some different roads

 

It was late in the week before Laura OLPH got to emailing around her plan for the ride she was going to lead today, and it was only last night that she got it listed on the club's calendar. But since we knew we were planning on going, we got signed up, and six of us went off on the ride today from Twin Pines. (Maybe I didn't get pictures of everybody.)

Laura had said she wanted to try some different roads, and a different stop in Lambertville. Yeah, I'm up for that. So off we went on the route she'd set up.

One of different roads was Mine Road west of Stony Brook. It's a different road from the ones we usually take in that neighborhood, largely because it climbs about 100 feet in about two-tenths of a mile. I was too busy breathing hard to complain at the time.

Another of the different roads (like, do you think I had any idea where we were at the time?) brought us to a farm with cows, triggering the obligatory photo stop.

This vista was better in person than shows in the picture.

 We rolled into Lambertville, and stopped at the new-to-me Lambertville Bakehouse, where the clerks sang the praises of a product called a bostock, a slice of Japanese milk bread, sugared and covered with almonds. Not real sweet, it had what I refer to as a "grown up" taste. They weren't wrong; I liked it. We haven't been there in the year-and-a-half they've been open; here's wishing them success and longevity.

Out front, in the rack where some of us put the bikes, was a cute girls bike.

I didn't notice until Heddy pointed it out, but the basket is unique: it's a plastic Tupperware-like thing, held on with blue painter's tape. Ingenious! I hope it works!

On the way back, we rode for a few miles on 579 Linvale-Harbourton Road. No shoulder, and lots of traffic; dozens of cars passed us in the three-or-so miles we rode it. I found the experience enervating, and when we turned onto Woosamonsa, I slow-pedaled to try to get my composure back again.

The "try some different roads" thing reminds me of a story Joe M told me about Joe McBride, for whom the old McBride Rides were named. The two Joes would go riding together, and Joe McBride would complain about riding the same old roads and plan to ride on roads they didn't often ride... and then would complain about the conditions of those roads: traffic, surfaces, hills, and so on. The other Joe would remind him that we often ride the same roads, because we know that their condition would be conducive to a safe, pleasant ride. Still, sometimes it pays to do something different.

Go check out the ride page (yeah, I know you won't do it, but Imma link to it anyways).