DROVES 2015 - Day 3

DROVES - Day 3 - 1 Trapped Cat, 1 Vertical Mile and Lots of Tulips

First let me say that if you want an awesome campfire, invite Ted to your event. Ted builds the best fires. He's a pro, coming prepared with his own special fire starting kit, which he conveniently keeps in the trunk of his car at all times for the spontaneous campfire. 

Sadly for the curious cat, Megatron, open trunks must be explored, and while we were enjoying tall tells, strange music and great beer, Megatron was getting cozy inside Ted's car.

But then, without realizing he had a visitor, Ted closed up the car, and once the beer was gone and fire died down, we all headed off to bed.

DROVES 2015 - Day 2

DROVES - Day 2 arrived with bright sunshine and much warmer temperatures. However, most folks seemed cautious and arm warmers and vests were still prominent as we gathered around the picnic table, getting ready for our attempt on Radar Road. It seemed that fresh memories from a very chilly descent to Lake Willoughby just couldn't be shaken. Nevertheless, as we mingled about pumping up tires and checking brakes, there was no denying that it was indeed significantly warmer. Some people even threw caution to the wind and stripped down to just shorts and short sleeve jersey. Still, being sensitive to cold, I traded leg warmers for knee warmers and kept my arm warmers on. I also carried my wind vest, just in case sanity left me and I climbed up to Radar and needed it for the descent.

As a special treat, Dave and Nancy came down from Waitsfield to join us for the day. We'd met them serendipitously at a Luka Bloom concert last year. While awaiting the start of the show, we discovered that we had more than musical taste in common, as Dave runs many of the Vermont brevets, and his sister and brother-in-law run Red Hen Baking Company, a bakery/cafe in Waitsfield that we love. We've kept in touch and when I sent out FB invites to come join us for rides and dinner, they decided to do just that.

DROVES 2015 - Day 1

For many years now, we have spent Memorial Day weekend ascending and descending the many exquisite dirt roads of Vermont. This year would be no exception.

Megatron, The Barn cat, has to inspect everything.

We've been staying at the Burke Bike Barn since it opened in 2011. The first time we stayed, we fell in love with the place. So much so, that I booked it for Memorial Day and Labor Day for life. I'm not sure that Doug, the owner, thought I was serious at first, but we've been going up for these dirty climb-fest weekends at the beginning and end of summer ever since, and we aren't about to give up our reservation for the future.

The Bike Barn is exactly what it says it is. It's a big old barn that's been converted to comfortable accommodation for cyclists in the center of one of the best biking locations on the planet. We usually have a dozen folks staying at the barn, with frequent drop-ins for rides by folks who live or are staying nearby. At this stage, it all works like clockwork. We have a few routes, covering a variety of distances. Depending on weather, mood and other arbitrary factors, we will decide which route to do. The one thing all the routes have in common is lots of smooth-packed, quiet dirt roads and maximal climbing per mile. These are quality miles, such that even a 30 mile ride will not leave any sane person wanting more.

F2G2 - Fall Foliage Gravel Grinder

I have a whole slew of posts to put together from our September trip in Oregon, but Fear Rothar still has to whittle down the massive number of photos he took on that trip, so in the meantime I'm skipping ahead to a ride we did last weekend. While the Fall Foliage Gravel Grinder also involved numerous photo stops per mile, being just a one day event, the sheer number of photos was smaller, making his task of going through them much less daunting. As such, it allows me to have an almost timely post, for once. But fear not, Oregon posts are forthcoming! After all, we've got to get them out before we go to Ireland and create an even worse backlog! [It would help if I wasn't working 16-hour days - FR] [Whatever - FP]

The Frenemy

I've long claimed that I don't train. I ride my bike to hang out with friends at good cafés, after taking in all the magnificent scenery on the way. I don't use a heart rate monitor. I don't do intervals. I don't race. I just ride my bike.

But the reality is that all that riding can have the side benefit of increased fitness. And sometimes I do seek out hills and make an effort to get up them in short order. But still this is not training, not in any structured way, not in any way that a coach would call training.

Not a Recovery Ride! Hair of the Dog

Fear Rothar teases me about my choice of routes for the day after various Big Event™ rides. He likes to call them Recovery Rides - with a big dose of sarcasm. I prefer to think of them more as Hair of the Dog that Bit Ya. In reality, I am just taking advantage of the great terrain in whatever place we happen to be. Since most of our Big Event™ rides take in lots of climbing and dirt roads, most of our day-after-the-day-before rides tend to do the same. Recovery rides do not happen on weekends!

Spring 7000 - a weekend with Henry and friends

We first met Henry in 2011, when he was the only person daft enough to join us on a bitterly cold Christmas eve ride to Mt. Wachusett and back, part of that year's Rapha Festive 500 challenge. That was his longest ride ever at that time, by quite a margin, if I recall correctly. However, he took everything in his stride and brought a spirit of festive cheer with him that made for a fun spin.

It was obvious that we had an affinity for exploring by bike and taking pictures of what we saw - not to mention that he and I had worked in the same building in The Netherlands many years before, albeit not at the same time - and we became fast friends (I'm speaking of Henry there). We have shared many miles on the road and trail since then, although that first ride hasn't been the only one with bad weather. However, those are stories for another time...

Belting Up Mt Washington

Yes, this post is about an event that happened a couple of weeks ago. Yes, I'm behind on the blog. What's new? At least I'm not as far behind as my friend Rob!

The 6 weeks between July's Newton's Revenge race up Mt Washington and the traditional August Mt Washington Hillclimb race was a very busy time for me. But with the motivation to do proper justice to my new Seven belt-drive fixie with extra special Mt Washington gearing, I decided to kick it up a notch and do some actual hill training.

I made a nuisance of myself on the various roads leading up to the Arlington Water Tower. I am either now considered part of the neighborhood watch program, or I've been reported by the neighborhood watch program. However, not being one for repeatedly going up the same road, I've found over a dozen different routes  up and a few different ways down, some of which had no Strava QOMs prior to my taking them! Of course, I don't expect them to last. Seems some of my fast female friends take great pleasure in finding and annihilating all my QOM times.

Rapha Rising - more like Mercury Rising

According to our local meteorologists, a heatwave is defined as more than three days in a row where the temperature exceeds 90 degrees Fahrenheit. Growing up in the south, a heatwave would typically start in April and end in October! But thankfully I left that weather behind long ago when I moved to Boston. The reward for putting up with long cold winters here is supposed to be a nice pleasant summer. But life isn't fair, and this year, we had a cold miserable winter, followed by a chilly wet spring, and you guessed it a hot humid summer. So careful what you wish for... it's not cold now! We have had many days of 90+F temps along with some brutal humidity this summer. Once every 7 to 10 days, we'll get a lovely 75F day with low humidity, but then the oppressive stuff comes right back... thus multiple heatwaves...

Mt Washington Demands Respect!

"Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it. " -George Santayana

Research suggests that for women who experience mild to moderate pain during childbirth, the euphoria and relief of having a happy healthy child seems to overwhelm the memories of pain such they later report their pain as less severe than those present for all the screaming might otherwise expect!

So maybe it's like that with me and Mt Washington. I just remember the relief and euphoria of being on the top and done, and forget all the dread leading up to the start, and all the suffering during the actual ascent. Or maybe I'm really just a masochist.

However, the article I read about mothers seemingly forgetting the intense pain of childbirth did go on to say that those women who initially reported their pain as unbearable - worse pain ever, did not have diminished memories of the severity of their pain later.

HighPoint Ride - presented by Ride Studio Cafe

A bit over a year ago, Rob Vandermark starting talking about doing a hilly ride. And by hilly, he meant he wanted to find the biggest climb in Massachusetts, and ride there from Ride Studio Cafe. Exploring on Strava, he found that Mt Greylock was the only Hors catégorie climb in the state, so he decided that would make a good destination. I pointed out that it would be more than 300 miles round trip, so we started planning a two day ride. Even with two days, it would still be quite the challenge, so he made the concession of allowing remote starts for folks who might be a bit less ambitious than to want to do 160 miles and 16,000 feet of climbing out to Greylock and 160 miles and 12,000 feet back!

A Vertical Epic

Yesterday I hit a milestone - well not so much a milestone as a foot-stone. According to my records on Strava, I've climbed 1 million feet this year!

Now I'll be the first to admit that I am quite lucky to have lots of time on my hands, enabling me to go out and do long rides every day. And my ability to clock up this much climbing has a lot more to do with time to ride than anything else. But it's still something I got excited about as I got closer to the big number.

We had a very mild winter in 2012, which allowed me and most of my riding neighbors to do a lot of early season riding. Then Strava had this climbing challenge from mid-March to the end of April. I got a little taste of competition as I flirted with the top spot on the female leaderboard. And by the end, I'd accumulated a lot of feet, and it seemed also a new love of climbing.

I've never considered myself a climber. Fear Rothar is the climber. But he seems to influence me a bit. I started doing the hill-climb races, because he was doing the hill-climb races. And of course when we ride the tandem, I have no choice but to go up and down all the same hills. But I will admit that at some point I developed a real love of the views from the top of these climbs, and eventually found I also really enjoyed the journey.

A suitable brew!

The ride that put me over the top!

Because Sometimes the Road Goes Up

Hello Mountains!

"Because sometimes the road goes up" - This was my gut reaction recently when, after posting these photos on facebook, a friend asked about the advantage of the nominal mountain bike derailleur on a road bike. I did think the "Hello Mountains" caption was pretty clear, but it seems it wasn't.

The Fall Five

This week, a unique solo stage race, Fall Five is being hosted by our local bike and coffee shop, Ride Studio Cafe (RSC). While RSC is clearly one of the best places for cyclists to hang out, drool over cool bikes and accessories and clothes, drink espresso and meet with cycling friends, the proprietors do recognize that we all have very busy schedules, and sometimes it's just not possible to coordinate and all get together for a ride/race at the same time. So they came up with this clever stage race, that let's us compete with each other, on our own schedules.

Two Chicks on a Tandem do the Great River Ride

This week my Tuesday ride had 4 riders of the female persuasion and one lone male. When Bob joined us en route, I commented to him that he was lucky to ride with 4 chicks. He agreed that we were delightful company, but commented that while we were allowed to call ourselves chicks, he probably was not!

Ah well, I've never been one to worry much about political correctness. I love telling the story of one of our fleche rides. We had three gals riding fixed gear bikes, and our team name was "Fixie Chicks".  But that's not the story. My two teammates were 10 or 20 years younger than me. We were close to the end of our 250 mile/24 hour ride, when we came to an intersection. I must have been slightly ahead and crossed safely, but the other two stopped and got a kick out of watching the guys passing by on Harleys, who apparently twisted their heads around quite noticeably checking me out! So now I call myself a post-feminist, because my reaction to that was to think that this was pretty cool!

Missed Opportunities

We will definitely make a return trip to the Cevennes. First and foremost to visit our friends, Eddie and Chisa. But we missed a few climbs, and we must do them all. We also missed about half the Gorges du Tarn, and according to some sources, the part we missed was even more spectacular than the part we saw. We didn't ride across the top of Mt Lozere. We never made it back to ride through  the Ardeche Gorge. And we totally missed out on Nimes. When we arrived in Nimes at the beginning of the trip, we really only saw the area immediately by the train station. It was all under construction and just wasn't appealing. Eddie's GPS then picked the most unattractive way out of town. And with all the construction in the area, Eddie was none too impressed with the city and made his feelings known.

For our return trip, Eddie drove us back into Nimes, where we'd spend the night and then catch the TGV the next morning to get back to Paris for our flight home. As we wandered around Nimes that evening, we realized we'd have to come back and spend some time there. I managed to get a few shots the next morning before we caught the train.

One More Day to Climb

We had one final day for cycling in France and it was a exquisite one. We had such a nice time climbing Mt. Bouquet the first week that we thought we'd head back out and take Eddie with us this time. We decided to make it a shorter ride than our first journey, since we needed to get back and take the bikes apart and pack up all our stuff before getting a lift into Nimes where we'd stay the night before catching the train to Paris the next morning.

We also decided to approach the mountain from the opposite side this time, which would make it a completely different ride for us. The interesting thing about this approach was that we could see the mountain sitting out in front of us for miles and miles, where the route we took the first time left the climb as a sudden shocking surprise. We suggested to Eddie that he could bring folks he didn't like up the surprise way!

The End Is Near

After the drama and excitement of the day before, our ride back to Vezenobres seemed almost like a let down. Moreso, since this was our last day out touring. It was sad to think our holiday was almost over. I think this made me ride slower and stop more often just to make the trip last longer.

After coffee and many thanks to Vincent for his kind hospitality (Joelle had left for work very early), we rode into town to find some food for breakfast and lunch. We would be following a lot of the roads we had ridden with Eddie when coming back from Mt Aiguoal, and we remembered that there weren't many services along the way, so again it would be a good idea to stock up where we could. 

The Kindness of Strangers

Josie Dew is one of my favorite authors. If you don't know of her, you may suspect, based on my cycling obsession and my fondness for her books, that she writes about cycling - self supported cycle touring to be specific. Twenty-some years ago, she started taking off on long self-supported tours, first with a boyfriend, and later, once he proved too fragile, solo. She wrote a book about one of those early tours, and then soon after wrote another and another. After a while books just kept appearing after some extended bike tour in some exotic or not so exotic place. Her writing style is quite humorous and very much to my taste.

The kindness of strangers is a recurring theme in her books. Maybe because she was a female touring alone, with an enormous load, including the kitchen sink it seems, she would often have folks stop and give her things, like food, and Hello Kitty paraphernalia (that - mostly when when she was touring in Japan). Now no one has ever stopped us while we were touring to offer us Hello Kitty socks, or cans of soda, or asked us to come home and camp in their back garden. I suspect part of the reason Josie got more attention is that she was a female, traveling alone. And given the load she was already carrying, what's a little more! Oh and we've never toured in Japan, so maybe we would get the same treatment there and need to carry an empty pannier to hold all the gifts!

Simply Gorges!

Today we really learned what makes the Cevennes so special. I hinted a couple of days ago that it seemed to be much more about the valleys or gorges than the mountains, and our ride through the Gorges Du Tarn proved that beyond any shadow of a doubt!

We have hundreds of photos from today, and have tried to select a nice subset. It's the reason it has taken so long to get this post out.