July riding

[Crankin]

Had a good commute today. The traffic was not detoured yet, but I was prepared with an alternate route. However, there were other narrowed lanes for other work, right before the real detour. I like when I commute on Mondays, because leaving work at 7 instead of 6 is just so much nicer! I was flying and had my fastest commute of the year.

[khg]

A week and a half ago, I was scheduled to do a fun ride on Mt Rainier with my husband and a friend--but woke up with a cold instead, and spent the day in bed I was really disappointed to miss the ride for training reasons, and because it's just a beautiful ride.

Between various commitments, today was the only time in a several week span that I could do it, as long as I got up early enough and didn't dilly-dally so that I could get back home in time to head to work in the afternoon... So painful as it was, I jumped out of bed at 5:45 and hit the road soon after. (I am NOT a morning person!)

The route I did starts at the Crystal Mountain turnoff, then enters Mt Rainier National Park to go up to the Sunrise Visitor Center (highest paved road in Washington State!), comes back down the mountain, then turns to go up to Cayuse Pass, continuing on to Chinook Pass, and then 13 miles of descending back to the car, with a respectable 55 miles and 5,500-6,000' of elevation, depending on who's counting. It's challenging--hardly a flat moment--but also stunningly beautiful, and the weather today was perfect for it--views for days.

I had a great time on the ride--no pictures, because I was trying not to stop (15 minutes to buy and eat food at Sunrise was my only time off the bike)--so you'll have to take my word for it that the wildflowers on the mountain were riotously beautiful. The range of colors and shapes was constantly engaging, as well as the contrast with the dark evergreen trees behind. On the last bits of the climb up to Sunrise, you're facing directly towards the summit of Mt Rainier, and it's just HUGE. Even from Seattle, it can dominate the landscape--up close, it's incredibly awe-inspiring.

I had a little more excitement than I wanted partway up to Sunrise. About 50 feet up the road, a bear emerged from the trees and started casually crossing the road. I immediately stopped and waited. And sure enough, a couple bear cubs soon followed. They lingered a bit, eventually crossed, then hung out on the side of the road for a while before heading up the hillside. The cubs were so cute--but that was way closer than I ever needed to be to a momma bear and her cubs!!!! Had I kept biking instead of stopping, I likely would have been directly between her and the cubs when they got to the road. Yikes!

And now... Now my legs are tired. We're doing a road trip this weekend, and sitting in the car for a long time suddenly sounds really really nice. Sitting anywhere sounds really really nice.

But I'm glad I made myself get up and go--it's a great ride, and was so worth it!

[Crankin]

And I think I'm tough because I ride 15 miles at 5 AM????
I would have totally freaked out at a bear sighting. Of course, seeing my neighbor's dog freaks me out, so it's all relative.
Had a lovely, and cool/dry ride this morning at 5. Fifteen miles, same ride I did last week, even though I was tempted to cut it short. It was below 50 degrees F at one point, and while I was dressed appropriately, I could have had knee warmers on. When I got to the top of Nashawtuc Hill, a deer and fawn were coming out of the woods. They didn't move, but I was concerned they might go down the hill the other way and run out in the road, out of the woods, on the other side.
I usually don't ride early AM on Thursdays, and I did not see as many riders as I do on Tuesdays.
Group ride tomorrow.

[smittykitty]

Just for you that may not have grasped kbh's discription of the incredibly beautiful and STEEP HILLS she rode at Mt Rainier, well I'll just say it's steep by car! Oh, and way to recover from your STP one-day ride on Saturday! I haven't even gotten back on a bike yet, let alone Mt. Rainier! Wow! I'm so impressed! We've had several deer wonder out in front of us lately. I hope we don't meet up with a bear and cubs.

[Helene2013]

I would freak out too I think seeing bears or anything that can "attack" me. I've had enough of 2 dogs chasing us for 8km.... never pedaled that fast in my fast for the 1st half of it since I did not know if they were dangerous or not. Happened they were friendly and sooooo happy to get a good run. Me? NOT...it was my 2nd road bike ever and I had no control on anything. Lucky I did not fall, kill myself or heart attack with such high cardio then. haha

You'll have to go by car...and get us pictures of that scenery KHG. You truly rock on a bike to get all this done..in the morning on top of this. yikes.

[khg]

Whether rightly or not, I'm more freaked out by dogs than bears. Dogs are people-oriented, like to chase things, can be territorial, etc. Off the bike, I've had some bad run-ins with them (luckily nothing on the bike yet). Whereas the bears, since I was a little ways away, didn't care about me at all--I don't even know that they bothered to look at me. There were more interesting things going on for them, like yummy plant bits to nibble... Still, I was sure glad that I had noticed the mom coming out of the trees soon enough to stop when/where I did...

It has been a chunk of challenging stuff on my bike for me. It's been fun, and I'm also hoping I will get some strength and stamina gains out of pushing myself like this. But I know that strength gains come from the body's rebuilding during rest, so I'm typing this while lying on the couch--and no big rides for a few days!

Crankin, 15 miles at 5AM counts as tough in my book! I think if you told me that I had to do that tomorrow, I'd just curl up in the fetal position and cry

[rebeccaC]

Bear cubs are cute but a protective mother isn't something i want to deal with. If I rode in areas where bears are I would be carrying this

I do carry regular pepper gel in my handlebar bag mainly because i ride alone a lot on low traveled mountain roads and some of the more iffy areas of L.A.....thankfully i haven't ever needed to use it.