a modest hike to make us smile

the day: october 17, goldilocks weather--not too warm, not too cold, not too sunny, not too cloudy, not too windy, not too still...basically, everything was just right!

the adventure: a fall hike looping the ranger trail and the AT on smarts mountain. pam likes to skip the summit which keeps it to about 7~ish miles.

the memories: i'm not a big hiker, but pam gets me out there, and that keeps it pleasant. she also carries a phone, so like biking with soy, there are pictures!

notes: the world is at your feet--literally

go outside and play!

the all new--possibly even improved--outside and playing!

you may (or may not) have noticed i have not posted any adventures since the spring. my excuse whenever i need it has been to plead "outside and playing" too much to blog about it. but on a ride with sawyer last month, he threw out the idea of a short recording of highlights. starting with that very ride, this is what i came up with--so far...

the day: october 5th, sunny and warm ~ish, your basic beautiful fall day!

the adventure: biking a section of the fom-ftt, friends of mascoma-five town tour: a good mixture of gravel and woods roads of various quality, with a few short paved sections thrown in for linkage.

the memories: riding with soy is always special and since he carries a phone, there are pictures! at one point, the trail goes along the mascoma river which was wicked pretty.

notes: being outside and playing definitely put smiles on our mugs, almost the whole time--even when i whacked my shin on a pedal and on the last big hill, when i might have heard, "why did i choose this way?"

go outside and play!

#30daysofbiking -- part 2

things in my life often sit around unfinished. the kitchen table is piled with stuff, including all of last year's ticks, taped to sheets of paper, labeled with all the pertinent info, in an addressed envelope, waiting for...i don't know what, maybe this year's crop already started. queues in both my blogs--ttyol and goap!--are the cyber equivalent of the kitchen table. #30daysofbiking finished almost two weeks ago, but...ok, here's part 2.

days sixteen was definitely snowy! the riding was pretty much insane. i loved it!

day seventeen was almost pleasant temperature wise. the snow on top of the leaves higher up in the hills made for a sliding paradise rolling down hill. 

day eighteen, sunday, was a hiking/biking day up moose mtn to look back at town hill and spot the flag. trouble was, you couldn't see diddly and the trail was wicked wet!

day twenty one, you can see the snow and wet in the driveway over my shoulder. it was a wild day to be out riding. huge, sharp cracks of thunder seemed to shake me. since i rarely saw the lightening, they were often surprising.

day twenty two, there are a couple of downhill sections on the commute into work that quickly let me know how cold riding a bike in april can be--especially in the morning. somehow i always feel warmer coming home even when the temp hasn't changed all that much.

day twenty three, a short day at work got me out early, yeah, it was in the low twenties. the water in the bike bottle was solid.

later that same day it warmed enough to shed my winter jackets and take off for a good long~ish ride. i stopped a couple times to pick up some 'big' ticket trash items. question, who tosses out two microwaves into a ditch?

day twenty four, saturday: went up firescrew--the northern approach to cardigan--avoiding the weekend crowd and doing some spring trail maintenance. the logging road up to the mowgli trailhead was recently fixed up and makes for a fast mile and a half descent! before bombing down, i found this tiny reflection pool.

day twenty five, sunday: another weekend and the wind not too strong, so back up the pine with some 'new' flagging. 

all in all april was a grand month to get #30daysofbiking in. i haven't stopped now that it's may. thursday and friday, 6th and 7th, i got in a wonderful ride over to maine to see kevin and mariel and then up to evans notch to help open the amc cold river camp. i tried a new route that cut down 115 miles to 82 for that first 'long day'. the only problem was every back road i took, had 'hill' in its name!

life on the saddle has been / is good. and now that this post is finished, i can go outside and play!

#30daysofbiking -- part 1

 this is my third year riding every day in the month of april. and like the third child in the family's photo album--there aren't as many pictures this time. some of the pictures will also be cropped weird as they are twitter screenshots. (bonus: pre april, i got in a bunch of rides. march was warm~ish and really dry. it seemed like i rode a lot more than normal. of course the weather was bound to change !)

day one of #30daysofbiking found me looping pam's trail with a saw in my frame bag, my mission was to cut out a blowdown too heavy for her to move.

day two, i took a 'classic' picture of the nishiki in front of the swix thermometer. this winter, the bike was completely rebuilt. it rides as good as it looks. amazingly, the low temp of april has continued to be april 2nd. 2020 made it into the 20s, but '19 and '21 were both in the mid-teens.

day three was a saturday and after hiking up on moose mountain with pam in the morning, billy and i rode down to 'koby's way'. there were a few highwater hazards to negotiate, complete with some substantial beaver activity.

day four i rode up and over town hill behind our house. i was thinking with the snow mostly gone, especially where the sun hits, there would be good enough traction. i was wrong. dry leaves are wicked slippery. this is one of those cropped pics--go to @kobeest for the full view.

day five, six, seven, eight, and nine were all work days, but i ended up riding to every school in our five town district, at least twice. throw in the sau office at least three or four times and you get a sense of a pedaling IT support person.

clockwise starting at the top left: high school, just outside my office; canaan elementary, that's mrs evan's room she had both sawyer and sadie around thirty years ago; enfield village school, at the playground entrance; indian river school, the jr high directly behind the high school.

the week was mostly sunny and warm. the 'quackers', wood frogs, were out quacking on sunday and monday, and the 'peepers', tree frogs, started peeping toward the end of the week. the picture below is a wet sight across rt 4 in front of the high school where i always hear the first frogs of spring. the snapper is crawling out of that wet area onto the rail trail to lay eggs in a gravelly nest.

day ten and eleven share a tweet as i went up town hill twice over the weekend. my goal was to find a thin sapling and lash it high in the wolf pine at the height of land. the point being with a colorful 'flag' attached i should be able to spot it from surrounding high peaks. while the wind had me swaying a good ten feet side to side at the top of the pine, the fast ride down hill was still the 'high' point.

days twelve through fourteen were commuting days riding to all of the schools again. on thursday the 15th, i pedaled into hanover for my teeth cleaning. it was drizzly but i didn't get soaked until coming home from stopping to sweep at the bike shop. i figured i was out and about and friday--my usual shop sweeping day--it was supposed to snow all day.

this is a good day to end part one and get this posted pronto. riding everyday can be a challenge in new hampshire's april. going outside to play! is my 'way' to stay happy. 

more snow, more rain, deep cold, unusual warm, dead calm, extreme wind...a new england winter!

no lie, it has been a roller coaster ride of a winter. while i am not holding my breath, i am hoping for one more good snow storm--hey it's only halfway through march!

since i last posted at the start of february, i have had all kinds of adventures, solo, with pam, with friends, with former MOC students, on snow, on ice, in frigid cold, in downright balmy sunshine, and just today, a wicked west wind. this past week has seen temps swing from below zero, to above fifty, to back into single numbers. three days of warm and sunny, laid all the shovels down again that had been standing for weeks after a couple of good snows in february and a heavy-wet~ish one in march.

some highlights: skiing cardigan 3 or 4 times, once from the chute at dawn after 6 inches of fresh fluff; sledding the same route at least three times, once in powder with olivia; a late afternoon--with a finish in the dark--ski up south peak on moose mtn with justin and olivia; skiing over at the shaker wildlife management area a good number of times solo and once with skip where we met up with dick on a second run; at least a dozen runs up and down town hill in some sweet fresh snows, once with susan and pam; dozens of trips around pam's loop, a couple of them with pam joining me on skis; some stunning sunsets from a number of views; hiking cardigan for more views, one at sunset; socially spaced, outdoor meetup for hot cider and a bernie pose...

looking up, a socked in summit on cardigan, and down the chute, a tiny patch of early light in the valley.

olivia gearing up for a morning sled run on cardigan and then an evening run with justin over on moose mountain.

skip ready to point them down over at the swma and susan's and my ski tracks and pam's snowshoes up on townhill.

the truck, mid trail up on the east side of town hill with the second shot taken out of the windshield.

pam skiing the loop up by where she took this wonderful sunset shot--red at night skiers' delight!

atop cardigan at sunset and with hannah, pam, karen, and bill for hot cider on a cold afternoon.

a snow-bernie inspiration and another sunset out over the garden and moose mtn...

today, i took the opportunity of a frozen track to hike up town hill to the wolf pine at the height of land. my goal was to climb as high as possible--a la a younger sawyer--and tie a white flag to a branch. if we remember to take binoculars with us next time we hike south peak on moose mtn, i was thinking we could get a bead on it. 

you can't really see it up the tall pine in the center, but trust me, it's there. the tree has three rather large trunks and since the two on the left had so many live branches, i took the one to the right with not so much green to obstruct a small white flag. it's not quite so high, but it's more open to the west. the wind was moving the main trunks a good 10 feet, from east to west, so i was distracted and forgot to take a picture until i remembered, halfway back toward earth. it was still a grand view.

it was a good end to the week. and much different from the ~20 mile bike ride i took on friday on the newly refurbished nishiki. dick, cory, josh, and i transformed a classic '84 japanese steel touring bike into a modern one. i am looking forward to taking it for a few rides in this year's version--my 3rd go--of #30daysofbiking in april. it's not necessarily the most suitable time to ride in new england, but always interesting when you're outside and playing.