ride to the Plains, turn right

I went for a wonderful bike ride yesterday. I went for just over 30 miles, and used my new gorillapod tripod (as recommended by Heather). It didn’t quite stay put during the one section of gravel road that I have to travel on, but other than that, I think it was pretty handy. It was nice to be able to just hit a button to take the photo, rather than fishing the camera out of my jersey pocket first. I rode to the Plains, VA, headed down Halfway Road and then Landmark Road. According to a sign at a fork in the road there is a winery or vineyard on that road (and actually, there was another one if I had taken a left at the fork instead of the right that I took), but I didn’t find it. I think I had about 2 more miles to ride before I would have ended up there. That 2 miles was going to involve a big downhill followed by a big uphill, and then I would have to repeat that once I turned around to go home. I felt that I really couldn’t take a chance with that because I still needed to ride home. So, I turned around at just over the 15 mile mark. I saw several birds, a few of them I couldn’t identify. Eastern Bluebirds have been my favorites to see on my rides. I also saw a woodchuck run into the hole at the base of a tree. There are several wonderful wildflowers along the route that I took. Wild geranium (I think), jack-in-the-pulpit, mayapple, small orange poppies and a bunch of others that I can’t remember the names of. I need to dig out my field guide at some point. There were also plenty of dogwoods, pink azaleas and wisteria. I think maybe Thursday on my day off I might go for a photo ride where I plan on actually getting off my bike to photograph some of the flora. I was enjoying riding too much yesterday to stop to take photographs. I did stop one time to try to take some photos of the mountain view to the west along Halfway Rd, but other then that it was all riding.

Ride stats:

Distance=30.69 miles

Time=2:08:46

Ride Type=training/recreation/get my rearend back into shape/enjoy a beautiful day

Average speed=14.7mph (34.86mph max-when you go uphill, you get to come back down!)

Ascent=5373 feet (according to GPS) I don’t know if that’s accurate, but I can say that I did a heck of a lot of climbing. This was a very hilly route.

Click chart to enlarge.