well and truly done

10/27 we picked up 3". Not so bad, it melted in a day or two. 10/29 we picked up another 7". Okay, I can take a hint. Time to clean and polish and setup for winter.

Off to sleep the winter away, until next spring...

last ride of the season

When you live in the northeast, it has to happen every year. The last ride. It's funny how many of them I can remember from years past. One was memorable because it happened in December, another because it was just me and my longest-time riding buddy, freezing our butts off to get in one last ride. Another because I crashed... but we'll move past that sad state of affairs.

This year we got yet another reprieve and a Sunday forecasted to warm above 50 by mid-day, so a bunch of the regulars met up a couple hours later into the day than we usually would for a group ride.

We went out on a route I was not familiar with, which had a lot of steep downgrades and sharp corners lurking at the bottom, so a few of us hung back a little. With temps cooling our reflexes and the road being even colder, today was not the day to set lap times, so the group settled into 2 packs and everyone ran the pace they wanted.

We stopped off at C&K's house for awhile and hung around and BS'd, then people started to head out. On the way home I took my time and ran down a few backroads for no reason other than to ride a little longer. Just a leisurely pace, enjoying being on the bike.

As it turned out, 3 days later...