That's Ms Mama Duck, thank you

Ride #101

11 miles around Lake Natoma
Saturday August 27th

It is supposed to get mighty hot today, so for some reason that now escapes me I scheduled this ride to start at 9am instead of 8. What was I thinking!

Nevertheless, it was OK since the group today was speedy. Speedy like roadrunners, or fire-tailed cats, or greased lightning (wouldn't that just ignite? Nevermind). So we beat the heat.

I had 9 people on 8 bikes (a tandem was along for the ride - cool!) behind me from Folsom onto the American River Bike Trail, and then over to Hazel Bridge, a stop at the state park there, and back to Folsom along the 'south' side of the lake. No mishaps, no mechanicals, no stupid freaking thorns, no heat problems. Just a great ride with fun people.

There was some kind of low-key running event on the ARBT side of the bridge, but since it was not signed 'trail closed' we decided to just use the trail anyway. We soon ran out of runners (ha ha) and had only the usual bikers and hikers along the path.

I did scare one beautiful golden retriever nearly to death. His owner was not controlling him very well and he was tending to wander onto the trail (she was also walking with traffic, not against it, so the dog would have wandered right into my trike). As I came up behind them, dinging my bell like a nut, the dog suddenly noticed me and teleported himself from the path to the ditch, cowering and flinching from the terrible machine that was going to EAT him. Or something. I am sad that I scared a dog (I like dogs and hate to see them scared) but I'm still a little irritated at the in-need-of-a-clue owner. I sure hope she had water for herself and the dog.

Some of the group stopped after the ride at Karen's Bakery Cafe (yummy yummy, good neither for my pocketbook nor my waistline but how could I resist the lure of fresh orange juice and an avocado/bacon/chicken sandwich). Half the sandwich is waiting in the refrigerator for my dinner.

I got to chat about my trike with a couple of people, always fun. One fellow had a scrumptious orange Catrike (another recumbent brand), one of the super speedy ones. After food, conversation and bike-chat I spiraled my way up to the top of the parking structure and loaded my trike.

I don't think I've really talked about that so here goes. When I'm driving the SUV, I just roll the trike up a pet ramp and into the truck.

I have to lift the front end of the trike since the bumper is high enough that the front of the trike would dig into the concrete. With the rear wheel supported, it is easy enough to move.

My flags, and their multitude of pole-pieces, tend to become scattered around the car, so I've taken to bundling them together with rubber bands.

Then tucking the whole mess behind an unused seatbelt along the side of the car.

The red thing is a shop rag and the white things are my sun sleeves. There are these nifty little plastic hooks along the sides of the car good for tucking random stuff into. The floor pump (blue) is usually piled on top of the flags out of the way.

The 'light bar' from the last post is coming along, just waiting for a few more lights. And I've decided that it is time to modify my front chainrings to a smaller 'big' and a slightly smaller 'middle' and a smaller granny.
Time to go count teeth and reading up on the procedure. I'm pretty sure I still want three rings, even with the duplication that can occur.

A longer ride tomorrow, and then probably a week off while I get ready for a weekend of house-partying.

"... ran out of songs to play."

Ride #73
Saturday, May 14th

38ish miles in Lodi, CA

Today I saw:
     Hawks
        A Magpie
           Cows
              Sheep
                 Goats
                    Emu (!)
                       Llamas
                          Horses

Puffy clouds, vineyards. Lovely.

and some bikes:
                          Road
                       Mountain
                    Tandem
                 Tandem recumbent
              Recumbent, plain
           Recumbent, trike
        Recumbent, handtrike

Most of the vineyards have lovely roses. One I passed seemed to believe in my principle of "no rose unless it is a stinky rose". Like pedaling through perfume.

I was passed nicely by:
        Farm equipment
           Pickup trucks
              Sports cars
                 Motorcycles
                    Other bicyclists.
Not so nicely by a couple of sedans. Hrmph.

This was a ride organized by the Lodi Rotary to raise money for their charitable efforts. The 15th one!

I decided to do the shortest ride they offered, the 50 km.
I dithered about trying twice that distance for a moment, but decided that I am not ready for more than about 40 miles at a time right now. As it was, the seemingly endless stretch of Peltier Rd into a headwind on the return ride wore me out!
My average speed for the first half (no headwind) was just shy of 11mph (10.9 if you must know) but my overall for the whole ride was exact-ally 10. Which which I am pleas-ed.
And down to the Mokelumne River I attained a zippy 28.6 mph. It was soooooo nice to coast! I'm not sure I really am in love with the constant pedaling necessary for truly flat rides.

OK. That last statement was inserted by my evil twin, Skippy.

Moving on.

Row of palms on Acampo Road

The Acampo store was more interesting to look at but this building was easier to take a picture of.

This was a bit different from the Napa Cycle for Sight I did earlier this year: everyone checked into the Lodi event as they arrived, got a nice red t-shirt, a wrist band, and a route map, unloaded their bikes, and set off.
Some folks traveled in pairs or bunches, but there were other independently minded singletons like me. The Napa event was 3 separate mass starts.
The camaraderie of the large group was nice, but I really think I prefer riding by myself. So I guess that's OK for a solo-tourist-wanna-be.

Rest stop at Clements Fire Department.

Sorry, strawberries already eaten in this shot.

There was a lot of fresh fruit at the rest stop, so I pigged out. Despite that, the aforementioned headwind took enough out of me that I stopped for some dried fruit and nuts on the side of the road.
I had picked up some Kirkland (Costco) brand individually packaged fruit and nut mix (dried cranberries and cherries, almonds, walnuts, and dry-roasted pistachios). Convenient enough, but I would have liked salted nuts in there instead. Time to make my own!

This picture is for all the people who grew up with human-sized haybales. It was a Very Large hayfield.

Returning to Lodi High School (home of the Flames), I loaded my trike in the car, ate a nice tri-tip lunch provided by the organizers, and drove home.

I had no real problems mechanically (although I did regret my decision to re-install the left wheel reflector - it sang to me the entire ride).
I need new batteries in my Cherry Bomb rear light; my Serfas seat-stay light (I have it on my headrest) came apart in the parking lot at the end of the ride (I had not gotten the battery cover back on correctly when I changed the batteries); but my Cateye Opticube HL-EL450 worked just fine.

I like the Cateye light: it has a strobe mode which my larger brighter light does not, it is small and easy to attach to a smallish tube with an o-ring. "But wait," you say! "Doesn't that light have an attached nifty clamp-strap thingummy?" Yes, it does, but it broke on the third use and it was such a pain to use that I don't want another thingummy anyway. Hurrah for o-rings.

I think I need to take apart my right bicycling shoe and see if the metal plate and cleat screws have shifted around.

And, major triumph, I stuffed my trike into a Toyota Prius!

It does, after all, fold

T-storms in the forecast. Should I be a responsible ride leader and cancel tomorrow's ride? I've another hour to decide.

Getting lost in Folsom

The next handful of posts appeared in a slightly different form on Bent Rider Online (a message board for recumbment riders).

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Squeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeal! (That's a happy sound, for those wondering.)

On this morning's ride (02 September, 2010) I saw one recumbent hand trike (delta), a couple of DFs (diamond frame bikes - shorthand for 'normal' bicycles), and lots of people out walking their dogs and generally getting outside before it gets to be 100 F. I collected a lot of smiles this morning and waves and one inquiry "Do you have air conditioning on that?" "Sure, as long as I keep moving!"

This morning was my second ride on my new toy and my first clipping in. I'm still sticking to neighborhood bike paths until I get a little more familiar with the machine.

There are a lot of components to play with on this machine, and it was tempting to spend all my time parked by the side of the path, allen keys in hand. I stopped a couple of times to adjust the neck rest and to play with the seat angle. And that's all! Really! I promise! Before my next ride I need to adjust the suspension a bit and I might investigate some slight adjustments to the handgrip position.

I also need to evict my former ride (Trek) from the corner of the garage and see if I can figure a way to hang the trike. Right now it is parked in the back of the Toyota. "No, dear. I am not planning on using the truck as a garage. Really! I promise!"

I had a devil of a time with my right shoe (new to clipping in) and eventually decided that the tension on that side was just too loose to stay clipped in. However, I seemed to have found an acceptable fore-aft position, side to side position, and angle for the cleats. Or at least on a short ride it seemed OK. Time will tell.

I improvised a water bladder bag to hang from the seat back. I am eventually getting (I hope!) dual water bottle cages but the shop is still working with HP Velo. on that. The non-folding Scorp that I test rode had a braze point on the frame under the seat for a dual cage when using the mesh seat. There is no braze point on the folding version. Neither of the two proprietary HP V cages the shop had on hand will fit this trike with a mesh seat. However, the shop managed to attach one short cage which will serve to hold the bottle-battery for my light.

Although I have the headlamp attached, I did not bother with the bottle battery and switch for this ride. I have an older Cygolite for which I was able to order an extension cord so I can have the battery behind the seat, the switch on the mirror mount, and the headlamp as far forward as I can get it.

That's all (and enough) for now.

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For the curious, I bought my ride from Peregrine Bicycle Works in Dixon, CA. A great shop.

What I did not admit to in this post was getting slightly lost. It has been 2 years since I spent any time on the paths in Folsom: there are a lot of paths and a lot of intersections. I got a bit turned around, but found my way safely back to my mobile garage: AKA Toyota SUV.

The folks on BROL (bent rider online) are super helpful, friendly and knowledgeable. After I made this post, I learned that there are braze on points to attach waterbottles in FOUR places on the seat frame: all one needs to do is apply a hot poker to the mesh seat cover to expose the braze points. All right! Hot pokers - my favorite!

And I was gently and kindly warned off from messing with the front suspension (which I was not planning on doing anyway) and the rear suspension turned out OK after all.

AND I got advice on storing my trike. Such a deal!