Like many of the other participants, I succeeded in riding every day.
Today started out at 24 degrees. However it had dropped to 21 degrees by 8AM, but the sun was shining brightly in a cloud free sky. How bad could it be? I posted to the group that I planned to ride 40 miles. It was still well below freezing as I pedaled out from Sellwood Riverfront Park as a layer of grey clouds began rolling in. I was on my fixed gear bike and planned to ride to Boring and back on the Springwater Trail. I was dressed warmly, so I was comfortable. Within a few miles I began getting pelted by ice pellets. I was beginning to develop an alternate plan to stay close in case I needed to bail out because of ice, but about as quickly as it had begun, it stopped. There were a few ice pellets on the ground, but no dangerous layer of ice accumulation. I pedaled onward, with just a hint of trepidation. There was bit of headwind that got more intense as I rode eastward on the trail.
When I got to 136th Ave I stopped at a neighborhood mini-grocery for some snacks.
I continued eastward until I reached 158th, where I came across 2 bollards that had been locked into position 1/4 of a turn off, making the reflective surfaces ineffective to trail users.
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| The bollard in the background is the first guilty party. |
I was told that I was caller #1 in the queue. I was still on hold for 12 minutes, by now with cold numbed fingers since I had taken my glove off to make the call. It took another 10 minutes to get the nice young sounding female to understand exactly what the problem was.
After the call I continued eastward, and the very next set of bollards, less than 2 blocks away, also had one post quarter turned. As luck would have it, the woman I talked to called back to tell me that she had reported it to her supervisor, but he told her that he had already taken care of it. I chuckled, and said that he must be thinking of a different location, and that I now had a second location to report! She assured me that she rode bike too and would see that this was taken care of.
Having done my good deed, I continued on. Just passed Gresham Main Park I came to Columbia Brickworks. The company started in 1906, and has been an important piece of Gresham history since then.
Another few miles east and it began to rain lightly. I was hoping that the air and trail surface had warmed enough that freezing rain wouldn't be a problem. I pedaled carefully testing the surface from time to time. I briefly considered cutting my ride to 30 miles. Last year I rode 100 miles on my 100th consecutive day, and thought that since it was raining that 30 miles on the 30th day might be ok. But I had told my #ridingeverydayinNovember friends that I would be riding 40 miles today, so ride 40 miles I would do!
I arrived at Boring, the end of the paved trail.
I struck up a conversation with a cyclist there. The conversation drifted toward him enjoying riding hills. I told him about Race Across Oregon because it is the Race Across America qualifier with the most climbing (42,000 ft in just over 500 mi) and because I am involved in the route planning and route book this year. ;-) He expressed interest in racing in, or crewing for, the event. We talked long enough that I was now looking at a 20 mile return ride with about 80 minutes before dark.
I pointed the fixie westbound and hoped for clear sailing and no ice. The rain had continued.
After about 8 miles the rain stopped. It had never rained hard and the fenderless fixed gear bike hadn't thrown a wet rooster tail spray. I continued pedaling quickly and didn't stop. I arrived back at Sellwood Riverfront Park just as it was getting dark enough that I would have had a headlight on, if I had one with me!
Day 30 is in the books! Thanks to the rest of my #ridingeverydayinNovember family for making it fun!
.........Road Bike.....Rollers.............MTB..........Lifecycle......Total
Today .......40...............0...............0.............0............40
Jan.........765..............0...............0.............0............765
Feb........248..............0...............0.............0............248
March....183..............0...............0.............0.............183
April......228...............0..............0..............0.............228
May.......200...............0..............0..............0.............200
June........199..............0..............26............0.............225
July.........246.............0...............0..............0.............246
Aug.........502.............0...............0..............0.............502
Sept.........974.............0,,,,,,,,,,,,,,44.............0............1018
Oct.......... 962.............0..............45.............0............1007
Nov...........504..............0..............20.............0...........524
_________________________________________
total.......5015.............0.............118............0...........5133
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