Millis, Norfolk
Got a nice ride in yesterday (68 mi). Beautiful day, lower 70s. I had planned to head for the north shore, but got out of the house and it was pretty cool, so decided to stick inland. Did the usual section of Bikes Not Bombs route, from Jamaica Pond to Charles River Village. Ate lunch in Dover center and went on to Norfolk and Millis on some new roads that were very pretty. Back through Sherborn and Dover.
I decided that even though traffic was very, very light, I wasn’t interested in fighting it, so I decided to come back the way I’d gone rather than take the marathon route from Wellesley back home. You know, reversing a route looks nothing like it does when going the other way. Somehow, and I’ve studied the map and don’t know how it happened, I got totally twisted around at one of the rotaries and ended up going in exactly the wrong direction. I was suspicious when some familiar buildings were on the wrong side of the street, but didn’t think too much about it until I somehow ended up in Newton rather than Brookline, along the exact same route I take out of town. I dunno.
But on one of the passes through Cutler Park, I startled a deer who was munching by the roadside. That was kind of cool. She (I assume) was very close and I felt the hooves pound and she bounded off into the woods. You can’t see too well in the picture, but there’s a brown blob in the center. That’s the deer who was keeping a watchful eye out.
Another thing you notice about wrong turns is that it wears you out. Not that I had anywhere specific to be, and it wasn’t very late, yet it seems you sort of budget your energy. You decide, “okay, I have 15 more miles to go” and your body says “15, aye aye Cap’n”. Suddenly, it’s not 15, it’s 20. Ugh.
But there couldn’t have been a nicer day oot and aboot.
