March In Like a Lion Rides

[rebeccaC]

Thanks Emily!!! Bryce is one of my favorite hiking areas….so beautiful!!

This is towards the end of the season of having a good ride in the Valley of Fire with its moderate temps now and low traffic and riding on a weekday helps too….and yeah, no shoulder could make for a nervous tension during more vehicle times of the year. Another consideration is the immense silence of the park and it being easy to hear vehicles approaching from farther behind. It was also probably my last desert ride until next fall.

It’s a rainy day here at home so Alex and I are just going to relax and enjoy being together today.

[north woods gal]

Breathtaking! I have never been there. I must remedy that.

As for me, back home, today, was my first all road ride of the year. Yippeee! Not a long ride at only 15 miles, but most of that was a sprint and I pushed it a bit, so happy I was to be out on the open road, again. Our local roads are down to dry pavement with only an occasional patch of ice which I can ride around. Dug the Surly Krampus out of our outdoor storage shed and got everything adjusted and ready to go, then off I went. Still have a lot off sand and gravel on the roads from winter maintenance, but the 3" tires on the Krampus handle that with ease. Gravel roads and secondary roads are still a fat bike, only, proposition for now.

I'm preaching to the choir, of course, but I really missed flying down the open road with no concern about techy riding or frantic gear changes and all the other challenges of trail work. So nice and relaxing to just breeze down the open road with just my thoughts and nice scenery for company. Really missed that kind of riding over the winter. I will do more road miles, this year.

[north woods gal]

As much as I hated not to ride my trails, today, they are now too many long sections that are nothing but ice and, worse than that, ice with standing water in spots. There's only so much that studded tires can do. Even bicycling out of our long driveway to go road riding is getting tricky, now. There's also a long stretch of pure ice, there. It's all caused by day after day of temps getting just high enough to melt some packed snow, then dropping again, at night, to freeze and cause ice.

Seems I can't escape it. Went for a nice road ride of 15 miles, again, on dry pavement. Decided I had gone far enough, so made a turn into a wildlife area parking lot to reverse direction. Big mistake. Yup, you guessed it. I hit a patch of ice that was covered with a light dusting of snow. Me and the Krampus had no chance. We went down in a flash. Hurt my left ankle in the fall, but not enough to prevent me from pedaling, home. Just a touch sore, this morning, but barely notice it, now.

I am SOOO tired of ice.

On a more positive note, had a pair of Lincoln's Sparrows land for an instant outside our window, this morning. The Lincoln's is an uncommon migrant for us, so a sure sign of spring. Lovely little bird.

[emily_in_nc]

NWG, hope your ankle heals up fast. Ice would not be fun -- have rarely experienced it on a bike (perhaps never), but certainly in a car during NC winters. Not fun! Hope the ice melts soon, or gets covered up with enough snow that it is not an issue!

[north woods gal]

Thanks, Emily. The ankle is fine this morning, but, please, no more snow. I've had enough and now that my trails are closed for the moment, I need our local roads to stay free of snow in the meantime. Most of our paved roads are now ice free, but some of the less traveled ones still have ice in patches. Sure is nice getting out to ride and see different country, though, after a long winter riding the same old trails.

Compared to last winter, this one has been much more north woods traditional, meaning long sustained cold and lots of snow. My notes show that this date, last March, I was actually able to put my canoe in the lake and do a little paddling, since about half the lake was open water. This winter, no way. The lake hasn't even begun to melt and is still covered in deep snow.

[ny biker]

The early-blooming trees around here have pink flowers on them but it is still cold, more like January than March and really I am just so over this cold wind that we have almost every day. Pollen allergies plus winter weather. Boo. The long-range forecast says more of the same next week and possibly some snow from yet another nor'easter. Next Saturday I will go to a march in DC and it will be colder than it was for the Women's March in January. Tomorrow I'm going to a college baseball game to see my nephew and it will be football weather. This is just nuts.

I am focused on getting other things done, like income taxes and packing up the small stuff in advance of new floors being installed in my condo. And writing emails to send to bike club members about various upcoming events and then figuring out how to use our web host's software to layout the emails and send them. And going to things like nephew's baseball games and marches in DC.

Maybe someday I will ride my bicycle again.

One good thing -- I managed to go out for a short walk around my neighborhood last night, and a slightly longer walk on Sunday night, thanks to short breaks from the cold wind. I wore a hat to cover my hair (keep the pollen out of it) as my neighborhood is full of pollen-spewing cedar trees. And I did not wake up with flaming red itchy eyes on Monday or today. So whenever this ridiculous winter weather passes, I should be able to ride my bike without too much of an allergic reaction.

[Crankin]

Same weather here. It's 38-40, but with a stiff breeze. Weekend high to be 32. I so want one more weekend of xc skiing, or to be able to ride my bike, but tomorrow I have a workshop. It will be good, but I have to take the train to Cambridge and walk in the freezing cold wind for a few blocks. My granddaughter is sleeping over on Sat. night, so unless I go to 7:30 AM spin, I'll be snow shoeing or hiking Sunday afternoon. My friends just arrived up in Bennington, where I was last weekend, and there's *70* inches of snow.
We are going to get hit again, Tues. night into Wednesday, so I may be skiing next weekend, as north of here it's still great.