Thursday, June 30, 2011

Bike tour 2011





Bike tour 2011, a set on Flickr.

Lake Champlain 2011

Monday, June 27, 2011

On the road Day 1

It is a sunny day as we launch down the gravel driveway.   Theresa almost gets run off the road by my nephews neighbor in her SUV.  I exchange the complementary bikers greeting of move over A-hole and we are off.  Its 7:30 an we already have an rush on .  We push it up the first big dirt hill and off we go.  I pass what appears to be a cat on RT104 but its a baby fox!
 Mushrooms in Fairfax


 Cows of course


  A turtle that was in the road -  I put him back into the field.




    A house and garage covered in cast iron fry pans -  ???


 Rt 78 in Vt  We almost get run over by trucks every 30 seconds or so.  Flooding is everywhere


      Yum green flooded roadsides!




   Fly hatch in Alburg


We cross at Alburg and pull up to customs.   There is no one around so we wait at the window for a while.  Someone shows up and we are let into Canada.   We could have just rode our bike across and no one would have noticed.  The roads instantly turn to crap.  

 We bike up to Noyan the next "town" on the map.   Yes three houses is a town I guess.  But we meet with a Bike Vermont tour group and they tell us about the only restaurant around so we bike south to get there.  We go in and find the menu of course in french.  I order the special that appears to me to be a Caesar salad but it turns our to be BBQ ribs with salad.

Its 85 degrees out and a plate full of ribs is not exactly bike food,  But its tasty and we devour it.  We have  a great chat with the bike group and off we go north.

We see lots of farms  - a field with dead fish from the flooding hat is across the road from the river what a smell!.   Porta potty's are everywhere as everyone septic systems are flooded out.   House are just trashed in some places.  Its hot - flat and farms.

We stop at a store to get drinks and they don't speak English or take American money.   We haven't changed and money to Canadian yet.  We finally hit St Jean after 72 miles and a million detours due to flooding.   We check in and head down the street for some great pizza and the BEST beer in the world!


Day one is over .

Lake Champlain Tour

So it begins:

The bikes - her bike  Trek 1.2    50/34 compact double   -  11/32  cassette- Brooks 68S saddle - Toppeak MXP trunk bag with expandable panniers.  Conti- 4 season 700x28 tires
His - Kona Jake the Snake  42/36 compact double -11/32 cassette -  Brooks 68 saddle - Trunk bag with expandable panniers ( some brand I can identify anymore)- Schwable marathon 700x28 tires.

The route for the first day:

View Larger Map

We pack everything into zip lock gallon bags and press all the air out to compact it as much as possible.  It looks like about 15 pounds of stuff when its all said and done.  The area we are riding into has had lots of flooding so I call ahead to Local Motion in Burlington and get a non-biker on the phone.  She said everything up north should be fine.   We shall see.   We have the route picked out and drive up to my nephews in Fairfax to drop the car and launch the next day.   We have an enjoyable stay but are of course chomping at the bit.

Monday, May 30, 2011

Good weekend

Two 60 mile rides and a 25. One great loop - Montague, Whatley, Hadenville, Leeds , Noho and back. The girls in Hadenville have big brown eyes.

Saturday, May 21, 2011

Brattleboro Ride

54 miles...

Start

Mile 12
Mile 29

Mile 31

So watch out for railroad tracks or you both end up in a pile.

Theresa did the tuck and roll.

I on the other hand even have road rash on my stomach. Over the handlebars at 15 mph.

Wednesday, May 18, 2011

Thursday, October 7, 2010

Comutaah


Park the car and ride the comutah

Bike that is. 44 miles round trip . 1.5 hours each way. Took the Bionx off and changed out the tires to slicks . Not bad.

Shelburne Falls



Or hill fest. 9600ft of vertical gain - 54 miles. Great views. Bridge of Flowers and lunch at McCuskers market. I took the picture of these cows in the field and they all came over , obviously not camera shy.

Wednesday, September 29, 2010

Top of the hill

Or Maybe over the hill. That's what I felt like for sure. So we head down the back side and pass a group that are involved with a race on the same course . The foundation is Keep on Pedaling. Check out the web site and the founders story. AKP Do something folks .

Donate - volunteer , kill the TV and get off the couch!

Monday, September 27, 2010

The hill


So out we go and head up to Rt 315 . The hill is 1000ft of vertical gain in 2 miles with and 18% grade for the last 100 yards or so. Talk about a workout. View from the top.

Day Two

We went out to Battenkill bike shop which by the way is an great shop. The owner was super helpful and pointed us to a ride up Rt 315 to Pawlet and back. This shop has the most accessories I have every seen in a bike shop . If you want it, need it ,lust for it they have it. Gear whore heaven. Here is the link: http://www.battenkillsports.com/

Great shop!

First day


So the first day the weatherman says temps in the upper 80's . What ?? Its late September. Oh well off we go. We started from Arlington and went up to West Rupert via rt 30. Nice road and yes it was HOT. But hey if you get tired you can always hitch a ride home . First day 56 miles.