Outriders
A three day weekend where I actually got away. It seems like it lasted a week. That was good. And boy did I need it.
Saturday was the Outriders Boston to P’town ride. It was very, very hot, but I made it with no real trouble. Slower than last year, of course, but still not too bad. I left here at 6:15 or so and got there around 5:30. It was so hot I took quite a bit of extra time at the rest stops and even added a stop at a perfectly lovely looking piece of turf in Orleans halfway along the rail trail.
My friend Mark wasn’t quite so lucky. He left the 1st rest stop before I did I caught up to him at the side of the road fixing a puncture. I asked if he had everything he needed, he said yes said to go on, so I did. I saw him later at rest stop 3, which was strange, because he’s not a fast rider (he was the last to arrive last year), so I hadn’t expected to see him for the rest of the day. He’d crashed. Twice. I guess the first time was because he hadn’t secured his pump and it fell into the spokes and threw him over. Later, his derailleur broke and bent into the spokes. That tacoed the wheel so that was it for him for the day. He wrenched his shoulder and has some road rash on his arm but didn’t seem to hurt anything more than his ego.
It was a very, very hot day, cloudy until the canal and sunny after. I left around 6:15 and got to P’town at about 5:30. A slight wrong turn in one place added about 3 miles for a total of 131.29 at an average 15ΒΌ mph, about 1 mph slower than last year. Somewhere during the ride, I went over 1000 miles for the year; less than I’d hoped, but with everything flooded, what can you do?
Passed one guy towing his dog all the way. He said his dog wasn’t entirely happy with the arrangement and was getting a little bored from time to time. Every time he slowed to climb one of the bigger hills, the dog wanted to get out and run along side.
I don’t know if it’s gas prices or what, but there were way fewer cars on the road that in years past. They’re just as agressive through Yarmouth, though. Hate that place. Route 6 is narrow and busy and the cars are infused with that “it’s mine” spirit. The route itself was pretty much the same as last year.
Stayed in the same place as last year. There were a couple other people there, but it was pretty quiet. I went back to my room after dinner Sunday night and stumbled over someone laying on the hallway floor. At first I thought he was probably drunk back from T dance, but I didn’t smell any alcohol, so I went back down to the office and told the manager “you know you have somebody passed out upstairs.” We went back up and he roused the guy in his Texas drawl.
Manager: You havin some trouble gettin in your room? Want me to get the door?
Guy: yeah
Manager: Okay, here we go.
Guy: sorry
Manager: That’s okay, y’all are havin fun.
Heh. I’m used to Boston where that would likely have been a psycho killer. I went out to the hot tub later and the manager came out to make sure it wasn’t him passed out under water. It would probably take a lot of chlorine to clear that up.
The rest of the weekend was pretty low key. I did decompress quite a bit and today seems to be moving slowly. The ride brunch was Sunday which was okay for a brunch buffet thing. Ate again at the South African place next to where I was staying: excellent gazpacho and an ostrich burger. Big plate of steamers on Sunday night and some other sundries.
The ferry ride was uneventful, but the wind had kicked up making the first part of the ride back pretty choppy. It also caused a lot of salt spray to hit the bikes (mine and everyone else’s). So the first thing I had to do when I got home was wash the bike.
While I was cleaning the bike, the woman from upstairs came out and said “where have you been?” “Uh…” says I, “P’town, why?” Apparently, late (1:30) Saturday night/Sunday morning, my phone called 9-1-1. The police came Everyone was in a tizzy, I guess. All the people who knew where I was were either also out of town or otherwise unavailable. They rang #3 who are not the friendliest people int he world. In fact the wife has never spoken to me at all. It’s an arranged Morrocan marriage and all they do is scream at each other. So, of course, she is the only one the police could rouse. So there were about five messages on my answering service wondering where I was. One from the police at about 1:30 saying they’d received a 9-1-1 hangup and wondered if they should send someone. Hope it doesn’t happen again. I’d hate to be shaken awake by the police at 2:00 am.
Puppy rider
