Papa Tom

Lots of cyclists in the Syosset-Plainview area surprised by the rain this am (Sat. 5/16). From the dry comfort of my car, it looked so refreshing. Some of my favorite all-time rides were in torrential Long Island downpours.

MoonJW

Newcomer here. I was with a friend and we took the LIRR from the city to Mineola. Our ride today went like this:

1) From Mineola, LIRR service road east to Woodbury Road
2) Woodbury Road north toward Huntington
3) My friend I was with wasn't into all the road traffic, so we turned around after a few miles and meandered our way down through various neighborhoods to the Bethpage bikeway, which we road to center of Bethpage.
4) We had in mind to take the LIRR back to the city from Bethpage, but many LIRR lines are out of service this weekend, so we biked back to Mineola using a combination of local roads and Old Country Road.

About 40 miles in all, very leisurely. The weather was good.

I'm not familiar with Long Island riding, but my observations are:

1) It's so convenient to get to. Much better than Westchester, and for me, even NJ
2) The car traffic is absolutely hideous, which I guess I expected. I bet it's better early in the day. (We didn't start riding until around 9:30AM). SUV after SUV careening through 40 MPH speed zones. Old Country Road, which we took in a couple of spots going from Bethpage to Mineola, was an unqualified nightmare. 6-8 lanes of traffic, and what little shoulder existed was full of glass and gravel. We rode on the sidewalks in a few spots because the traffic was bumper to bumper and the small shoulder had too many potholes.

My big takeaway: Route planning is a must in this area. Today, in the residential areas there were too many stop signs to get going any faster than about ~12MPH for anything longer than a few hundred yards. And if you don't pay close attention to your GPS, you will turn down many cul-de-sacs and have to turn around. A planned ride would be much more fun.

The 495 service road was convenient but hardly scenic.

All in all, for mostly-first time riding in the area it was a learning experience. (At least I know where not to go next time.) I'll come back and with more information. I'm looking forward to exploring more of the area and finding more bucolic sections to ride. Suggestions are always welcome.

Papa Tom

I think the root of your problem is that someone told you Bethpage is "Eastern Long Island." The "Eastern Long Island" that people write about begins, in my opinion, around Port Jefferson. From there eastward, the roads get calmer (except for peak summer season) and more scenic all the way to either tip, Greenport or Montauk.

You picked a section that is really crowded and not much fun to ride. But had you stayed on the Bethpage Bikeway south of Bethpage Park, your ride would have been much more memorable. The southern section of this bikeway, which is noticeably flatter, takes you through a nature preserve and some very peaceful suburban scenery. You could have also made your way down to the ocean on one of Long Island's finest bike paths.

I don't know what level riders you are, but many city cyclists also enjoy riding the "Gold Coast" areas of Oyster Bay Cove, East Norwich, Brookville, Lattingtown, etc. This is some hilly riding, but it's about as peaceful and quiet as LI riding gets.

There's also the "Across-The-Forks" ride that takes you from the Greenport LIRR station across Shelter Island to North Haven to Sag Harbor and The Hamptons. You're definitely right...the next time you plan to ride out here, ask for suggestions on this forum. There are lots of Long Island cyclists with good ideas and routes for all kinds of cyclists.

MoonJW

D-oh! Brain lapse there. I meant "western Long Island." I do like bethpage, as well as the ride down to and around jones beach. That much I've done. I like quiet roads and getting from one place to another with some scenery. Any suggestions for a good, quiet 50-mile ride near Port Jefferson?

kaos joe

Moon,
Next time you want to ride on a weekend, get a train to Bethpage arriving about 8am. Half a mile north of the station is the Bethpage public library. Ride into the parking lot across the street from the library and start asking the people you see wearing funny clothes where they are riding to. There will be 3 or 4 groups going various distances at various speeds, but they will all be starting at 830 and they will all have excellent knowledge of the roads. The rides will generally go north from there, either into the "Gold Coast" areas of Nassau or into northeastern Suffolk and will avoid heavily used roads. You won't have another bad day.

GlennR

Planned on riding out of Bethpage but didn't get a good nights sleep and it was really wet and humid. So I waited to 10:30am and headed out solo. Rode through the village of Massapequa Park and saw 10-12 cyclists outside the bagel shop. I quickly realized that it was the Huntington club "B" ride. So I decided to join them for the return and ride solo back. We headed north via Seaman's Neck, through Bethpage and up Washington. The pace was a bit slow so at Cold Spring Road i dropped off and headed north via 108. Turned left up "Fish Hatchery" and turned north to Oyster Bay. Took a break and then headed south to Syosset with a quick bathroom break at Brickwell. Then west to Muttontown, but decided to head south on 107 and back to Betpage and finally Massapequa.

It felt like summer and I drank a lot of water. Time to start carrying 2 water bottles.

GlennR

Wanted to ride with the Huntington club but had to be back early so I decided to head out solo and earlier.

Left at 6:30 and went to Toby. Headed north and rolled into the Bethpage Library lot at 8:15 and decided to jump on the "A" ride to Kings Park. 3/4 of the way there I along with another rider broke off and headed to Greenlawn where we stopped for a snack. Then kind of "noodled" our way back to to Old Country - Half Hollow - Farmingdale and finally back to Massapequa.

64 miles @ 15.1 with a nasty North wind.

Just pasted 400 miles for the month and i still have a week left.

FIVE ONE SIX

where does the HBC meet?! their website just says Greenlawn, but Greenlawn is a pretty decent sized area...

GlennR

Near the train station.

kaos joe

Not the best day on the tandem, but could have been a lot worse......did the MPBC AA ride up to Ft. Salonga. We hit a pothole on the way up that claimed another riders tubular tire and caused my h-bars to rotate downwards. Tire changed, bars straightened, we continued....on the way home hit another much smaller bump, nothing much really, and with a nice cracking sound the threads ripped out of the stem at one of the 2 faceplate bolts. They must have been slowly failing. This time the bars really rotated downward, in a fraction of a second. Quite exciting. We were able to stop safely and no blood was shed. The Mrs. wanted to know how close we came to crashing and I lied. I gave my car keys to one of the other guys and he rescued us. New stem installed, let's try this again tomorrow.

GlennR

Glad you survived.

GlennR

Went out today with my son's best friend (24) and dragged his ass for 30 miles.

North to Woodbury and then south via Sweet Hollow, over Mt. Misery and down Round Swamp and back to Massapequa.

Must of passed 100 other cyclist heading north on Sweet Hollow.

FIVE ONE SIX

thanks...

GlennR

Rode from Massapequa to Sagamore Hill and back. I stopped at Cedar Creek and the path was packed. so bad that I turned around about a 1/2 mile down. Too many families (4-5 bikes), couldn't get even a slow pace going. Headed back to the head of trail to rest and all 4 benches were taken.. .no room to sit.

Just passed 1000 miles for the season.

csi56

On Sunday afternoon, after the Jones Beach air show was over, I finally made it down to Cedar Creek area, parked north of Merrick. I was a salmon going upstream against the family traffic and the 13 mph wind, so I got to practice holding a narrow line at the right edge of the pavement in order to give the masses enough room going the other way. On the way back, the wind was at my back, making for an easy trip. Pleasant, but maybe next year I'll get my butt in gear a little earlier and see the show.

Papa Tom

It's a real "cyclist scene" down at the show - the one time of year I feel like I'm part of one of those motorcycle meet-ups you always see on TV. The air show, if you don't have any reservations about glorifying killing machines, is something that sticks with you for a long time.

GlennR

Went out for a "easy" 20 miles and wound up doing 52 miles @ 15.6mph with 2150' of climbing.

I need to get my head examined.

GlennR

Rode with the Huntington Bike Club out of Greenlawn today. We went to St. James. Got a flat on the way back. .250" cut in the tire but was able to make it back.

There goes a $70 repair.

BTW... killer month for riding.

kaos joe

BTW... killer month for riding.

Wow, 598 miles!

I'm way behind you at about 475.

Papa Tom

You guys make me feel so inadequate, but I will report that I took an awesome ride today from Syosset to Teddy Roosevelt Beach in Oyster Bay. It's only about 10 miles round trip, but I incorporate a small patch of wooded dirt trail that adds a special dimension to the ride. It's also uphill pretty much the whole way home, which, on my tank of a bicycle, feels like I'm pushing a damned cruise ship for five miles.

My vertigo is definitely better, but the pollen is totally killing me on my bike commutes and leisure rides like this one. The studded platform pedals I switched to when I first got on the bike after two weeks with the dizzies have really grown on me. I think I'm going to keep them.

If the weather holds out tomorrow (Sunday), I may do Syosset to Bethpage to Massapequa and, if the energy is there,I might continue to Jones Beach. I haven't felt that kind of strength or ambition yet this year, but who knows when it will finally hit.

GlennR

Awesome news.

If you make it to Massapequa, you should look me up.

GlennR

Went out of Bethpage today heading to Comack, but had a nasty creak coming from the crank so i turned back and only did 14 miles. It pushed my past 600 miles.

Anyway the creak turned out to be from the cleat and not the crank. It was a easy fix.

Ferdinand NYC

I am glad to see that I am not the only one who keeps a graph of his riding! I began doing that three years ago, and it has kept me motivated.

I also had a great month of May, passing 700 miles.

GlennR

Damn... when do you sleep?

Ferdinand NYC

Hehe! Well, I commute to work, about 10 1/2 miles each way. So, if I do nothing else but ride to and from work Monday through Friday, that's about 400 miles in the month. That is what I shoot for during a bad-weather month.

But, when the warm weather comes in, I start to take my vacation days in order to ride all day; and I also frequently do full days on the weekends. This past week, May 24-30, I totalled more than 300 miles, doing more than 50 miles on four separate days. It was my third highest weekly total since I began keeping records.

I am hoping for a very hot summer. The hotter it is, the stronger I get.