Not an actual park

I had a very pleasant ride today with a couple of unusual occurrences. It was so nice out that I think I rode a little harder than I really should. For the first time this year I finished the two hour ride in under two hours. That's a fair amount faster than I usually go.

On the way out I met my bicycling neighbors John and Betsy on the approach, for them, to the Raymond Avenue overpass (as opposed to the Raymond Avenue underpass, aka Dead Man's Curve). When I glanced in their direction I thought they looked friendly enough but when they both hailed me by name I had to take a closer look. I did recognize them and responded to their greetings. I know that they ride but I don't run into them out there very much. I know from seeing him warm up and cool down in the cul-de-sac that John usually rides at a much different time of the day than I do. So it was nice to see them and a bit of a rarity.

I completed the last of the more or less regular rides today, riding down into the city and then south along the River Road all the way to the scenic overlook at Fort Snelling. I have now ridden everything in the two hour ride category, there a couple of longer rides that I have ridden nearly every year, those are still on the to do list. Along the way in today's ride I passed this very park like setting. It looks a lot like a park but it is actually the back lawn at the Ford assembly plant along River Road.I believe that the toxic materials problems that they have been discovering over there in anticipation of closing the plant are all on the other side of the plant. I believe that this area is under consideration for expansion of the actual park on the other side of the street.

This also looks a lot like a park and in fact most of it is but it is all pretty much undeveloped. This is a look up the river from the Fort Snelling overlook.It would have been a much nicer photo if the sky had only been a bit more blue.

So those are pretty nice park looking places that are not actually parks.

Not as nice as this one.That's the garden of the Rodin Museum in Paris. Many of Rodin's most famous works are on display in this setting. It is not an actual park, however.

Here is one of those quite famous works with TOPWLH for scale.The gold dome in the background is Les Invalides, the church where Napoleon is entombed. So this photo is a double up as it includes yesterday's theme, in front of.