Monday, September 21, 2009

Sunday McAlpine Creek Greenway

Yesterday afternoon Mein Schatz and I loaded up the bikes and headed over to the Sardis end of the McAlpine Park Greenway. The atmospheric condition from the severely extreme weather center was overcast all weekend with a chance of scattered rain showers. I saw the radar image before we left and was able to conclude that all the rain was going to stay far to the west of town. Our ride was extraordinary and filled with surprises. The first surprise was Ms. Arcen's performance. She rode out and back from the Sardis End, to the East Harris end at the broken bridge with all the options including a new section(that I had not ridden before) seen in the image above faster than I can ever remember her riding. The kid did not even once talk about a scheduled break which usually she starts requesting after about 30 minutes of spinning. This day she felt better than great.
Ms. Arcen has always seemed comfortable out on physical challenge but this day's increase in happiness was so noticeable that during the ride I commented on her speed and fluid spin. With the wave of her left hand she let me know that it was not her, that the Cruiser was doing it all by allowing her to float on air. 3rd Gear in the Sturmey was good to her. Do you see her hiding in the foliage in the below image?
At the turn around point we left the bikes on the side of the greenway path and explored a side trail up a hill and along the creek. All was going well with that jaunt until I stepped into a human feces with my left foot. Panic, anxiety and a tinge of anger for two reasons. First I was not watching my step and secondly what would compel anyone to defecate 6 inches off of the trail. Major decontamination steps went into action and after she realized I was okay she laughed at me. Back to the broken closed bridge I found this Writing Spider hanging from the center of her web.
When we returned to the car lot we decided to do a 'cool down' ride out of the parking lot and right onto Old Bell Rd. Just before the end of the street on top of a hill on the left Ms. Arcen said, "Look a deer." I turned the bike and on top of the hill saw an ornamental yard buck. "Kid, it's one of those fake deer", I said as I cut back around towards her to continue down Old Bell. Just then on the right hand side of the road about 20 meters ahead were 2 real deer staring at us. Ms. Arcen appeared to stop breathing for a second as she smiled with her entire body. The bigger of the two leaped across the road and bounded up the hill towards the Faux Buck while the other one turned and disappeared into the woods on the right. "Amazing", she said with a huge grin. Truly indeed Mein Schatz.

1 comment:

chromatos said...

The pic of the foot pedaling, FUCKIN AWESOME.

-g