rholland1951

Guy on the radio this morning said Summer had been cancelled, at least until Monday. That certainly seemed to be the case when I took an evening ride on the Minuteman, 10 miles with a pearly gray sky and temperatures in the low 60s, long pants and long sleeves.


rod

kobaneul

I went to visit a friend in Auburndale today and had a very pleasant ride mostly along the Charles River path (that newish bike lane on Western Ave is pretty nice too). Great day for it and the clouds seemed to have kept a lot of people home so I had it mostly to myself.

Except for the suicidal flock of geese I ran into in Allston. Why aren't the animals on the trail afraid of bicycles?? And last time I rode this stretch I barely avoided a bunch of rabbits.

So if you heard someone on the trail this afternoon madly ringing their bell and screaming unprintable things at a goose, that was me.

rholland1951

Took the LHT out for 10 miles on the Minuteman this evening, in part to ride test some prior wrenching. Summer's back.


rod

jimmuller 

Suicidal geese and rabbits, indeed. Last week on my morning commute about a mile from the house a coyote ran across the road maybe 20 in front of me with a rabbit in its mouth. Yesterday's commute produced this in Woburn:

rumrunn6

was gonna hit a squirrel that was heading from the left into my lane on Monday morning. I tapped my brakes and he turned around. fortunately, he ran quick enough not to get squished from the car approaching on that side. would have been bad to avoid me only to get it from the car

Ghazmh

Sadly I ran over a chipmunk in May. I somehow doubt that it survived the encounter with a 28mm Conti. It happened so fast I couldn't avoid him without dangerously swerving into traffic.

Ghazmh

I've been finding myself working the Minuteman and returning to Waltham through Belmont into my repitoir of regular routes. The added congestion and slower speed has allowed me to savor the moment, smell the roses in a way that's different than hammering hard on the open country roads of my usual routes.

sherbornpeddler

I rode a moderate 25 miler from Sherborn into Dover and back yesterday and today we escaped to ride 19 miles from the ferry to Middle Road out to Aquinnah. The light rain was cooling and pleasant. Traffic is a little fast but no issues.

kobaneul

At least it was probably over quickly for him. They do dart right in front of you sometimes. I worry about hitting something and only badly injuring it.

rholland1951

By the time I took the Rawland out for an after-work-before-dinner ride, the temperature was down to 92.


Perhaps it was as low as 85 in the cool spot at Arlington's Great Meadow.


All this, and a Street Strider sighting, too...


Arlington Center was still cooking on the return, and the thermometer read 87 on my leafy East Arlington street when I put the bike away.

rod

rholland1951

Rolled out on the Rawland yesterday morning, temperatures in the high 80s and heading up. As sometimes happens, I didn't quite know where I wanted to go, so I headed out the Minuteman and considered options. By the time I got to Depot Park, I had a notion to combine the three Depot Park rail trails with the big arc running from West Street, Billerica, to North Road Carlisle past Great Brook Farm, on to Curve Street with its Cranberry Bog, then Acton Street, West Street, Pope Road, Strawberry Hill Road, Barret's Mill Road, Barnes Hill Road, an unabandoned bit of Estabrook Road, with a hop across North Bridge to Monument Street to the Reformatory Branch. This gave me a 47 mile ride with 4004' of elevation gain, through Arlington, Lexington, Bedford, Billerica, Carlisle, Concord, and Acton, on a mix of pavement, stone dust, and dirt, much of it in the shade: that was a definite advantage on a ride that saw temperatures in the mid-90s in the course of the afternoon.

Walkers and giant space crabs on the Minuteman.


Narrow Gauge Rail Trail: peeping at Fawn Lake through the trees.


Narrow Gauge Rail Trail: stone dust, shadows, and a fire hydrant if needed.


North Street, Carlisle: roller coaster and time machine.


Great Brook Farm: hens eat ice cream! Who knew?


There's a working Farm at Great Brook, and they were irrigating the corn up by North Road. I got the benefit of some of the spray, perfect day for it.


Curve Street, Carlisle: the Cranberry Bog naps in the sun.


Curve Street: the corn is coming along.


North Bridge, Concord: a couple of ospreys appear to have taken up residence on this stretch of the Concord River.


Reformatory Branch: if a mosquito bites you in Concord Center, this swamp may be where it came from.


rod

jimmuller 

We rode 52 miles on the tandem yesterday, just a pleasant ramble around Metro-northwest, Waltham to Carlisle and back. Today we went out with a purpose, to pick up veggies at Hutchins Organic Farm in Concord. We ended up 40.8 miles and 37.8 pounds of veggies!

Even better, we stopped here Welcome - The Robbins House for a bite of lunch and were treated to a lovely and unexpected cello concert.



Hutchins Farm:



And the obligatory loading of the bike:

Ghazmh

Link to the Craigslist post for the Selle Italia that I originally had on my 2 month old Smootie. A brown C17 Cambium is now perched atop the Velo Orange seatpost.

Selle Italia Turbo 1980 Nubuck

Trades or offers welcome

rumrunn6

wow, she's still there? we saw her playing a month ago. guess it's a regular gig for her. it's a nice added touch! did you go in and get the short lecture? we found it interesting

jimmuller 

Apparently she is still there. We didn't go in for the lecture. We had stopped by there before, just never heard any music.

mr_bill

Two score years ago I rode around these parts outside of Rochester NY.

Here, the highways are fast (55 mph national speed limit back then) but the shoulders are very wide. But there was either just me, or just me and my friend bold enough to ride bicycles on these roads around here. Now the Erie Canal is a transportation resource again - but the vehicles are bicycles. LOTS of people on bicycles.

Guard Gate 9 - used in an emergency to dam the canal (which happened once in my memory when there was a break not far from here) - but more importantly, to keep the canal empty in the winter to minimize ice damage.

Visions of Amsterdam damned by dams - we learned our first winter that there was no ice skating on the canals - sigh.


Flip side of the gate - traveling over the (closed) spillway.



Just like in the past, very few boats. (I saw two in the hour I had to tour.)


There are a few levies separating the canal from adjacent waters.


There is a section of the path at Schoen Place where pedestrians have the canal walk, and people on bicycles ride in the road.

Traffic is moderate - and SLOW - very SLOW - it's not uncommon to be held up by motor cars. I only got a couple of shots where I wasn't looking at someone's bumper.


There are also raised pedestrian crossings and lots of bike parking.


Rare shot of getting ready to load the bike into the car before the long drive home.


-mr. bill

rholland1951

Sometimes I wait for the bus, sometimes the bus waits for me.


10 low-energy miles on the Rawland in the late afternoon, during which it occurred to me that what I actually wanted was a nap.

rod

rholland1951

Had the day off today, and took the Rawland to Depot Park mid-morning, warm and breezy, with both the thermometer and the Air Quality Index on the rise, hot and hazy by the end. Vibrant Summer day. Minuteman demographics report: a spike in the incidence of men pushing strollers at 10:30.


The Shawsheen impersonates the great gray-green greasy Limpopo River.






rod

jimmuller 

I left the house at 7:45 this morning for 53.04 miles on the Masi. The air got warmer as the day progressed and the miles accumulated!

Stopped to speak with a woman tending the flowers at in intersection island:



Rt 62 crosses the Assabet River five times between Maynard and Concord, if I counted right.

rumrunn6

10 miles w Wifey on the Hudson MUP. mostly uphill heading out and after 5 miles she was done and seemed to be suffering from the heat. rested a while drank water and poured some on her head. when she fell better, we rolled back practically all 5 miles downhill. got some food in her, now we're going to the pool before the storms start. not far from us got nailed hard yesterday afternoon.

Ghazmh

52 miles on the oh-so comfy and fast R3 this past Thursday. I am counting the hours until my Sunday morning ride. It had better be a great ride as I'll be off the bike for the next 8+ days for work and family commitments.

Ghazmh

It was a great Sunday ride indeed. The weather was oh so perfect. I squeezed in 62 miles, I could have counted the other cyclists I saw in the hundreds.

jimmuller 

Rode to work as usual this morning. Arlington must have been hit pretty hard by storms yesterday. One stretch of the Minuteman had some large tree trunks and branches broken, big sections a foot or more in diameter.

Archwhorides 

The Minuteman is now pretty clean, with only twigs and the occasional acorn as reminders of the weekend squalls. I departed Arlington Heights at 6 a.m. this morning and was rewarded with a pleasantly cool ride, contrasting with the blast-furnace temps of my previous daytime rides this week.

jimmuller 

My commute in the morning was delayed briefly by tree work going on on Pleasant St/Rt60 between Waverley Square and Belmont Center. Lots of stopped traffic and police barricades. I got off the bike and walked the sidewalk until I got to the work. A big section of tree branch had come down and was hanging from a very thick section of wires, probably communication (phone or cable), not power. A large cherry-picker truck with a power saw was taking off pieces one small bit at a time. Drivers were getting impatient, turning around, and zooming off the other way "at a high rate of speed". Other than that the road was quiet!