maxine

Great story! I love the image of the fierce dog pressing flowers and reading Emerson.

balto charlie

My bad, I am out of town on the wknd following easter10/11. I just heard the blossoms are a little behind with only a few trees blooming now. I might be able to take off Easter Monday (less tourist) but I don't know how others can handle taking off.

NoRacer

They'll probably go back into hibernation after today's cold front--it's friggin 40 degrees F out and the front hasn't bottomed out, yet!

NWS predicts for the Essex area:



I should've brought my leg warmers to work with me.

HC203

Might be able to do Easter Monday, though I'm hiking the A.T Fri, Sat, Sun, so may want to rest on Monday.

balto charlie

Who would have thought that this AM commute was as warm as it was going to be. I just went outside,temps dropping. My gear "might" keep me warm enough for the evenings return......but only barely. Gonna use it all my stuff. At least I have long pants:-) The blossoms might get frozen this year as temps in some areas is going into the 20's tonight.

Let's see what time Barry is good with. AT, hope the weather warms. Backpack trip or day hikes?

HC203

Yah, I'll keep my eye on the weather. I expect chilly mornings and evenings but if we get a front like this then I would probably postpone. We were going to do the entire MD length but have decided to just do two nights with a friend of mine and his sone. Probably hop on the trail around Rt 40 and i-70 and hike it to Harpers Ferry. I've never really done any over night hiking, hard to believe.

greaterbrown

The April Rando Ramble is the 4th, Easter. 4/17, 4/24, 5/8, 5/15, 5/22. any of those weekends work for me.

NoRacer

Son-of-a-b*tch!

https://bimactive.com/ba/journal/post/10783/31224

NoRacer

Woohoo! Performance sold me a new set of 7800 DuraAce shifters for about $100 less than a new set of Ultegra 6700 shifters would have gone for. And, of course, they gave me $200 back in credit for the Forte shifters I returned.

So... eating dinner, now, then I'll be installing the new shifters and restringing the brakes and derailleurs, finishing up with a new tape job on the handlebars.

I'm thinking about starting at 5am, tomorrow, to ride 70 miles to Chesapeake City, do Bud Lippert 25 mile ride, then ride 70 miles home... or, if too tired, bum a ride with Bud back into Essex. That's the plan.

greaterbrown

NR's just finishing up Bud Lippert's BBC ride in Ches. City. 75mi.(ride up) + 35mi.(Bud's ride) + 75mi(ride back?) will give him a big day.

Saturday quiz: What is this?
https://maps.google.com/maps/ms?ie=UT...7,0.42057&z=12

maxine

NR, what is up???? You have the most bike breakage of anyone I know, and it's not like you're some 250-pound hulk.

Of course, when you calculate it in terms of "stuff broken per mile," maybe it's not so bad . . .

So, I got up this morning, saw the temperature outside . . . It didn't take long for me to get spoiled by all that nice weather we had!! I did a 5-mile hike at Patapsco State Park instead, which was great.

There's been some family drama that kept rearranging my travel plans, but now it's on again (for sure!) that I'll be in PA Easter weekend. I think most of my upcoming weekends are open (although softball on Friday nights starts mid-April, I think.) After a brief reprieve, work has taken another turn for the crazy, so I may have trouble sneaking out on a weekday, but it's hard to say for certain.

maxine

Hmmm, I'll take a guess . . . ways to break out of the Beltway that don't involve death-by-major-cloverleaf?

HC203

Can somebody please adopt my kids for the day? Didn't get anything in today as I was helping prep the ballfields for little league, coaching t-ball again. Family first biking second I suppose. I will certainly be out tomorrow before the rain.

NoRacer

I came up with about 179 miles for the day.

Bob Carson and a woman named Winnie did the 25 mile route. The rest of us (Bud, Mike, Sandy, Ann, Frank, me) did a 34 mile route.

greaterbrown

Close. It's a tool for creating Rando Ramble routes.

The 4 points are the 4 ride start locations I use for rides. The radial lines get me out to the beltway in fairly even compass increments. With these I can extend a route outward from that radial line, go 80 or so miles and come back to the end of another radial line, preferably one that is linked to the same start point. If it isn't, I can use the connectors to get me back to my original start.

You might notice there's no connector between Canton and Carroll park. The only route that would stop/start between these two would be a long one- up and over the Susquehanna, past Elkton, down Delmarva and over the rt50 bridge to Annap. and back up to Baltimore. Or, I guess you could ride down to Norfolk and get a ride over the bridge/tunnel, and ride back up to Elkton and over. Only 600 miles.

balto charlie

looks like a google spider to me.

Those were the days.... Don't think it gets any better with age. This wknd I woke up to my son's friend sleeping on our couch however my son was not home????

What can i say. When you wrote you were biking 75 miles to the start I was thinking 75miles RT to get to the start. I guess you didn't do your taxes.

I never touched the bike. I was requested to produce 200 bottles(9 cases, 20 gallons) of homebrew for my niece's wedding in May. So I cranked out 4 batches of brew as well as a lot of yard clean-up. My property looked like a war zone since the winters snow. I didn't do my taxes either. Anything but taxes.
4/24 and 5/15 days don't work but 4/25 and 5/16 work as do the other wknds GB listed.

fletchh

HC, no thanks. I think you can only do that once in a lifetime, and once they are out of the house, you spend some time wondering what that was all about, then you party, and plan on moving without leaving a forwarding address.

NoRacer

No... no taxes. Maybe Sunday,... right, that GBs next ride and Easter and... and... and...

When you guys finally decide, let me know. As you know, I'm very flexible schedule-wise.

Besides, I've already done one farewell ride with Barry and bought him a beer, too. The rest of you are behind! But, I'm ready for another ride with Barry as soon as y'all make up yer minds!

NoRacer

GB! Did you do a checkout ride today? for Sunday?

balto charlie

Waiting for Mr. Barry. Taxes going down this week before the weekend!!!

Today was a windy one. I got to the Muirkirk station and "lo 'n behold " someone else got off and onto a bike. We rode a few blocks together. My first at the Muirkirk station in 9 years. I felt like I was in Amsterdam or at least Portland:-)

NR You got me hooked onto the Amsterdamize blog. It is cool to watch folks ride in such a laissez-faire way. Some of the bike setups resemble our cars with multiple children seats, music, trunks, baskets etc. As we are to cars they are to bikes.

greaterbrown

Geez, I got suckered by the weatherman yesterday. It was obviously rainy, but the forecasters were saying hard rain all day so I decided against a check-out ride. Then at 10AM there was only a little sprinkle. So, I hopped on the fixie to hit the first 20 and last 25 miles of the ride. I was slogging by the last hill up Providence rd. Short, sharp hills are HARD on that bike.

I'll be able to take off the 1st half of this Thurs. I'll throw the bike in the Nova and drive up to NW Bel Air and finish the middle 60 miles from there. Nice weather for that.
... or so they say.

balto charlie

Got to bike #2 and lo-n-behold the nearly new Pasela Tour Guard tire was flat. My first flat commuting in a loooong time. Might be going back to Schwalbes. I wasn't too bummed since the morning was nice. Started getting my tire stuff out, only to notice my pump was missing off of my bike frame!!! WTF. I have no idea where it went. It has been so long since I flatted. I guess someone ripped it off the bike. I was at REI and MOM's last week during lunch, maybe there. Had to walk to work. Cut through the woods to shorten the distance. It was a pleasant day for a walk. Cherry trees are blooming big time.
Going to have to revisit the Pasela's. PG county roads are not kind to tires. Anyone have recommendations for a pump that will fit in my pannier.

maxine

I don't know how big your pannier is, but my Topeak Road Morph fits into one of the side pockets of my TransIt Garment Bag Pannier, which I use for commuting. It's about 14 inches long, so it's not a mini, but it is the *only* take-along pump that I've ever tried (frame, mini, or otherwise) with which I could actually pump a completely flat tire up to 100 psi and not risk a coronary, torn arm muscles, or a busted valve stem in the process.

NoRacer

Bummer, dude--for both the flat and the lack of a pump!

It must be catching. I had a slow leak this morning. I used CO2 to keep adding air (2x to get to work.) I'm sure it'll be flat by now, so I'll go out at lunchtime and replace the tube or do it after work. Depends on how warm it is out at noon. I've been needing to pull that tire off anyway. There's been water in it for days, but there was no sense emptying it until after yesterday's rain.

rizz

Really nice weather coming up. Y'all better be doing some riding!