"Mmmm, roads, he rode" Yoda said. Today's ride added 66 miles to the Masi. I wanted to get out to Lancaster, no particular reason, just a nominal destination half a world away. A few things conspired to delay me (that happens to me a lot, I never quite make my original destination) so I ended up doing a nice backroads loop in Stowe before heading home. One of the delays was stopping to assist another cyclist. It turns out some guy had lost a link of his chain and a woman cyclist with thoroughly grimy hands was trying to fix it. She'd removed one link but was having trouble getting her chain tool to drive the last pin home. I carry a spare Quick Link so I offered it. Then she says "Ah, it went in! You helped just by showing up!" He! I wish it were that easy, just show up and things work. In real life however...
The second delay was this on Powder Mill Rd which I think is in Concord at this point. There's huge hole between here and there.
That other cyclist pulled up as I was setting up for a picture. He was doing a longish ride out of Chelmsford and wanted to dash west over to Old Pickard Rd for a run back into Concord. Otherwise he was out of his element and didn't know how to get back. I wanted to cut over to rt117 bypassing a section with a narrow shoulder. So I said I knew how to get around that obstacle. Traffic was light so we rode together south to rt117 then west to Dakum Rd where he went north. As we were starting off he noted my bike, said "That's a real classic." We spoke bikes for a bit. It was nice payback for showing him how to get back on track.
I continued west, through parts of Maynard, stopped for a quick lunch in some nice shade at a shopping center in Stowe.
The bike took a selfie of itself too.
The way back was uneventful. My left knee has been talking to me these last few weeks, and some of the things it has been saying aren't exactly, as how you might say, charitable. I think a tendon is the squeaky part. Must be careful not to mash too hard. Fortunately the Masi encourages spinning!