Will do, Barry.

sounds fun

Catonsville/ Baltimore. I'm living in College Park currently, doing the college thing.

We may have to get a BF-Maryland ride coordinated, eh?

Let me know. It would be good to meet y'all. I ride all year but don't know about a century in winter....unless the temps are as nice as this week.

This is crazy talk, but you guys make me want to get off my rollers and go out and ride in cold weather!

Hey no-racer, you have some really nice rides on route-slip. I have often done a "tour" of sparrow's point myself when there is more light out-- its my favorite for after work. In fact, I got puncture resistant tires expressly so that I could ride down there without getting multiple flats.

Since I'm here, has anyone ever done Franklintown and Dogwood roads to go westbound out of the city? I've been thinking of adding those to my little repertoire of routes. They are long rural roads but I don't have a feel for how safe/convenient they are. Basically this route (but backwards and I would probably avoid starting on Franklintown at Frederick road).

Back in the day when I live near Morgan State College, I did that route. I rode south through Baltimore, west on Rt. 40, then cut through a neighborhood to the eastern end of Dogwood Rd. That takes you through Leakin Park, Franklintown, Woodlawn and out across Rolling Road. There is also a great little detour to Dickyville you can take to see an old mill town. If you continue west you will pass Diamond Ridge golf course and go down to the Patapsco Valley and then climb a huge hill. If you follow Dogwood all the way it ends on Old Court Rd. and you can continue west into Howard County. It's a fun ride, but I would do the Rt. 40 part as early in the morning as possible to keep from getting jumped....

If you're worried about Franklintown, the Gwynn's Falls Trail runs parallel to it. Nice ride thru the woods, and not crowded.
The parts of Franklintown I have been on seem ok (although I haven't taken it near 40)
Never ridden on Dogwood, so I can't help you there.

I'm up for a MD BF ride this winter. Maybe not a full century. We could call it the MD Frostbite Metric. You all just have to make the ride no drop so I don't end up by myself :-)

-D

Bah! No crazier than riding in the fog this morning! :D

I'll try to give this some thought for this weekend (Saturday), since it looks like it will stay out of the 20s F in the morning.

Sunday, I -may- be doing this low stress BBC ride:

From experience, this ride is not very scenic until you get closer to the park. Even then, it depends on what your definition of scenic is.

At the start, you're riding toward Alicianna and Boston St, crossing over Dundalk Ave., picking up Delvale, then Sollers Point, crossing Merrit Blvd to Pennisula Blvd. You pick up "Beth' Blvd" to Wharf Rd followed by North Point Blvd. Then we pick up some trails and low traffic roads that eventually land us at the park.

This ride is later in the day, so the temps will be up.

This is definitely a "smell the roses" ride--a good one for new members who have never ridden on a group ride before. There will be some 10-12 MPH 'speedsters' on this ride and maybe even some 'bent' riders.

Yea I am definitely getting some riding in this weekend. Probably my "lunchtime" ride with some modifications for more distance.

http://trail.motionbased.com/trail/i...kValue=1638578

-D

I was freakin' out in that fog this morning. FWIW I haven't driven a car to work since mid Oct I'm approaching 5,000 miles but don't think I'll get it this year

Angelo: I have ridden Frederick rd(Pratt and Lombard in the city) and it's fair. had a little verbal thrown my way but no real problems. The Gwynn Falls trail is ok as well. Dogwood scenic BUT narrow twisty tight road. Franklintown has a real nasty area(Monroe street). If you drive it, it's the area the mini freeway bypasses. I think the best way out of town is to ride N towards JHU campus, go towards Hampden, cross JFX on 42nd st (near TV hill,avoid the big hills this way), snake your way through Mondawmin mall area(not to bad) through Leakin Park/Dickeysville to Dogwood. If you are seriously interested I'll googlemap it for ya. Charlie
PS I have a ton of ***** to do this wknd, lots of family coming in for the holidays....but post up the rides you never know.

PPS: On a parting note: Is there a bike trail being built along the JFX. I saw a lot of dirt and what looks to be a road on the eastern side of the expressway. This would be awesome

That looks like a nice ride.

Did you want some company? And, if so, what time do you want to start? (taking into consideration that I would still have ~2.4 hours more of riding to get home)

I exported your route to a GPX, then imported it into RouteSlip, so that I could more easily find the start (and apparently the stop) for the ride. Then, I mapped a route from the end of your ride to my street-- ~60 miles total. After that, I added in the difference of 36 miles to get to the start of your route. I'll have ~96 miles @ >5,000 ft of climbing. It's do-able, if you let me have ~2.4 hours to get there (avg 15 MPH).

Here's the route that I mapped in RouteSlip:

derath's Lunchtime Ride then home

Anyone else interested in meeting me along the way? The Human Car (Barry)? Charlie?

.

No Racer: I doubt I can do it this wknd. Doubt I will see a bike this wknd

EDIT!!! I was wrong about Franklintown road. I meant Franklin blvd. Franklintown road is very nice(i've ridden it 100's of X's, doh) I just made a gmapsped ride from the city which will take you through 4 nice parks(druidhill, wyman and leakin/Gwynn oak) and ends at Patapsco. Dogwood at patapsco gets really steep. You might want to ride to the Patapsco river for a lunch break. Ride into the parking lot (on left)where Dogwood gets steep. Ride past the private residence(stay to the left and loop back around). This trail is flat(not for 23 tires) and follows the river for a few miles. Have fun, Charlie
http://www.gmap-pedometer.com/?r=587762

I dunno. My only concern is how bad you guys would smoke me:D

Seriously though. I just was reminded by my social director (wife) that we are taking the family to the [edit]Kenilworth Mall[edit] for some model train christmas thing at noon on saturday. That kind of cuts my day.

So if we wanted to get together and ride on saturday, probably the only way would be if we somehow met in Towson (I can bring my stuff) and take a ride. Then I would have to figure out a route home.

Otherwise sunday is possible. I generally ride home from church.

http://www.routeslip.com/map.php?map=11522

But I could reroute another way and take the long way home or something...

Plus I think my inlaws get into town sunday, so I may not be in a huge rush to get home.

-D

Supposed to be warm tomorrow. I will be doing the club/team ride out of Mt. Washington (Joe's) bike shop (Baltimore). This ride leaves at 10 AM (supposedly - but is always a few minutes late) and I ride over and pick it up as it heads north on Falls Rd. Most times the ride will head northwest up Park Heights Ave. or Thornton Rd. and out through the valley to Hampstead via Dover Rd. or just south of Hampstead, then turn east and return through Lock Raven reservoir. Otherwise, it goes generally the other way, out through Loch Raven reservoir first then heading west and home through the valley and Cuba Rd. This ride is open to all and the pace/distance varies depending on the whims of the ride 'patrons' (cat 1/2 guys). Usually the pace is quite mellow for the first hour. Then, it will pick up with slowdowns after the climbs for regrouping. Folks wishing to go shorter/slower will peal off in small groupettos when they feel like it. The hard-core guys get whittled down to eight to ten riders and put in 3-4 hours at a 18+ MPH average pace over rolling terrain.

I live in DC but want to get out to Beltsville Ag. station for a ride. Can someone tell me a good loop to do out there and how to access the place. I know nothing about it. Maps would be good, too.

Thanks,

Can you be more specific? There is the visitors center, which I don't think is all that great for cycling. They have some trails but not extensive.

There is another area further north. But closer to the summer it got damaged by flooding.

-D

Here's the main route from the Greenbelt Metro. It includes Old town Bowie/Ducketstown loop and the Patuxent wildlife loop. This is my hood during work hours. I often ride these roads for a lunch nooner. Very very nice ride. You can include the Anacostia or NW trail systems. For more info go to bikewash site. both links below. Charlie

http://www.gmap-pedometer.com/?r=589149

http://bikewashington.org/

Charlie,

How are the roads on that 24-mile loop you do? It looks pretty rural east of the Baltimore-Washington Tpk. Is it a good ride for hammering, or is there too much traffic?

Hey All...eastern shore guy here, looking to do some new exploring around the area on some "day tours". I would definately be interested in a Metric Century or something similar. I did a roundtrip Easton to Tilghman Island ride today, ended up with 54 miles total. I have only 38 more miles to go to hit the 3K mark since May 1st (when I started counting the miles).

As far as that route through west baltimore goes...the last time I went that way (in a vehicle) it looked a tad bit rough, you may want to drive it first to get a more current impression.

-Scott

Western MD checking in here....Hagerstown/Williamsport area near Potomac river.

That's gotta be some pretty riding. Pretty hilly too

-D

Powder mill(212) has traffic but a large fairly clean and great condition shoulder, and very scenic. Beaver dam rd is narrow fair condition, blind curves, low traffic and even more scenic. Loop through Patuxent wildlife refuge has little traffic and very scenic. Springfield rd in Old Bowie is narrow with light traffic. Kenilworth, road from the Metro, has the most traffic but does have a new repaved shoulder You can easily hammer on Powdermill, Beaver dam and Sprinfield. The roads east of Kenilworth(201) are owned by USDA Research Center, are very rural(considering you are just outside the DC beltway). You'll see research buildings, farms as well as NASA and Secret Service property. Lots of hunting in the nearby woods these days.

I hope you all rode your bikes this weekend. I was stuck working on my kitchen and visiting relatives. Charlie

For Saturday, I decided to ride alone, because I wanted to try out some new "instrumentation" and didn't want the ridicule from racers, otherwise, I would have gone with the Joe's Bike Shop out at Mt. Washington. Here's where I went Saturday:

http://www.routeslip.com/map.php?map=14197 [Essex to Havre de Grace - ~64 miles @ ~1,700 ft of climbing]

Sunday, I met up with the Baltimore Bike Club for their Fells Point to North Point Park ride. The Human Car (Barry) was there, but along the way, we lost our ride leader. Much of the ride was leaderless, but cue sheets were available at the beginning of the ride, so the risk of getting lost was minimal for those not familiar with the area.

Here's the route that I took for my ride, yesterday:

http://www.gmap-pedometer.com/?r=593185

Notice, that I rode around in circles for a while, as I waited for the club to reach Boston St. They didn't get to where I dismounted until ~20 minutes after the ride should have started (if it started on time).

Also, on the way back (since we mysteriously lost our ride leader--I took up the "sweeper" duties), I took an alternate route. In hind-sight, I shouldv'e not led the less experienced rider that I had with me through this area, but once on O'Donnell, I was pretty much committed, especially after missing my left turn to Boston St after riding through the Travel Center. (duh!)

Barry, the clover-leaf on-ramp that we touched on yesterday is shown in the map above (Eastern Blvd to I-695 ramp).

It's the very same one that I wrote about, here:

http://www.baltimorespokes.org/artic...51228133125987

If there is a way to get permission to legally use it to get to Dundalk, that'd be great!

I didn't get to ride saturday. Kid issues+cleaning for the inlaws arrival ate up my day.

Sunday I got one in though

http://trail.motionbased.com/trail/e...kValue=1758580

25 miles and about 2600 feet of climbing. Best part is I cut out almost an hour of inlaw visiting as a result. Of course they are visiting for 2 weeks so that benefit is all relative...

I wrote up a report over in the road forum

http://www.bikeforums.net/showthread.php?t=253917

Gonna try to ride tomorrow as well. I know it will be colder, but I have ample motivation to stay out of the house.

-D

Southeast Baltimore County here - Sparrows Point

glad to see some folks get out and ride. I could tell you all about the fine paint brush strokes I applied for 2 coats of paint on wall and trim over the course of 25 hrs of work. I won't bore you w/ the details.

No Racer The east side of town has some tough roads to navigate(Eastern Ave..pot holes traffic and no shoulder) There are more freeways, overpasses and just a serious amount traffic in this region of Balto. I was able to eliminate it by riding on Rolling Mill rd and Lombard(north of eastern). Seems like you did a good job avoiding it as well.

Thanks, Charlie.

Actually, I take Eastern Blvd/Ave head on. Many times I haven't had a problem getting to the city, but coming back, there's a couple of sections where motor vehicle operators make their displeasure known when I take up an entire lane on a hill that they're used to doing the speed limit (usually faster) on--the section at the junction of I-95 and Eastern and going up the hill towards Eastpoint (cemetary on the right). I've even been passed on the right by a motocycle when taking an entire lane, because at the time I was riding where the left car tires would usually be. Too bad there's not a cop around when you need one.