Right on, ride on

I haven’t been logging my activities much lately, but that doesn’t mean there hasn’t been much to write about. Here’s an account of my doings for this summer so far.

There was the Bikes Not Bombs ride in June, delayed to its rain date. I struggled a bit on this 65+ miler, not having trained enough and starting too aggressively, but I rallied and pulled off a clean finish.

I have been making trips out to Concord on my fixed gear bike, usually stopping by the overlook at Hanscom on the return trip. I spotted some wild turkeys on the Minuteman one of the times I went out.

More recently I attended the unveiling of the new bike sharing program in Boston, the Hubway. I got a little sunburned on the inaugural ride where I joined other volunteers in populating the stations with the first fleet of bikes, and later that day used the system to get from my office in Allston to Government Center where I had left my bike, managing the trip in roughly half an hour, obeying traffic rules (it was slow going as the bikes aren’t built for speed).

I am currently on vacation visiting my folks in northern NY, and my sister is here as well on break from her job teaching English in South Korea. No bike means no rides, and that’s a shame because the area has a lot to offer for scenery.

There’s still tons to do, summer isn’t over yet!

Earlier this week I found out that the Bruce Freeman Rail Trail phase one, from Chelmsford to Westford, was opened to the public.

Even earlier on in the week I was in planning with one of my coworkers to get him out more on his bike. Our initial plan included another person, a former coworker of ours, who unfortunately had to back out due to issues with her ankle. Plans shifted from riding out to Concord, to starting a ride from Concord that might include Walden or the Sculpture Park, or even the Nagog Pond Loop (as I’ve been meaning to revisit it all summer.) But, when word of the rail trail opening came in we thought it was be good fun to go and check it out. So today we did just that.
Read the rest of this entry »

Happy (belated) Birthday, America!

Last year I hiked some of the Presidential Mountains in New Hampshire in recognition of our Declaration of Independence . This year I joined a group for camping and hiking in the Adirondacks, and later visited my parents for a couple of days to catch the fireworks at Boldt Castle in the 1000 Islands.

When I first heard of the plans for the camping trip began I was overjoyed. I grew up in the northern foothills of the Adirondack mountains in upstate New York. This is a familiar area to me and one that I missed many opportunities while growing up and living around.

It is impossible to grow up where I did without some degree of camping; however, my family tended to stop outdoor activities there and not participate in many of the other mountain-based experiences: hiking, rafting, skiing/snowboarding, snowmobiling, hunting, or cycling.

My experiences growing up with biking there ended when I was able to start driving a car. The nearest real grocery store was 10+ miles away, as was the nearest movie theater and bowling alley. The farthest I rode a bike back then was less than 10 miles in a single trip, and it might have been to get to the baseball field for practice during those questing couple of years where I tried every sport my school had to offer. (I stuck with soccer throughout high school, but even so I have never really been much into sports.) I only biked around town – in hindsight I see that I missed an opportunity to get ridiculously strong at hill climbing.
Read the rest of this entry »

This week I was not at a loss for weekend ride options.

On the one hand I had a list of Pocket Rides that include some loops at either end of the Minuteman Bikeway. These rides have the advantage of both partial familiarity (Bikeway) and complete newness, plus there are comments about what to expect in hills and attractions.

On the other hand I could join one of the Bikes not Bombs group rides that are meant for training for their 62-miler coming up in June’s Bike-a-thon. I participated in last year’s 25-mile ride, which I rode 35 miles of and still didn’t finish. (I got waylaid in the last mile, twice, and ended up needing to be picked up. To my defense, it was 95+ degrees F that day.) I am still trying to find other interested people to join my team, “BikeMe”, so I have yet to sign up for this year’s ride. I’m also thinking of going for the 62-miler, so these training rides would really help me prepare for that.

It was at about 10AM this morning that I made my mind up, I was going to go with a Pocket Ride suggestion: Nagog Pond Loop. This starts at the Bedford end of the Minuteman and goes for about 30 miles though Carlisle, Acton, and Concord. Nagog Pond itself is in Acton.
Read the rest of this entry »

This June I will be turning 30, one of those benchmark years that suddenly makes me no longer a 20-something by simple definition.

Since turning 29 I have been trying to think of things to do that would somehow cap my 20’s much like graduating high school and moving to Boston did for my teen years. Graduating college counts towards that, but I wanted something more recent to feel that I am continuing to grow and define myself.

I lagged through about half of my 29-hood without coming up with something. I said to myself: “Self, I need to have a personal achievement that I can attain before my age becomes evenly divisible by the first five values of the Fibonacci sequence.”

And so at the start of winter I decided it was high time I rode a Century – my first personally propelled 100-miles in a single day.

This, I knew, would be a challenge for me and I’d need to improve certain personal aspects in order to achieve it.
Read the rest of this entry »