New Year’s Eve Ride
It’s official. This month will go into the record books as the warmest December ever. Plus we had only three inches of snow as compared to the long-term average of 25. My snow tires are still in the bedroom, where they’re likely to stay for another two weeks, judging from the long-term forecast.
This makes me feel less than “hard-core” about today’s ride. Even so, there are few people around there who rode on New Year’s Eve. In 59 miles, we encountered fewer than 10 other cyclists.
Another Rochesterian, squegeeboo, popped-up on Bike Forums a couple of weeks ago. We exchanged PMs, emails and finally a phone call, and made a date to ride today. Turns out he lives in the next block even. He’s a newbie too and has a bike very similar to mine. Same brand, same line, slightly different components, and I think it’s a 2005 model. He wanted to go on his first long ride, thinking 30 or 40 miles or so.
“I was thinking maybe ride out to Brockport and back,” he told me.
“Wait a minute,” I said. “I’ll look it up in my journal.” A few clicks later and, “Last time I rode there it was 50 miles round-trip.”
“That sounds okay to me.”
We set out at 10 this morning. It was sunny, right around freezing and, unusually, the wind was from the ESE. This typically means a storm is coming within a few hours. But we figured we’d have enough time. Partway out to Brockport, we swung by Bikerjohn’s place. I knocked on the door and he answered, clad in lycra as if he was waiting for us.
I never did ask why he was hanging around the house in bike clothes. Hmmm…
Anyway, he joined us for the middle 20 miles or so of our ride. Perhaps most importantly, he directed us to the Radio Shack in Brockport, where I got new batteries for my cyclometer, and took us to a great little hole-in-the-wall hot dog and burger place on Main St in the village.
My two white hots were grilled to perfection and the bun was slightly toasted on the grill too. Mmmm, yummy.
I initially balked at riding back on NY 104, which Bikerjohn had suggested. “The Ridge” is one of the busiest highways through the city and through the eastern suburbs, one of the deadliest highways in the entire state. Here on the west side, I remember it being narrow, bumpy, with broken shoulders and a 55 MPH speed limit.
He assured me that recent repaving had made it quite a nice bike route, with wide shoulders, and that they’d reduced the speed limit. He was right. Although there’s no way I’d have ridden it much further east than we did.
Shortly after John left us, a cloud bank moved-in, so the rest of the ride back was in heavy overcast and a headwind. We rode NY31, which is also State Bike Route 5, to the city, jumped on the Canalway, taking the paths back to the east side.
Arriving home, I was tired, sore and feeling great all at the same time. I logged my ride and was disappointed to find I was less than two miles short of 2,800 for the year.
What the hell, I thought. I geared-up and went on a grocery run. That let me close the year with 2,801.93 miles, close the month with 304.01, and, dammit! Four miles short of a metric century, at 58.12 on the day. It was not worth it to gear up again.
