left) and Somerset (right), c. 1998

Warren (top), a bit of Sussex (middle), and Hunterdon (bottom), c. 1998

Newark Quad, Hubbard Scientific (3-D relief), c. 1961

#53: 80 Miles on a Peanut Butter Sandwich/Trenton Makes/Rowlf's Got This

Happy to Be Finally Out of the House 

19 June 2018

When I have big ideas I run it by the Hill Slug regulars first. If what I have in mind doesn't pass muster with them it doesn't turn into a route.

Ricky was up for a long ride. Jack H was too. Jim and Tom, not so much. The first route I came up with didn't last a day before I panned it. Tom rescued me with one he'd done last year. I meant to modify it only a little, keeping it down to 50 miles. When I was finished it was 62, and 80 from my house. 

Ricky and Pete R registered for the ride. Jack H said he'd ride in from home and meet me at my house. Tom said he'd ride part of the way with me. Ricky said he'd ride to the park from home and cut out on the way back.

This is a very long way of explaining that, given enough advance notice, I'll try to accommodate people, especially if I've been riding with them for the better part of a decade. When I get a text at 6:30 a.m. the day of the ride  however, I'm not so easy-going. 

I woke to a message from someone I've never ridden with. A metric century didn't fit with this person's training regimen; a 40-mile ride was more to this person's liking. Would I be able to modify my route?

How about no? Does no work for you? Because it's 6:30 a.m., I just woke up, the ride starts at 8:30, and I'm leaving home at 7:50 to get there. Between now and then I need to get dressed, cover myself in sun-block, feed the cats, scoop their poop, hang from the inversion table, and eat breakfast. In that order.

I just about got all that done in time. Jack H, having planned for 10 miles between his house in New Hope and mine, got here in 7.

I was pleasantly surprised to see Jim at the park. I'd been nudging him to get past the 50-mile wall by riding 62 today. Not quite ready for that, he'd been rescued by Tom, who invited him to start from his house and do the 50-mile version.

Pete R, the only one who had driven over, seemed determined to ride over next time. He gets a pass because he's new to the area and hadn't yet heard of njbikemap.com .

We had about as perfect a day possible for mid-June as we headed south towards Jackson. There wasn't enough wind to bother us in any direction. We had long stretches without turns. We were moving at the top end of the pace I'd promised. Nobody seemed to mind.

Tom and Jim split of exactly where my comfort with the roads ended. As soon as they left I felt alone in the wilderness. We were on Stump Tavern Road, west of Plumsted, south of Cassville, east of Jackson, in the Pinelands. The rest stop was at the One Stop Shop, where Stump Tavern meets 571. Imagine the Clarksburg Deli, but with real food and a clean bathroom. 

As I was wandering towards the cold drinks I noticed, hanging on a peg board, not one, but two, packs of telephone extension cords, the long, flat kind we used to use to connect a phone in one room to a jack in the next. From the looks of the price tags, these things had probably been hanging there since Poppy Bush was president.

Ricky asked if I was going on Jim's Sunday recovery ride. I admitted I hadn't even looked at the Sunday calendar. I mentioned that I usually take the Colnago on recovery rides. "I haven't seen that one yet," he said. Rowlf hasn't been out all year.

I hadn't planned a second rest stop, but it was hot enough that I'd need more water, and three of us would be putting in more than 70 miles. When we reached the intersection of Millstone and Baird we turned into the little strip mall there. I don't think I've ever been inside Vesuvio's. They were bike-friendly: they let me fill my water bottle with ice from the soda machine, even offering to fill it behind the counter. They let us sit outside even though none of us bought anything.

The topic was ice cream. Jack H apologized, knowing I'd been off the stuff for the winter.

"No problem," I said. "We started again in Maine." For Jack H there is no ice cream off-season.

"You know what's better than ice cream?" Pete R asked. "Take a banana and put it in the freezer. It's just like ice cream."

"No, it isn't," Jack and I both said.

Ricky said, "I just have ice cream."

That's one of the many things I like about the Slug regulars. They're not afraid to eat crap and they're not ashamed of it either. Hell, if this had been a Wawa and had Jim been with us, a large apple fritter would have been keeping him company.

It was then that I realized I hadn't taken any pictures yet. 

And I didn't take any more for the rest of the trip back to the park. Ricky had left us for home after the Millstone break.

When we reached Route 130 I felt a cramp coming on. I rummaged around for a salt tablet. Pete R offered me a piece of banana instead.

"Thanks," I told him. "I've been doing 80 miles on a peanut butter sandwich."

Jack and I rode with Pete back to the parking lot so that Jack could fill his water bottles. I didn't bother because I only had 8 miles to go. I gobbled some Shot Bloks instead.

While we were standing there, someone approached who turned out to be Rajesh in civilian clothing. He went to hug me: "How are you?"

"Sweaty," I said. He hugged me anyway.

"How are your shorts?"

That got us into a conversation about saddles and, from there, Raj's life as a randonneur. He doesn't get out much, but when he does, he's on his bike for 250 miles.

Not me. I know how I feel after only 100: slightly smug and slightly off.

Speaking of 100, I was feeling pretty good when we got back to my house. I told Jack I'd ride back to Pennsylvania with him if he'd show me the Trenton Makes bridge on the way. I ran into the house to fill my water bottle and down a glass of orange juice.

We followed Princeton Pike all the way into Trenton. At Spruce Street Jack said, "When there's traffic I hop onto the sidewalk."

I followed him as we rode on and off the road, cutting into driveways, hopping curbs, and reaching a tree-lined street near the State House. The homes were brick and boarded up. "This used to be the nice part of town," Jack lamented. As we crossed over cobblestones he pointed out where the big movie theaters used to be.

We passed the War Memorial and the canal, and then there I was, riding my bike on the Trenton Makes bridge.

Jack, who doesn't like to stop, encouraged me to take more than one picture.

He pointed north. "That's called the Falls," he said. It's the dividing line between the upper and lower Delaware River.

"Get a picture of the State House," he suggested.

From the water line on the cement bank it looked like low tide.

Jack turned uphill on the Pennsylvania side. I stayed on Route 32, heading for the Calhoun Street bridge. I needed to find a few more miles before turning around, though, so I rode along the Delaware towards the Yardley Park and Ride. On my right the river was like glass, blue, and peaceful. I felt lucky to be able to have all of this as my weekend playground.

When I got to the Park and Ride I turned around, stopping for pictures of the Delaware Canal and the new I-95 bridge construction, and to snarf down half a Clif bar.

On the way back to the Calhoun Street bridge I took pictures of the railroad bridge that I'd wanted to take the last time I was here.

On the bridge is a sign for the East Coast Greenway:

I had 100.29 miles when I pulled into my driveway. I deliberately added that quarter mile to make up for walking across the Calhoun Street bridge.

I figured I'd take the next day off, as I usually do after a century. Still, I wrote to Jim to ask what his Sunday recovery route looked like, thinking that if I were stupid enough and the route flat enough I might give it a go.

Showing off Rowlf to Ricky was motivation enough for me to put air in the tires and change the computer battery on Sunday morning. Jim was promising 30 mostly flat miles. If my legs hurt too much I would turn around.

They didn't and I didn't, which is to say that my legs did hurt in the beginning, and I did fall behind more than once. The pace and weather were perfect, though. 

The ride started from Six Mile Run, where, it seemed, every mountain biker from the tri-county area was suiting up. "Is there an event today?" I asked a pair of cyclists.

"No," they said.

"It's the first day that the trail isn't pure mud!" Jim explained. Ricky, Jim, Prem, and I were the only road bikers in the lot.

We went west through Hillsborough, then south on East Mountain. I stopped once for a shot I couldn't pass up: a dead tree behind a pair of hay bales in the middle of an otherwise empty field.

We stopped at that bagel place on 206 at 518. I never remember what it's called. I could look it up, I suppose, but, nah.

As we lounged outside a fellow started chatting with us about building a tandem with two free wheels. He and Jim got into a long conversation about it. I'm far from an expert, but it didn't take long for me to realize that Jim was providing information that anyone attempting to build a bike from scratch should have known.

When I asked what material he was going to use, he said, "Steel tubing." He figured he'd weld the tubes together.

"You could use lugs," Jim suggested.

"Lugs?"

"The Colnago," Jim and I said in unison, and we walked him over to Rowlf. (Jim took this picture, which I swiped shamelessly from his blog.)

(Here's a bad, poorly-lit, indoor flash, close-up that I took later of one of Rowlf's lugs:

)

"I'm amazed I made it the whole way," I told Jim as we approached the end of the ride. Granted, it was only 30 miles, and mostly flat, but I kept up, and at a faster pace than I expected. 

I don't give Rowlf enough credit*. I only take him out when I'm tired. He did me well today. "Don't worry," it seemed as if he were saying. "I got this."

(*Props to Jeff A, my trainer at RWJ-Hamilton, too. He's the one who I paid to beat me up weekly for 24 sessions. It was money well spent.)

Coming Apart at the Seams

White Bridge Road, Quakertown, Hunterdon County

9 June 2018

"I can't wait to see what you write in your blog about this ride," Jack H said after the second time I waited at a corner for people to turn around and catch up.

"Where's the dog house?" Ricky asked after we waited for him and Elaine the first time. Ricky gave me cow socks last year; I couldn't Sprague him in good conscience. I told him that he'd have immunity until the socks wear out.

"I'm too much of a squish to be a complete bastard," I said to Elaine, a newcomer to the Slug life.

As usual, everyone on the ride was faster than me. All the work at the gym has made me stronger, but that only means that these days I'm not quite as far behind as I was last year.

We -- Jack H, Elaine, Ricky, Bob, Pete, JeffX, and me -- were on our way to Clinton from Lambertville.  Why JeffX and Elaine, both A riders, were slumming it with me remains a mystery.

In an effort not to be too annoying, I only stopped once for pictures. We were on White Bridge Road in Quakertown (the one next to Pittstown), still on the ridge. There was a good view of the Hunterdon hills across an open field. It would have been better without the massive power line support. It was one of those that looks like a wire robot mannequin, the kind that really ruins the scenery.

As we climbed I kept feeling a little pinch on my inner thigh on my right leg, as if something were sticking out on my saddlebag and rubbing with each pedal stroke. Something must have shifted when I was moving the bag around to fit the rear camera last week. I kept pushing the bag out of the way, which would work for a while.

I jiggered it some more when we got to Clinton, then spent a few minutes taking the obligatory picture of the red mill across the river. I wonder what would happen if I didn't take the picture. I might get fined or something.

I zoomed in to the little outbuilding between the water wheel and the spillway.

I zoomed in even more on a dead tree trunk straddling the spillway.

I took a picture of the rocks downstream because they were there.

I tried to make the shadow of the steel bridge deck on the ugly supporting cement look artsy. Meh.

I took pictures of the bridge because everyone else probably does too, and it was there.

Who waters the flowers in the pots hanging from the bridge?

As soon as we left Clinton the little sting in my leg started up again. This time I felt around not on the saddle bag but on my leg, thinking maybe there was something lodged in my shorts.

Nope. I reached down and felt my own flesh pooching out of a half-inch hole in my shorts. "Well," I thought, "this is a new one." Usually it's the padding that dies first, which hurts more but is, at least, something that happens to everyone, and doesn't happen all at once.

I had to wait until we got to the top of Spring Hill before I could do anything about it.

Everyone but JeffX, who was, mysteriously, behind me, was already waiting at the corner.

"Hang on," I said. "Ol' Thunder Thighs done ripped her shorts."

"Must be all that weight training," Pete said, and then, unbeknownst to me, took my picture as I attempted to affix strips of electrical tape (because that's what I had in my bag) to my leg under my rolled-up shorts. "Geez," I said. "It broke the skin." No wonder it hurt. What I really could have used was a large bandage, but none of us was carrying one.

The tape held for most of the next hill. I had to stop at the top to wrap the remaining strips of tape around the outside of my leg.

That held long enough for me to find out that JeffX was nursing an IT band injury which he incurred after a 350-mile ride and which had sidelined him for a month. "I knew something had to be wrong for you to be behind me," I said, because JeffX is never behind me.

When we got to Route 12 at 519 JeffX decided to go back to Lambertville on his own while I stepped inside the general store to look for tape.

The clerk, a friendly, young fellow, pointed me to an aisle where my choice was cellophane or packing. I was about to spring for the small roll of packing tape when he said, "I might have something better in my bag."

He pulled out a roll of athletic adhesive tape. "Perfect!" I said. "I lived on this stuff in high school. 12 ankle sprains in 11 years." He was a rock climber who wasn't climbing enough to keep his callouses. "Ow," I said in sympathy as I wrapped the hole and my leg three times around.

This held better, but, Spandex being Spandex, the hole escaped a few times. I was able to shift the tape with one hand while pedaling. We were finished with the hills anyway so it wasn't as bad.

I took pictures of the mess when we got back to Lambertville. Bob threatened to take pictures of me taking pictures.

Now the shorts are in the trash, a new set of electrical tape strips are in my bag, and I've added athletic tape and bandages to the mess of things I carry on each ride. Two new pairs of shorts are on order, because if one pair just went, the other one I got at the same time is surely on its way. I like to have unopened packages of shorts on deck. I consider them a supply, like tubes and carbon dioxide cartridges.

JeffX emailed me to say he made it back to Lambertville safely, and that the Hill Slugs ride was just what he needed to get back into randonneur shape.

Plain Jim has a recovery ride tomorrow. I'll do my best not to have another wardrobe malfunction.