Progress report

Some, not much.Both yesterday and today I wanted to ride, as is my custom, into the wind. For both days that meant north. Because of the stuff on the streets of Falcon Heights I had to detour around that city before I could head north. This involves west into Lauderdale, south to Larpenteur, back east along Larpenteur to Cleveland, south onto the Farm campus, down off the hill onto the Fairgrounds, south out to Como, east to Lake Como, and finally north on Victoria, swinging back to the west along Roselawn again to rejoin the regular route at Hamline. To accomplish Falcon Heights avoidance I have to ride eight miles before actually starting to make progress towards the north.

There is some kind of law enforcement vehicle conference going on in the back parking lot of the Fair. They have a road course set up using cones and are out there test driving cars. That's sorta interesting to watch for a minute or two but it doesn't make a good photo. I do think this extremely unusual looking tent is interesting though.The whole round about ride is necessary because I don't want to ride even within a block of Falcon Heights. I could get south on Cleveland, for instance, but that's the Falcon Heights city limits. It would probably be okay as no city streets intersect with Cleveland but I really, really hate having to stop to clean off my tires. To get to the next street after Cleveland that goes through I have to ride all the way around the University golf course. Then to avoid Larpenteur next to and through Falcon Heights it is necessary to go all the way around the Fairgrounds. Then to avoid Hamline back next to Falcon Heights it is necessary to go all the way around Como Park and the only way to do that makes sense to me includes all the way around Lake Como.

I got the progress report photo on my only appearance anywhere near the city. I rode about half a block on Roselawn to get across Snelling headed west on the way home, turning instantly off once across main Snelling to take the Snelling frontage road. During that one half block yesterday I picked up four, yes four, new patches of oil on my front tire, including one which included an impressively large sized rock chip which the tar cemented to my tire. I say that there has been some progress because today I only got two new patches and the rock chip in one of them was smaller and not as firmly attached to my tire.

It was a nice day and as a result of the big detour I ended up riding a route completely out of the ordinary ride catalog.