We had a fairly warm start for the month of November. I think my body doesn't like this freezing cold one day and sixty degrees the next!
We went out at about 11:30, with the idea of doing a destination ride, for a light lunch. My goal was to enjoy myself and not look at my speed. So, we set out on my old commute route, which looks very nice in the fall. There are actually still a lot of trees with colorful leaves left. I actually dressed sort of right; it did get warm after we had gone about 7 miles, so I took off my buff and switched to my regular gloves. It had been about 53 when we left, but it was cloudy. The sun came out and it felt really warm. I was wearing my Terry fleecy jersey, which I still haven't found a good temperature for. At least I didn't have anything underneath it, since it doesn't have a zipper. Oh, and a wind vest, since it was breezy. After the stop to strip off the stuff, we came to my favorite cycling road, where I got ahead of my husband and did a nice 3.5 mile cruise at 18-19 mph (my husband is having to monitor his exertion because of a medical issue). We then cruised into west Acton, where we stopped at a cafe and had the most delicious bowl of butternut squash soup with roasted veggies. One of my former colleagues was in there, so we chatted. We decided to go home a different way, which involved a nice downhill, where I was glad I had the fleecy thing on. The temperature started going down and the sun left, too. There was tons of traffic in West Concord, and the train had just come through, so it was backed up. I got in the lane, but my husband went along side the cars and we got separated. I finally caught him as we waited to cross the highway. Then there was more traffic in Concord center. Just tons of people out enjoying the nice day and cyclists everywhere, some doing some very dangerous things in the traffic. After carefully turning left across this all, we stopped and sat on a bench to people watch. I saw one of classmates from grad school and then we decided to head home, it was getting colder and windier. As I started up my hill, I shifted to my granny and my chain came off! I can't remember the last time this happened, but I was out of my normal routine; usually I shift when I turn on the street, since it's a slight uphill. Thankfully, I was still on a pretty flat spot, so I hopped off and got the chain on the big ring and was fiddling around to get it safely back in the granny, when a guy flew by me going up the hill. I swear, he was going 20 up the hill! Anyway, I got home safely and was glad I actually enjoyed this ride.
