A day worth 100 miles

My friend Art posted an invitation to join him on a ride up the Clackamas River to a facebook group I belong to. He started late enough in the day that a ride to the ride worked out perfectly.

The commute by bike was just under 19 miles.  There was a bit of fog for the first 10 miles so I turned on the front light. (the back blinky is always on). By the time I passed Oregon City and began my way up the Clackamas River the sky had cleared and it was going to be a gorgeous day.

I arrived at Carver Park, our meeting point, to find that we were going to be a group of 5.  We started counter-clockwise on the 42 mile route that Art had planned.

We exited Hwy 224 and took E. Faraday Rd.  We took one detour to take a look at Faraday Forebay, which added less than a mile to our route. It was "just water" and evidently none of us found it interesting enough to snap a photo. :-O

E Faraday Rd is closed to unauthorized motor vehicles but open to bikes and pedestrians.  It offers some great views of the river.

 

 

 

 

We arrived at the North Fork Reservoir and dam.

The group rode up the road away where there was boat access, and room for us to grab some snacks that we had been carrying.

 I had a good day on the bike, when it was my turn to take a pull I held it between 20-24 mph.  Not bad for a old out of shape guy.

We had some rude drivers.  Nothing terribly dangerous, but just rude.  One oncoming pickup driver layed on the horn and flew a middle fingered salute. The only thing we could figure out was that he was mad that he was stuck in a vehicle instead of enjoying the day as we were.  We had some close passes as we made our way back down through Estacada.  It's been my experience that if we are going to have issues, it's in timber towns.  Estacada and Mollala rarely disappoint.

We still had good views of the river though.

We arrived back at Carver Park and Kent continued on down the road.  He lives not too far away from there.  Max, Art, and Peter loaded their bikes in cars and headed back home.  I exited the park and continued back downstream.  I retraced my inbound commute back. 

I took a detour as neared Tualatin and took a brief soak in the hot tub. ;-)

I got near home and noted that I had 98 miles.  Just like the old days, I found a road that needed riding and offered 2 miles to complete a century.  It evidently was my first century since April 7th, 2014.   I used to ride 2 each weekend.  I guess I've got to start somewhere.

UPDATE:  Silly me, I rode more than 100 miles on STP in July.

 ..........road bike..........rollers........mtb.........lifecycle....total Today..........100...............0..............0...............0............100 Jan............710................0..............0...............0...........710
Feb........... 578...............0..............0...............0............578
March ...........701.............0..............0...............0............701
April..........749.................0..............0...............0..........749
May...........613.................0..............0...............0...........613
June............309...............0..............0...............0...........309
July...............615...............0..............0...............0............615
August.........359................0..............0...............0.............359
Sept............292................0...............0...............0.............292
 Oct............475....................0..............0...............0............475  Total..........5300...............0..............0...............0............5300