UniChris

Did another Century on the northern portion of the trail yesterday, again as with the one I did early last month starting from Northampton and riding roads from Easthampton to the main portion of the trail running south from Westfield.

Riding a few days after a major wind storm might not have been smart, but it worked out. Returning home I laughed at my naivete in having taken a picture of the first tree leaning across the trail at the little westfield river, as so much was to follow. Found around six down across the trail on the MA portion, all of which it was possible to go around or over though in only one case did I manage to do so without dismounting. On the evening return a crew was out and I only found two remaining.

Apart from lots of leaf / stick litter the CT portion went well, until encountering a very official closure just past the giant bike sculpture in Simsbury, which also closed off the road just to the north. It's possible climbing the hill would have worked but I ended up taking the main road down to Latimer Lane. Had no sooner stopped for a fluids refill at the pride gas station and gotten going again than at the crossing of Hopmeadow some pedestrians mentioned they had just seen a bear. And indeed, after crossing the driveway of an office park, there he was, lazily lumbering along the trail as if he owned it. Wasn't quire sure what to do - there looked to be a parallel gravel road, some other cyclists came up too. Finally we couldn't actually see him, perhaps because a ride-on leaf blower was coming the other way, so mounted up and rode through while making a lot of noise.

Even though it wasn't a particularly hot or sunny day the few less shaded miles from Red Oak Hill Rd. down to Northwest Drive in Plainville didn't really appeal, so on a whim checked some distances and decided that completing the loop through Unionville, Collinsville, Canton and West Simsbury wouldn't really change my total, so ended up doing that. A tree down in each of Unionville and Collinsville but was able to go around. Had been concerned about traffic on the initial road portion of the loop closure but midafternoon on a weekday it was fine. Definitely glad I was going it clockwise however as that meant riding down a fairly substantial grade on Dry Bridge Rd that I'd not want to ride up. The gravel path through Simsbury was nice and made me realize I hadn't really ridden any gravel in a while, alas it looks like it had and perhaps will again be subject to closure for some work a water company is doing (?)

Met another BF member in Collinsville. At the first fallen tree in Southwick a walker who had shouted at as I passed caught up with me, turned out he was a fellow unicyclist but not riding that day. And then in the evening a jeep coming out of the Dunkin Donuts shouted and stopped, and the guy turned out to have two little unicycles along with a bike on his rear rack. Doubtless it was those conversations that lead to this ride taking an hour longer than last months ;-)