The Ride

In which law enforcement gives me a hand

Wheel full 70px So here’s the story on last night.

Wheel full 70px As the campground I was headed to turned out to be closed down, I was without accommodations when I arrived at the little town I had set as my goal for day two of this ride. There were no other accommodations available without another 25 miles of riding. I wound up at about 7:00 p.m. in a convenience store where pretty much everyone wanted to be helpful (but nobody appeared to want a tent in their own front yard or else didn’t live in town). Finally about nine in the evening after several hours of nothing panning out I called the sheriff’s department, which sent over an officer who looked me and the packed bike over, said “you’re legit,” and accompanied me to a city park where he indicated that I could put my tent anywhere I would like. So, in the dark, I took my tent out for the very first time and fumbled my way through setting it up.

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Wheel full 70px Not bad, eh?

Wheel full 70px So today I am going to take it very easy, planning to do 33 miles to Newberry, Florida.  There is a small mom ‘n pop motel there in the center of town.

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Wheel full 70px It’s very hot.  We’ll see how this goes.

 

I couldn’t pass it up

Wheel full 70px The first Hardees’s I passed pulled me in to its strong gravitational field.  We have its sister store Carl’s Jr. in Alaska but they are just not the same.

Wheel full 70px A thousand fifty calories of bicycling heaven.  Plus the cherry Coke, of course, but hey… I’m sipping.

I’m in Macclenny, Florida

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Wheel full 70px Bet nobody else reading this can say that.

Wheel full 70px Random thoughts and observations:

  • Flat is nice, but if you never climb a hill you never get to coast down.
  • The ratio of bicycle-friendly drivers to -ssholes here appears to be about 100 or so to one.  And yes, the -ssholes all appear to be driving pickup trucks.
  • I’ve not seen a single bit of roadkill.  What does Skink [linkie] eat?

Wheel full 70px Gotta go- the road is waiting.

Day #2

Wheel full 70px Well, made it through the first day.  Wound up doing just a little over 20 miles/32 kilometers and spent the night at a Mom ‘n Pop motel in Baldwin, Florida at the end of the Jacksonville-Baldwin bike trail.

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Wheel full 70px The room was not much to speak of, but it was clean, had a bed and the air conditioner worked.

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Wheel full 70px Couldn’t ask for more.

Wheel full 70px As far as the bike goes, I had three issues yesterday.  The seat came a little loose, which I tightened this morning.

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Wheel full 70px I kept kicking the front fender when I mounted the bike and once managed to push it out of adjustment so that it rubbed the tire.

Wheel full 70px I fixed that on the road yesterday but am going to have to be conscious of avoiding that mistake in the future.  The third issue was not a bike problem.  Both RidewithGPS  and Strava crapped out on me.  RidewithGPS reported the entire ride, but the mileage was wrong and Strava just stopped along the way.  I was disappointed, but what can you do?

Wheel full 70px I didn’t take many pictures yesterday- I was too focused on what was going on with the bike.  I hope to do better today.

Wheel full 70px Yesterday was also a very short day at 20.2 miles/32 km.  Urban riding accounted for much of that, and I just felt tired.  I could have pressed on and made it to Mcclenny, about 10 miles/16 km down the road, but it is a busy two lane, dusk was approaching, and there was a big thunderstorm off to the south that didn’t look good (it ultimately never rained here, but there was a lot of thunder).

Wheel full 70px Today I plan to ride to Booker, FL, just a little over 40 miles away.  I have an earlier start and won’t have spent five hours sorting and packing panniers.

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Wheel full 70px Today’s weather is expected to be in the low 90s with intermittent rain this afternoon.  It rained for about half an hour yesterday while I was riding- like being in a warm shower.

Wheel full 70px Let’s go!

 

 

A long, long time ago…

…someone told me that just because you can fit everything in your panniers doesn’t mean you should put everything in your panniers.

I don't need this 800px

Wheel full 70px Still sounds like good advice to me.  Wish I was following it.

Wheel full 70pxFine tuning the load is still in progress.  Fortunately it’s a bit cooler here today.  I’ll let you know when I get started.

So let’s get this show on the road

Wheel full 70px Today really didn’t go as planned.  The Topeak cadence/speed sensor we were waiting on didn’t exactly work with my bike.   I’ll be getting in touch with the company, because a phone call to them from owner Garf Cooper at the ZenCog bike shop indicated that I might have gotten an older unit. Shame on someone.

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Garf giving the malfunctioning sensor the evil eye

Wheel full 70px So I spent much of the afternoon hanging around ZenCog  instead of getting going. My schedule is set up to accommodate things like this happening, but it’s sort of disappointing to blow the first day of the ride.   Garf and his crew are great folks to hang around with though, and I’d highly recommend ZenCog to anyone who has need of a bicycle shop in Jacksonville, Florida.  It’s a real bike shop and I could tell over the several days I hung around there that Garf does right by his customers.

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Abandon hope all ye who enter here

Wheel full 70px Here then is what I’m  doing tomorrow.  I’ll be up early to sort out the last packing of the panniers and loading of the bike.  Sometime around nine I’ll head out and ride west through the environs of Jacksonville, pass under the I-295 beltway,  and then pick up the Jacksonville – Baldwin rail trail.   Past Baldwin, the trail ends and I’ll pick up US 90, the old two-lane main route west that was replaced by Interstate 10.  I plan to stop for the day in Macclenny after cycling a bit more than 30 miles/50 km  and stay for the night at an inexpensive motel at the freeway interchange south of town. That will give me a good chance to check over and adjust as needed my gear and the bike before I set out on a longer riding day on Wednesday.

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Wheel full 70px As you can see, these miles are as flat is the proverbial parking lot.  They should go by pretty quickly, but I’m still a little nervous about the impact of four fully loaded panniers.   We’ll see.

Wheel full 70px I’m estimating four hours riding time making seven and a half miles an hour with a 15 minute break each hour.  That should hopefully put me in Macclenny before the day really heats up.

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Wheel full 70px This first week of the trip will get me by next weekend to Spring Hill, Florida where my sister Sue and her family live.

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Wheel full 70px I’ll visit with them ’til early next week then head off for Key West.  Back with you tomorrow.