St. Patrick's Century Ride - A Week Early.....

Rozmo and I did a bicycle ride in the town of Dublin, Georgia today. Because its name is DUBLIN, naturally the town goes all out for St. Patrick's Day. But because many, many, many people go to Savannah for St. Patrick's Day (particularly years like this one, when it falls on a Saturday), Dublin has its St. Patrick's Day-themed events beforehand.

That was a long-winded way of explaining why we did a St. Patrick's Ride a week before St. Patrick's Day. And I'm done with typing St. Patrick's Day.

We spent the night in Dublin, since I had yesterday out of school. It was about a 3-hour drive, so we would have had to leave around 5:00 this morning in order to get there, get registered, unloaded, etc. etc. etc. It was hard enough driving the three hours BACK.

I had one of those long debates with myself about proper cycling clothing this morning. I had two base-layer shirts, a thinner one and one lined with sort-of fleece. I didn't think I needed the fleece-lined one, but that was the one I grabbed out of the suitcase. Fine. Then I debated about the jacket. My usual philosophy is I can stand being cold at the beginning if I'm pretty sure it's going to warm up. Temperatures were supposed to climb into the 60's today, so I initially left the jacket in the car. "I'm tough," I said.

Then I went back and got the jacket, and boy am I glad I did. It did warm up (eventually), but the winds were brutal and NEVER let up. ALL. DAY. LONG. Have I mentioned lately (like in the last sentence or two) how much I HATE riding in the wind? It's probably a very good thing I was unable to donate blood yesterday (iron count was too low); I would never have been able to tap the reserves needed to complete that ride.

The terrain wasn't difficult, and the scenery was pretty. Beautiful blue skies, early flowering flowers, lots and lots of gorgeous horses.

And the wind.

Here's our map from today. If you look near the triangle (indicating starting and, in this case, ending point), you may see some squiggly lines that look like we got lost right at the end. I assure you that's not the case. This time.

The ride was billed as a century (100 miles) with a 55-mile option. We were pretty sure absolutely positive we didn't want to ride the century, but 55 was doable. When we got back to the recreation center where the ride began and ended, we had ridden 47 miles. Being members of the even numbers club, we had to ride around and around the rec center until we had the requisite 50 miles. I made the almost-fatal mistake on about our hundredth lap of saying to Rozmo, "Why don't we go for 60?" Luckily she had a deadline to get back home so she could go to her Supper Club, so she didn't take me up on it.

Whew.

We averaged over 15 mph, higher than I usually do on long rides. The extra exertion required to fight the wind and keep up that kind of average has sapped my energy. On the way home from dinner, I asked Hubby, "Isn't it about bedtime?"

It was 5:46.

Goodnight.

The Lewis Grizzard and Catfish Memorial Ride....

Today's bike ride was in the hometown of Lewis Grizzard, a humorist and longtime writer for the Atlanta Journal-Constitution. (Catfish was the name of his dog.)


One of my favorite stories about Lewis came from his (fourth) wife after his death in 1994 (I think). A huge UGA football fan, one of Lewis' final wishes was that his ashes be scattered on the 50-yard line in Sanford Stadium. His wife attempted to do so, but her efforts were blocked by UGA officials, citing concerns that they would be overrun with people wanting to do the same. I can just see the little piles of ashes accumulating on the 50.


Lewis' widow somehow managed to gain entrance to the stadium anyway, ashes in tow. I'm pretty sure someone simply turned a blind eye, thus skirting the rules and allowing Lewis' last wishes to be honored. It was the off-season, however, and there were no lines on the field. She couldn't tell where the 50-yard line WAS.


I'm not sure who her companion was (and I'm way too tired to look it up, but feel free to do my research FOR me if you're so inclined, and thank you), but he said to her, "Honey just scatter the ashes. Lewis will find the 50."


Katydid, Rozmo and I have done this ride a number of times, and it is in a BEAUTIFUL part of the state. It passes by numerous horse farms (in fact, a rest stop is at one of those farms) and features some very rural roads with scenery that makes you glad to be alive and on a bicycle.


A cold front came through yesterday, and this morning's temperatures were the lowest we've had since last spring. It was the first bike ride this fall where we had to wear layers, and we never unlayered the whole ride. Well, I did take off my ear warmers, but my jacket, jersey, and long-sleeved t-shirt stayed for the entire ride. It eventually warmed up to the 70's, but by that time I was wet with sweat underneath, and I still couldn't take any of my layers off for fear of becoming chilled in the wind.


Wind. There's a comforting thought on a bicycle. Not.


The winds were relentless. Brutal. Infuriating. Not even Lewis Grizzard could have found a nice or funny thing to say about the winds today.

The route map said the ride was 62 miles. I checked my cycling log from last year, and I KNEW it was more like 66. But still I got the idea in my head that we might be pleasantly surprised to finish at "only" 62 miles. Wrong.



I would love to post the four pictures I took on today's ride, including the one of the yellow and purple water tower. See, this ride overlaps some of the same roads we were on for the Wilson 100 in August. At the end of the Wilson, when a purple and yellow water tower comes into view, it means you have reached the end of the ride. The finish is in sight. You have survived again. On TODAY'S ride, however, the purple and yellow water tower that is usually such a comforting sight was an indication that you still had another 20 miles to ride. Oh, and please turn into the wind for those last 20 miles. Thank you.


Alas, in "transferring" the pictures from my camera to the computer, apparently DELETED them. No, they aren't still on the camera card. They aren't in the recycling bin. They aren't on the computer. They are lost in cyber space.

Trust me. They were very nice pictures. Not award-winning, but nice.


Lewis would have been proud. Catfish would have drooled.

North Florida Tour Day 2.......

I would love to tell you that today was much better than yesterday as far as cycling goes.

I would love to, but I can't.

However, I'm also not going to go on and on whining about how MIS. ER. A. BLE. I was. ALL. DAY. LONG.

I'm just going to whine a little bit.

It was 36 degrees when we got up this morning. "It won't be so bad," I thought, "as long as the wind doesn't blow."

It did blow.

I guesstimated that yesterday's winds were around 15 mph. Today's had to be 20 mph. We did a loop ride, and I swear with my hand up that the winds were ALWAYS in our faces.

We left around 10:00. We made up our own route for the first part because the SHORT option for today was 68 miles. There was also the option of doing a century.

Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha.

I would have been happy (well not HAPPY, but you know what I mean) to do around 30 miles, but I didn't want to seem like a wimp, so I said a 50-mile route would be fine with me.

We set out down Florida highway 53 to Madison, and it was an awesome route. I can't say for sure if there was a lot of traffic on that road, because there was so much pavement OUTSIDE the white line that it felt like we had our own bike lane. We stopped in Madison at a convenience store that is hands-down the neatest store I've ever been in. They had a "bee" theme for the whole store. There was a warning in the restroom that employees who didn't wash their hands would be "stung and _______" (I can't remember the second word). They had a separate little room that was the beer cooler, called the "beer hive." The lady behind the counter was super nice and even took a picture of the three of us.

We had packed sack lunches before we left this morning, and the ride organizer, Margaret, brought them to Blue Springs to a state park where there are springs and the water is ...... you guessed it, blue. I will try to post pictures in the next day or so, when I'm not dependent upon a cantankerous internet connect card. (My new definition of "roughing it": not having wifi.) We stayed at the lunch stop for over an hour because I simply could not face getting back on that bike.

The last town we went through was Pinetta, Florida, where all the street names start with "P": Petunia, Pennyroyal, Primrose, Poplar.

I try my best to remain upbeat and remind myself that no one held a gun to my head and MADE me go ride a bike in this weather, but sometimes my sour attitude wins the battle. It got so bad today that I started yelling at dogs. To the German Shepherd-looking dog that barked from his pen in his backyard, I yelled, "SHUT UP!" When a boxer-looking dog barked and charged at us from his yard, I pointed my finger at him and shouted, "YOU DO NOT WANT TO MESS WITH ME TODAY!" Later when Rozmo was riding alongside us (that didn't happen a lot today), another dog barked from the confines of a fence, and once again I yelled, "SHUT UP!" Unfortunately Rozmo neither heard nor saw the dog, and when I yelled it almost startled her off her bike.

Just as all good things must end, even the miserable ones drag themselves to a merciful death eventually. We limped back into camp around 4:20. Our total mileage for the day was 59 miles and change, and when Rozmo asked if we wanted to ride a loop around the lake to get 60, I almost took her head off. That loop around the lake was actually about 4 miles, and I'm not sure I would have survived it.

Dinner was wonderful, and the wine and music are still going at the pavilion next door to the RV. Katydid left first, then I sneaked away from the dancing, and Rozmo is still going strong. I have a sneaky suspicion the wine has a lot to do with it.

I won't say I will NEVER do this ride again, because we tend to have short memories when it comes to cycling. We always THINK we had a good time. And it has been a good time with Rozmo and Katydid, and laughing with the other folks on the ride. But I don't think I will pre-register for this ride in the future. I will wait until the Monday before it and see what the weather forecast says.

If it's going to be 80 degrees with no wind in North Florida the first weekend in November, count me there. Otherwise you will find me home with Hubby and Gus, watching football and eating nachos.