Riding

Over the last two months, I have done a lot of riding.  I think I have put about 10,000km, or 6,000 miles on my bike.

The miles rolled past in long and short stretches, some warm some cold and some just right.  It has given me a certain amount of insight into what makes for good bike clothing, and what makes for bad riding.

The jacket I am using is showing wear, the venting zippers were glued in place, not sewn and the glue has let go.  The collar is getting worn, but other than that, it has been nice.
The pants are annoying in that chaps are more comfy as long as it is not raining, but when it does rain, the pants are sooooo much better.
In the stretch from Manitou Springs, Colorado to Salt Lake, Utah I went over some high windy passes.  I am sure that one was approaching 11,000 feet high, and the signs on two others were over 9,000.  With headwinds for virtually all this section of over 30mph it was no surprise my gas mileage sucked, but I was pleasantly surprised that although I was cool, I was never really chilled.

Then I hit the road from Salt Lake through to Boise.  I had thought that with the lower elevations, the ride would be warmer.

Silly me.

It was the coldest riding of the trip.  The humidity may have had something to do with it, as the headwind was about the same, the road was about 3,000 feet lower and although it never rained, it threatened to for most of the day.
I have seen bikers with thermometers, and I am now tempted to mount one just so I can keep track to see how much the temperature varies on the passes.  This time of year, it was easy to see the effect of elevation on the plant life around me.  In the valley, there would be trees almost fully leafed out, and at the top of the passes the trees were barely into the budding phase, and in Colorado, there were plenty of places where the budding had not even started.

It also gave in a shorter distance the transition I had seen going from East to West.  Starting in Florida, the trees had fully leafed out but as I drove West and North, the leaves pulled in, the trees becoming more bare and the green lighter and more tentative.  By the time I got to Colorado, over half of the trees I was seeing had not budded, and most were just nicely breaking out in green.  The lower elevation of Salt Lake really showed with the fully leafed out trees even though the temperature felt much the same.  By the time I rolled into the West Coast
rain forest I felt I had repeatedly done the transition from early spring to full summer four or five times.


At last it is time for a pause from riding, visit friends and family and see what all of them have been up to while I have been gallivanting in southern climes.