Turtle crossing

TFMWLH (the faculty member who . . .) was not available to join today's ride. She begged off saying that she had a previous engagement as a "hooder" and that she had to go somewhere to "hood" people. It all sounds more than a little criminal to me but I am a simple nearly retired person. In a related note, everyone should ask her for the details of the goings on at the Friday evening faculty dinner.

It was overcast when I set out but the radar appeared promising and the sun eventually did break through. I rode a bit beyond the standard ride, venturing once again across Highway 96 into the residential enclave behind the gate.

Just before I came to this sign I passed the remains of a former turtle crushed on the road.Such are the penalties for turtles attempting to cross the road outside the marked crossing. As I say, former turtle.

I also found out why that uphill where I got caught in the big ring last time was so hard. Today I knew it was coming and got myself into an appropriate gear but the hill was still plenty hard in the small ring. It is a nasty little rise that does that especially unpleasant trick of going around a curve on the way up. You cannot see the top of the rise from the bottom and can be easily lulled into a false sense of "this won't be too hard". Then it hits a short false flat which is, in fact, still slightly uphill before once again hitting a shorter but still nasty second rise. As on the first, the second rise goes around a curve, and again, you cannot see the whole hill from the bottom to allow you to gauge the effort. It's a tough little hill, visible just after the three mile mark on my North Oaks ride. The upside of the climb is, as always, the downhill on the backside where I hit 35 mph. I suppose I am going to have to ride out there again and try that sequence while traveling in the opposite direction.