Chinese Menu Ride

Ride #89

Friday, July 22nd
Just a shade under 11 miles on bike paths in Folsom

Here's the closest you or I will come to seeing a recumbent on this ride

I saw such a variety of people, bicycles (no recumbents), and so on that I can only illustrate as follows:

Please choose one from each column. Repeat until bored or until the need for coffee becomes overwhelming.

Col. A	Col. B	Col. C
Hybrid bike	Retiree	Bike Lane
Road bike	Mom	Bike Path
Cruiser bike	Dad	Traffic circle
Stroller	Jersey-clad	Pedest. push-button crossing
Kid trailer	Dog walker	Wet pavement
Roller blades	Bird watcher	Dry pavement
Skateboard	Farmer	Speedbumps

No I did not see a skateboard-riding jersey-clad farmer sailing over a speedbump while navigating a traffic circle. But I could have.

Some of the intersections used to join up bike-path segments are better than others.

No curb cut. And there is a perfectly good bike lane right on the other side of the drop-off.

Splendid push-button crosswalk.

Behind me is a traffic circle. In front is an intersection with a single stop sign. Away over there, to the right of the pretty iron fence, is the rest of the bike path.

As long as there are no leaf blowers running, it is possible to safely navigate this intersection, just listen for the cars and pedal like mad.


Then there are these old speedbumps in the parking lot on the way to the farmer's market.

If I aim just right I can make it over without bottoming out. I aim right about 1/2 the time.

Where I got fab food and loaded up my bag.

From left to right: Lamb pie from Z-pies, scrumptious strawberries, and tantalizing tomatoes.

The approach to my favorite bridge. Gives you an idea of the beautiful sunny weather this morning.

I've been meaning for a while to get new gel inserts for my shoes, instead of the make-do women's high heel forefoot cushions I've been, um. making do with.

So I picked up these on Amazon and so far, so good. I spent some time muttering on the couch, determining the exact right place for them in my shoe. I seem to have guessed right, since I had very little feeling of undue pressure on the balls of my feet. Normally about 6 miles into any ride I get uncomfortable.

My shifting was a little weird today, so I think I need to take a look at the rear derailluer wheel thingies and see if there is stuff stuck in there again.

Thingies
Stuff

Maybe it is time for coffee after all

Heading toward the Bidwell Street overcrossing. This may have been where I exceed 20mph.

This map does not include the side trip to the farmer's market.

Snot-pocalypse

First, a note.  There is a benefit ride coming up in the Sacramento area: Ride4Matt. 
Check it out, participate if you can.

Ride #68
Thursday, May 5th

57 miles along most of the American River bike path

I think this is the longest I've ever ridden in one day in my life. I'm not dead so it is obviously survivable.

My triking pal and I left Folsom on a fine, bright Spring day. We returned later - much later - that day. And on my part at least, hot, tired, slightly sunburned, and ever-so-mildly crabby.

This was, I suppose, a little taste of touring in some ways:  it was a fair distance, it was a bit stressful, and I'm sitting here a day later composing this post in a coffee shop.
On my phone.

My left foot is bruised, my leg muscles are tired, and my allergies are in full swing. It is a good thing the coffee shop has lots of paper napkins. I'm thinking about what kind of small pump I want to buy, and trying recall the correct sequence for removing and replacing a rear tire. And thinking about the next loooooong ride!

Hey, I just noticed that my phone's keyboard has a voice recognition function. Here goes: I have no idea if this is good to work or not I have removed myself to the car so I don't sit in peets coffee house talking to my phone which would sound very very very strange.
Hey. I can 'speatype' a run-on sentence! Ok. Back to work.

When using clipless pedals (pedals-that-attach-to-your-shoe-with clips. Don't ask me, I didn't name them) on a recumbent, it is useful to push the foot away as well as pulling back on the return. Apparently, I cannot do that effectively for more than about 35 miles. I started loosing the "oomph" in my legs at that point and I suppose my left foot was repeatedly slamming into the bottom of my shoe: hence the bruise. I'm considering more cushy forefoot inserts for my shoes.

We took plenty of breaks on the way out and even more on the way back! I stopped and stretched about 3/4 of the way through the ride. I drank 24 x 6 ozs of water: still not enough, since I came home with a raging headache. Two packets of electrolyte replacement powder and several glasses of water put me to rights.
I've added some packets to my bike bag.

I ate two oranges and a handful of trail mix along the way. And some jerky. I was pretty hungry at the end of the ride, so I think more trail mix is in order.

About 4 miles from the end of our ride, my steering started getting squirrelly. My rear tire was losing air! So we stopped and pumped it up to see if I could get back without hassling with a tube change. It held enough air to do so, I did no damage to my rim, and I put a new tube in the next day. And here's the "tattoo" to prove it. Saturday's ride will tell if I did a good job.

Have you hugged your bike today?

My pump sucks. Yes, air pumps are supposed to blow (which in this case is a good thing), so we used my pal's pump. I LIKE that pump! It's a Topeak road morph. Very nice, especially the built in pressure gauge.

I experimented a little bit with tipping my seat all the way back. I seemed to have more power with less effort, and it uses slightly different muscles than my usual, more upright, posture. I've set up the seat and the mirrors for the new laid back position and I'll give it a try on Saturday's ride.

TTFN

Look! I forgot to make a title!

Ride #41
Sunday, February 6th
11 or so miles on the American River Trail

Somewhere between 70 and 80 degrees today. Moderate breezes, and shockingly green grass. My nose is stuffed up and the dog is shedding like there's no tomorrow.
It is spring. I'm sure it will rain again and be cold and miserable before May, but right now that is very hard to imagine.

My sweetheart felt a little queasy (happens sometimes when he over-exerts himself) so we stopped for a while at a beautiful shady spot along the river to rest, drink some more water, and share a orange. Yes, the grass really is that green - unreal, isn't it? We saw a large raptor circling overhead, and heard plenty of birdsong. Not so many squirrels as yesterday. Several folks stopped to check that we were OK and that we were not too far from the car and so on. Lovely people, bicyclists are. Recovered, we finished our ride.

Today, we decided to go around Lake Natomas (something we have not done since they've been doing the Hazel Ave. improvement project, and something I'd not done on my trike). I'm sure it will be lovely when it is finished, but right now it is not stellar for a trike. There is a steep grade going up to Hazel from the "north" side of the lake, Granny handled that just fine (but I did wonder if Himself would have to push me up the last bit - there was some swearing as I powered up the steepest part. Yep. Me. Potty mouth). However the interface between the very wide concrete sidewalk on the upstream side of Hazel and the existing bike path needs some work. I only had to dodge one oncoming cyclist and travel against traffic for a little while. I'll be glad when the construction is done.

The other thing about the Lake Natomas loop is getting across the river at the Folsom end. There is a bike lane on Folsom-Auburn Rd., segregated from traffic by reassuring concrete walls, but that path is quite narrow for a trike, even my trike which can fit through most doorways. The other option is to take surface streets to the old wooden bridge across the American River, which is what we did today.

Something I forgot to note about yesterday's long ride - I added some gel forefoot inserts (marketed for women's high heels) to my yellow Superfeet insoles in my bike shoes. I was looking for something that would be a little cushy but not too squishy, since on the 30 mile ride a few months ago the balls of my feet felt a little pounded on. Much better with the gel inserts. Since I unstuck these from a pair of heels I don't wear very often, I needed to stick the edge down with some paper medical tape since the trailing edge of the insert tends to roll up and attach itself to my sock. I think some of the 'stick' remained in the other shoes.

And on today's ride, I again managed to drop my chain between the small and middle chain rings while shifting down. Himself held the back of my ride up and I wrestled the chain back into place. I think this happens when I am applying a little more force to the cranks then I might normally when shifting, and when I am in a smaller ring in back. Easy enough to fix, just annoying and greasy. I was worrying about my sweetheart and not paying attention to my shifting!

A couple of rides scheduled for next week: hope the weather holds!

I did my best to show how the Hazel interface worked today: no guarantees...