Mostly yesterday

I rode today.  But I rode today in conditions that never inspired photography.

I also rode yesterday but apparently in conditions that never inspired blogging.

The combination of the two?

It was pretty nice both days.  It was plenty warm enough yesterday, perhaps a bit too warm for the way I was dressed.  But it was windy, windy at this time of year is a delicate balance, perhaps I missed by a bit, but for the most part I was glad to have my jacket.

Then we had a pretty hard rain overnight.  I wasn't expecting to ride today but by golly by about the time I usually set out to ride there just was not any excuse for why I wouldn't.  It was dry enough, warm enough, and not punitive wind enough.

So I rode today.  I rode mostly to the same places I rode yesterday.  I didn't take any pictures today so these are pictures I took yesterday.

I rode to the Fairgrounds. I like the Fairgrounds.  Pavement.  No traffic.  Interesting stuff to look at.

But the Fairgrounds is an active location.  Even though the Fair is over, winter is coming and there is still lots of activity as preparations for winter are ongoing.   The time has come for storage of stuff inside buildings at the Fairgrounds in buildings which are plenty good at this time of year for storage as they mostly won't be needed for any other purpose until late next summer.  Late next summer looks more and more like what it truly is, almost a year away.

This way for storage.

Skyride.  Agriculture.

Bright reddish tree and some greenish yellow for perspective. That's the Food Building in the background on the right.

As I rode away from the Fairgrounds I discovered some fairly exotic horticulture.  This is a display along the street boulevard fronting two houses in that Como neighborhood.

Some of that stuff displays an alarming growth rate which just is not going to be sustainable in this climate.

Kudos to the folks over there who plant and maintain a pretty interesting display.

In the spirit of signs of the season I noticed the hockey boards have gone up at McMurray Fields.  Actually, as a long time ago former employee (I receive $72 per month pension) of the city I note that those particular rinks have never been primarily hockey rinks, they are mostly used for adult recreational broomball.

I swung by to get a seasonal photo but was surprised instead by this:

Hockey/broomball boards in the background but an electric car charging station in the foreground.  A solar powered electric charging station.

With lots of still interesting trees and a pretty nice blue sky doing their best to keep late October a still visually interesting environment.  And it is.

A nice ride today and a nice ride yesterday.

No line at Se Salt today

Probably a much smaller crowd at the Falls today than on Sunday which might explain the lack of an early afternoon line at the restaurant concession over there.

Of course, the lack of a line can also probably be attributed to a handwritten note on the entrance door proclaiming that they are closed for the season.

They have given up too soon, the Falls certainly are not done for the season.

I thought for a minute I might get another no one else was there picture at the wall viewing position but then a homeless looking person wandered down from the foot bridge followed by a couple with a small child.  And then a group of 8 or so tourists came running down from the park building to begin exclaiming extravagantly (in a foreign language) about the wonder of the Falls.

It seemed clearly to be their first time at the Falls but they were not wrong.  The Falls were in fine form again today.

As was October.

Uphill into Shoreview

Yet another nice day.

As I suspected it is now possible to ride in Shoreview.  I followed the traditional route out towards Lake Vadnais today, north on Hamline then uphill into Shoreview.

Those are mostly oak trees.

I rode up that hill and back around past the water tower.  I detoured down towards the freeway to duck onto the path through the Grass Lake park.  I was last here in conditions like today back in May.

I tried to ride through there again after the big storms of July and this thing was under water nearly to the top of the tunnel.

It was a great day for wildlife.  The auto focus continues to mostly defeat me on any photo or an object more than five or six feet away but the great blue heron was posing nicely and I ended up with something acceptable.

Here's a tree in the Snail Lake marsh part of the park.  I remember trying to photograph this thing last year and never being there on a day when there was decent lighting.  Eventually I think I published a photo of a leafless November tree.  Today it still isn't quite to peak but it is starting to show the color that made me want to include it last year.

So I got out to Highway 96 in pretty much the traditional manner.  This allows for entering the Sucker Vadnais corridor from the north end.  This means that today I arrived at Sucker Lake before Vadnais.  This allowed me to discover swans at the first lake I visited.

I wish they would come over a little closer and let us all get a decent look.  Today was not a day to head down the dirt path around the lake to get closer.  The archery deer hunt is on out there and the park is closed except for the paved path.

I past some guys in camouflage carrying bows in the Vadnais Parking lot.  The far side of the lake has lots and lots of good habitat.

The scaup are still at Vadnais and their numbers are increasing.  Today there were five or six groups, or which this was the largest.

Just a little bit farther down the shore there was another group.

And then the biggest surprise, visible from the lower parking lot, swans at Lake Vadnais.  Although *sigh* they stay on the far side of the lake down here too.  There is another pod of scaup out there as well, just to the right of the tree.

It was a great day for wildlife sighting, the mother and the two fawns were out browsing today at Lake Owasso.

It's kind of a find Waldo thing, but all three of them are there.

Two views of Sheldon and Frankson

Yesterday would have been a nice day for a ride but I stayed inside for a 3pm video stream from Madison.

And it was worth it.  The Gophers tied the Badgers at 1-1 with a goal with only 1:28 remaining in regulations and then subdued the red menace with an overtime goal with 59.something seconds remaining.

The Gophers who had previously been number 1 in every weekly poll for over two years until this week when they were rated number 2 to Wisconsin overturned the apple cart and swept the this week number 1 rated stinking Badgers.

That should settle that, at least for now.

No hockey today, instead I rode my bicycle.

TOPWLH came back from her support visit to the ancients with a report of 71F at their Bloomington abode.  I think the official is going to be more like 68 but why quibble.  It was a pretty nice day.  I rode in shorts.

The temperature made it feel like the last day of summer.  It really isn't anything like summer anymore.  This is pretty rapidly getting to be late fall.  But some of the tree displays seem just as behind the calendar as today's high temperatures, they just don't do a lot to declare that this will all be over very, very soon.

Here are a couple of looks at the intersection of Sheldon and Frankson, an intersection I visit a couple of hundred times most years.

The first is of Frankson street looking west.  The trees are mostly maples and still show some green.  They definitely are still retaining almost all of their leaves.  Even so, it ain't summer anymore.  It is pretty, but it ain't summer.

From a vantage point with about ten feet or so of the above photo, here is a look down Sheldon Street, facing north.  Sheldon Street is the street with all boulevard trees being oak trees.

Street sign validating location visible there on the left.  It is only just barely fall on Sheldon Street.

I rode in shorts.  On October 19.

Apparently it was a pretty nice day, it sure felt like that to me.

More fun with numbers

As I note from another blogger, this is the time of year when it is pretty hard to not note annual accomplishments.

Today I reached more miles in October than I had in October of last year.  This is six months in a row this year when I have exceeded the level for the same month last year.  Of course, last year I had one ride in October after the 10th (and in fact then only one ride in November, two rides after October 10).

If any riding at all occurs in November (most years it does) I can make seven months in a row with plus mileage.

Which pretty much explains why I have more miles this year than last.

Yesterday was beyond expectations nice.  Today was pretty normal for what is now fairly obviously the last half of October.  The temperatures descended to about average for this time of year and the wind came out a'howlin'.

Too cold.  Way too windy.

I have the gear.

If this was a day with the sun shining this would probably have made for a pretty nice photo.  The colors are good on the trees, if only the sky were blue and the sun shining.

The truth is that if the sun were shining I would not have been anywhere near that spot.  That's along the Hamline Avenue corridor that most years I ride many times on my way out to the northern lakes.  If the sun had been out today I probably would have tried for the northern lakes which would have meant there was no way I would have taken this route.  This route is a dead end into the south side of Shoreview, all oil and tiny pieces of gravel, just completely not what I want.

I rode out into this dead end against the border of Shoreview and was just about to turn back when I decided that a turn back was going to lead to some unpleasant riding later when I was going to have to be trying to make up some miles.  I decided to see if it was at all possible to ride in Shoreview.

And?

Well, there are still lots of places where there are just too many pebbles in the road.  On the other hand at 52F the oil is not in the slightest bit sticky.

So you can ride in Shoreview in these conditions.

I got all the way to the Shoreview Water Tower.

I checked the archives and I think April is the last time I had a photo out there.

At that time I wasn't certain if the new building on the site of the former strip mall was condos or business suites.  The appearance of all of those balconies on the lake side of the building convinces me:  condos.

I turned back from there but I admit it was a tiny bit exhilarating to revisit those very familiar streets and to discover that if the weather cooperates and if I want to that I can take a ride this fall along the very familiar route and discover myself at Lake Vadnais from the north, the more visually pleasing end.

Ten percent chance of rain and at about 4:30 it did in fact drizzle.

Too cold, way too windy.

Nice day for a ride.

Punishment

The GRider announced in the comments yesterday that she wanted to ride to Lake Vadnais.  Well.  It was an extremely nice day here yet again, temperatures heading towards 70, very light wind, we rode in shorts.

In shorts.  In October.

But we rode in contravention of the most fundamental bicycle weather rule.  The winds were very light, mostly east but slightly south east.  We headed north.  During the part of the trek when we were headed east we had a slight head wind, during the part of the trek when we were headed north we had the benefit of a very slight tail wind.

It seemed perfectly OK, the winds were very light.

And it WAS a beautiful day.

No swans at Lake Vadnais, those tausens and tausens of dux were there again today.

And today no swans at Sucker Lake either.  This picnic table is at the south end of the lake.

We stopped by the beaver area.  The beaver habitat has been usurped by mallards.  The big fella green head didn't really hang around when we stopped to try to get his portrait.  But he didn't actually flee either, maybe you can catch a bit of his outline as he sneaks around the corner in the center of the photo, heading away from the intruders.

If you examine those last two photos you may be able to discern a change in the weather.

Conditions were quite bright when we were at Sucker Lake.  Less than a quarter of a mile later at the beaver area it is now hazy.

And then it went for a time pretty heavily overcast.

It didn't ever feel like rain but clearly there had been a change in the dominant weather.  When the weather changes you almost always get a change in the wind direction and wind velocity.

What we got was strong winds, strong from the west and strong from the south.  We were about 10 miles north and east of home.  With strong head winds in every direction all the way home.

Punishment for ignoring the rules.

After we got home the weather changed again, the winds fell off to nothing, it ended up being really, really nice.

Which we couldn't really enjoy as much as we wanted to because we had been punished, I am knackered.  And so is she.

3,002

It becomes more and more obvious with each day that goes by when I don't ride 100 or so miles that the former goal of 4,000 miles is out of reach this year.  Well, actually that goal has been pretty dang obviously out of reach since about April 15.  But today I reached the thousand number just below that former goal and I feel pretty good about it.  As previously noted, this is already more miles than I rode last year.  And with probably 2 or 3 weeks remaining before the season rings to a close I might even reach 80 percent of the former goal.

80 percent would be a B.  B is not the top grade but it is respectable, last year I barely, barely made C.  I'm going to keep grinding trying to get to B.

Today's wind conditions were similar to yesterday's in direction but quite a bit better in velocity.  That means predominantly north, secondarily east winds but today very light in velocity.  Light NE winds is a perfect recipe for Vadnais and I went there again today.

I have had lots of years when I went to Vadnais several days in a row, it feels pretty good to at least finally get there two days in a row.

No swans at Vadnais today but the scaup made a repeat appearance.

There must about a tausen dux inaroe.

Onojo.

The scaup still move away from the shoreline when another species approaches but having been here for a few days now they are less frantic in their flight.  They move away certainly, but easily and confident that the danger if present is slight.

A pretty good reason why there were no swans at Vadnais is that the two I saw there yesterday have moved one lake farther north.  Swans at Sucker Lake.

Pretty spectacular scenery at Sucker Lake today.

This one is within a mile of my house.  Spectacular orange maple with another maple in the background still mostly green, spruce on the right, white pine on the left, spectacular blue sky above.

I still have one more bicycle statistical goal I would be really pleased to reach.  Sometimes I think this goal still seems well within reason but the truth is that is only well within reason if I get probably at least three more weeks of decent weather and decent riding.

Maybe yes, maybe no.

You can't count the miles until you actually ride them.

Floating holiday

It just occurred to me that I didn't get my usual floating holiday this year as the date on which I customarily exercise the floating holiday option fell on a weekend this year.  Since I don't work on weekends I was already not working that day and didn't need the floater.

But today . . .

Wait.

Possible confusion.  Give me a few minutes and I am sure I will get this figured out.

It feels like the seasons are starting to run pretty rapidly downhill.  After a prolonged period of mostly southerly winds the more usual northerlies seem to be pretty firmly reestablished.  Have I mentioned that a north wind is a cold wind?  But a north wind means that after lots and lots of days circling around trying to find a way down into the big city today I was circling around trying to find a way out to the northern lakes without having to ride through the oil and gravel project which consumed southern Shoreview this summer.

Actually, I have now done this ride enough that I have it memorized.

Follow the usual route to the north, deviate over to Lexington, further east on County Road B, eventually finding a route across 36 on Victoria, over to Dale, right on County Road B2, down into the neighborhood at the first available left, right on Transit, left on Western, right on Iona Lane, left on Galtier, right on Maple Lane, left on Woodbridge, over to Rice Street, north to Lake Vadnais.

What was striking about Vadnais today was the deep almost cobalt blue color presented by the lake itself.

The scaup were not around today but at the north end of the lake I paused to photograph this.  The focus is poor but it should be obvious that there are two big white things out there in the water.

Swans.

If the weather holds I will be able to get out there at least a few more times and it seems quite likely that eventually the swans will be closer to this side of the lake.

Swans.

Maybe the pelicans will also show up.

The vermin cull season at the northern lakes natural areas begins very soon.

I rode on up through Sucker Lake all the way to Highway 96 again.  Lots of the yellows are gone but the red oaks and lots of late maple oranges are still out there with a surprising to me amount of still slightly green.

Riding to Vadnais with the northeasterly winds that we had today is pretty much ideal.  The ride out there is all about getting north and getting east, on the new route that is accomplished usually in fairly small increments of each at any one time.  You kind of weave your way out there.

When you turn back every direction is a tail wind.

Here's an update on the formerly heavily wooded intersection of South Owasso Boulevard and Western.  My guess is that the property was owned by an eccentric old dude who has now leveled up to former eccentric old dude.  His property was too valuable to allow for the family to do anything but sell to avoid probate issues like taxes (and probably sell is what they wanted to do anyway).  So now it is going to be something called Owasso Shores.

Five lots, will build to suit, prices in the 700s.

*sigh*

This one is very nearby, only about a mile from home.

Beauty of a tree, fabulous blue sky.

Our ash tree is bare, clearly it is late fall and yet lots of these trees seem to be just getting started in putting on their show.

I got it now.  I don't actually have a job anymore, that's why I didn't get a floating holiday.

See, I told you I would figure it out.

God said to Abraham

Everyone should find their own personal recording of Dylan's Highway 61 Revisited and let it run in the background, I know that's what I am going to do.

God say, “You can do what you want Abe, but
The next time you see me comin’ you better run”
Well Abe says, “Where do you want this killin’ done?”
God says, “Out on Highway 61.”

We were in sorta Duluth for the weekend for Gopher women's hockey and for a little road trip.  We actually didn't end up overnight either night in Duluth as the hotel room rentals actually in Duluth are greatly inflated in price at this time of year due to "peepers", people headed "up north" to get a view of the leaf colors.  There was also some sort of international girls' hockey event centered in Duluth.  The result of this conflation of events was that rooms in motels on the Canal Park waterfront were available for about $250 per night.  Meanwhile rooms at the Black Bear Casino Hotel located 18 or so miles south of the Duluth waterfront were going for $89 per.  And we like gambling . . . so . . .

We were in the Black Bear Casino Hotel.

These are all from our Saturday excursion, starting Saturday morning.  We headed out from the casino down into the nearest extremely small town, Carlton.  To get there we had to travel down Highway 61.

There is going to be a fair amount of railroad content, the first of which is that in traversing that section of old Highway 61 we passed the point just outside of Carlton at which Jay Cooke's fledgling railroad company began construction of a railroad line which would reach the Pacific (and make Cooke wealthy).

From there we headed on down to investigate as best we could what if any damage the big flood following last spring's record rains had wreaked on the gorge above Jay Cooke State Park.

We have visited this spot before.  This is the dam on the Saint Louis River.

We walked a bit farther across the bridge than we have most times previously.  Partly this was because it was a warm and wonderful day in Carlton and partly because we had never got a photo any time previously of this quite large and healthy tree apparently springing directly from a bed rock spur directly below the dam.

It was unbelievable out there Saturday morning.  It was 27F overnight but by the time we had breakfast and got out onto the town it was just light jacket weather, gorgeous, sunny, mild, spectacular.

Minnesota comes through in October again.

We headed up to Duluth to try to see what was up at Hawk Ridge.

Here is the board at the time when we arrived.

It was mostly a Sharpshinned Hawk day.  This year the skies were much more clear than when we were there last year under mostly overcast skies.  Further the wind conditions this time were such that the birds flew much closer to the ridge line viewing areas than they did a year ago.  Last year it was kind of a kick to be there and see the birds migrating but this year it was a bigger kick in that the birds were often close enough for people on the ridge line to get a pretty close up clear view.  Within about a minute of our arrival a "Sharpy" flew up to within about 10 or so meters of the gathered crowd and hovered there taking as good a look at us as we were taking of it.  Within a few minutes several more repeated the routine and in fact the "Sharpies" repeated the pattern so often that the staff birder who was alerting normals to the arrival of birds tired of "Sharpies", proclaiming that there were so many of them that it was becoming boring to comment upon them.  At one point he launched into a fairly lengthy description of a nearby common grackle and gave us all lots of tips on how to differentiate them from the very similar in appearance crow.  Tail feather shape.  And, of course, call.

But mostly for us being at Hawk Ridge is about being at a beautiful spot overlooking the city and harbor at a time of year when Duluth is presenting some of its absolute finest views.  Looking back towards the head of the lake.

You can only barely discern that there is a city there.

We are not birders.  We like the atmosphere but we had other items on our itinerary.  We were getting ready to leave when this thing showed up and came very close.

An American Bald Eagle, close enough to be photographed with a camera which was NOT equipped with a telephoto lens.  That's my standard wide angle lens and it looks like an eagle to me.

Wanna compare numbers?  Here's the board when we left the ridge.

During the hour or so that we were there 140 Sharpshinned Hawks, 20 Bald Eagles, 12 Red tailed Hawks and 7 Turkey Vultures passed by close enough to be officially recorded by the designated counters on the very top of the ridge.

We are not birders.  But we thought that was pretty cool.

It was getting late for lunch.

We ate at "At Sara's Table".  Or perhaps it was the "Chester Creek Cafe".

Or perhaps it was Taran's Market Place.

That's 19th Avenue East on the right of the photo leading down to the greatest of the great lakes.

If you ever, ever, ever have to have lunch in Duluth you would be well served by having lunch at "At Sara's Table, Chester Creek Cafe".

Watch the video.

By the time we left we had both eaten too much but this time we wanted to go to Two Harbors.  Here's where the railroad content kicks back in.  Two Harbors was the Lake Superior terminus of the Duluth, Missabe and Iron Range Railroad and there are some nice museum bits at the former depot on the Lake Superior waterfront.

Here is TOPWLH next to the larger of the two locomotives on display.

The newer kids liked their stuff bigger.

Here she is next to a much older locomotive.

For both photographs TOPWLH for scale.  Some difference, huh?

Here's a look at the charming old depot, now in use as the museum.

The tracks in front are still in use for some sort of tourist train which runs during the height of the tourist season from the depot museum in Duluth.

But for me the trip topper is that while we were taking those photos of ancient what used to be railroad stuff we could hear very distinctly industrial creakings and slammings from behind us.  We pivoted around and eventually moved down the harbor a bit to get a better angle for the photo.  What makes Two Harbors truly charming is that it isn't a potemkin railroad place.  It is still a working port.

The noises from behind us were from the loading operations going on for that iron ore freighter at one of the THREE still in operation ore docks on the Two Harbors harbor.  That's Two Harbors on the right.

It is called TWO Harbors because there are two harbors.  This one is Agate Bay.  We drove around the corner of land and looked at the other harbor.  There's nothing happening over there except condos and vacation rentals.

Agate Bay is better.

Still counting some miles

It is being said here and there that you have to ride the miles before you can count them.

Quite true.

However, you do NOT have to blog about the ride before you can count the miles.  I counted them each of the previous two days without blogging.  And today too, although apparently I will blog about today.

Both days featured warm enough temperatures but absolutely punitive wind conditions.  I came back from the first of the two and responded to TOPWLH's query about the ride with the information that I was pretty sure I had perished.  Too hard.  Too hard.

But I DID ride some miles.  I also got some new pavement.  The Sheep/Poultry building was open and I got inside for a picture back towards the open doorway.

But that was then, today I got better conditions for riding.  It was a bit too chilly but the winds subsided to something much more manageable.  With north the main source of the wind (a north wind is a cold wind) I set out to try to go somewhere.

This is along the new all-Roseville route to Lake Vadnais.

A very pretty day, but, as noted, quite a long way towards the end of the spectrum where it will inevitably become too cold.

I wasn't even sure what these were at first but there certainly were a lot of them.

I think Lesser Scaup, on the migration route from their more northern summer habitat to a much farther south wintering ground.

I got all the way out to Highway 96, a long ways from home.  This is Sucker Lake.

I spotted vermin along the road past Lake Owasso again.  I am pretty sure these are the same two fawns that I spotted back in August when they were there with their mother.  At that time they were still sporting spotted coats.

They are still hanging out in almost the exact same spot where I spotted them in August and they still haven't learned to fear a guy on a bicycle.  Mom didn't seem to be anywhere around today.

On a related note the signs are up at Vadnais and Sucker alerting park users to areas which will be closed October 22 and some other days for the annual archery vermin cull.