It’s worthwhile to check out writeups from Tim and David. From their descriptions, I glean that it was very, VERY difficult, and involved a lot of suffering. I’ve had little time for training lately, so it may be a blessing in disguise that I wasn’t able to ride. Even so, I’m still irked that I didn’t get to go.

Saturday night I came down with a cold or something, just in time to be sick for possibly my busiest week of the entire semester. I’m hoping winter break in a few weeks will allow me to decompress and maybe even do some recreational riding.

The problem is, Indiana roads are unpredictable. It’s very difficult to tell which will be paved, and which will be gravel. Usually, we’re seeking out gravel, and we try to plan as many gravel roads as possible. This time we had the opposite idea in mind, but we still didn’t know if all the roads would be paved or not. Tim put together a route that looked very interesting, and we scheduled the ride. Here is the route.

In the days leading up to the ride, we inspected the route more closely, and it started to look like some of the roads would be gravel. With rain in the forecast, we ultimately decided that the fast, skinny-tired road bikes were out. They wouldn’t fare well in wet gravel, which is something we had to be prepared to deal with.

The other riders in our group (David, Patrick, and Timothy) had all already chosen beefier bikes, so Sunday morning we set out, prepared for … well, we didn’t know what to expect, so, anything.

We rolled out of Orleans at 9:00 am. Here is Timothy, who was joining us for his first RCCS ride, or at least the first one that I have been on as well. He was riding a rigid, steel Trek mountain bike. He’s training for the Heck of the North ride in Duluth, MN in October. We crossed paths at the Louisville 100k populaire, but only spoke for a few minutes on that ride.

Here is Patrick, on his Rivendell Bombadil. This was my first time riding with him, though he rides with RCCS sometimes, but usually in Louisville. It was also my first time seeing a Bombadil in person, and it seemed like a fine rig, extra badass, with its second top tube.

Here are the two Tims. The day got off to a brisk start, with the two of them setting a strong pace.

We saw a lot of dogs this day, many of which gave chase. I find this photo amusing because the dogs are smiling, but David isn’t …

We made a brief stop in Campbellsburg, where Tim had to make a few fender adjustments. His front fender actually snapped off, and he had to chuck it.

Campbellsburg seemed like a scrappy little town, with lots of run-down homes. Many were worse than this — some had holes in their crumbling walls.

But, that didn’t last long. We were out in the country again, with a mild climb and some stellar views.

We went into a wonderful, mile-long decent into a valley bottom with flat fields surrounded by hills. We were less than 20 miles into the ride, and already we had some excellent highlights.

David picked up a hitchhiker in the form of a grasshopper under his front rack.

After a few flat miles, we had to pay for that stellar descent, with a long climb. It was tough, and the weather was warming up. Soon thereafter, and much to our surprise, we hit our first gravel for the day. Then there was another crazy downhill, this time on loose gravel. I wimped out and went really slowly. I’ve had a few too many crashes on these rides. Fortunately none have been serious, but I’m a little spooked when it comes to gravel downhills.

The pavement soon came back and we had another big climb. I can’t remember if this one was on pavement or gravel. Timothy sure was enjoying the ride.

After a brief section on State Road 135, we turned onto Old SR 135 for what would be a highlight of the day for many of us. A long descent, nearly two miles, with quite a few switchbacks which meant the ride was never too steep but we could build up some speed and carve through the sharp turns. This was bliss!

We stopped about halfway down to check out the views. Here comes Timothy down the hill.

We had a great view out into the distance, with the road curving well below us.

Toward the bottom, after the road straightened out, we saw several kittens alongside the road. I didn’t stop to photograph them. Soon we reached the Muscatatuck River, and another surprise. Our route had us turning here.

Naturally, we were able to crawl through and lift our bikes over the fence.We took a few photos from the bridge.

Then, we rolled on, and enjoyed a few flat paved miles, surrounded by farmland.

At this point we reached a couple miles of rough gravel.

We found a covered bridge to explore.

The small town of Medora appeared in the distance. This would be our only store stop, roughly halfway through the ride.

I kept seeing these white wildflowers, but I’m not sure what they were.

Soon we reached Medora.

A stop there was much needed. Some of us were out of water, or nearly out. We all stocked up on water, and ate some lunch. The place where we stopped served food, in addition to being a convenience store. I had brought a sandwich but some other folks bought some sandwiches there.

After refueling, we rolled out again. Everyone was moving slowly after lunch, with the heat kicking in and lunches not yet settled. We thought the return trip would be easier, but there were some more surprises in store for us.

First was the wind. We knew we had a tailwind much of the way out, but we hadn’t realized how strong it was. The wind was quite strong at times, though in some areas, we were shielded by hills, trees, etc. But when we were out in the open, we were pushing against the wind.

The reflection in this pond looked absolutely perfect. An idyllic spot, an image captured in a fraction of a second, but I could have lingered here for hours. Staring at the photo takes me right back to that spot. It’s funny, we didn’t even stop here, but I keep looking at this image and thinking how perfect that spot was.

Soon we reached the East Fork of the White River, which we would see at several points along the route.

We saw another closed bridge, but this one was not on our route.

And a lot of run-down barns and the like. For a while, the road had the river on one side, train tracks on the other, and shacks on the other side of the tracks.

Then, another surprise: more gravel. This time, in the form of an 8.5-mile stretch, with a few hills thrown into the mix. None of the hills were too extreme, but the hot conditions, dusty gravel road and some hills, made for a very challenging section of road.

It started off well enough, with some fun gravel, and even some shade.

Part of the challenge was mental. Somewhere along here, Tim and Patrick rode on ahead. I was having problems with my GPS crapping out on me (I think due to the vibration on the rough gravel), and at one point, I tried to push my sunglasses up and the lens popped out. I managed to catch it in my hand. I tossed it in my handlebar bag until I could find a good time to stop.

Every time I’d see a bit of shade, I thought maybe Tim and Patrick would be stopped there so we could regroup. My GPS kept beeping at me every time I hit a bump. I wanted to put my sunglasses back on. I just kept on riding and still, no Tim or Patrick. Eventually I just stopped and fixed my glasses, and tried to fix the GPS. Then Timothy caught up with me, and I rode with him for a while. This was a nice stretch of road, but it was too hot and I didn’t know how far ahead Tim and Patrick were, and my stomach was starting not to feel very well. I was ready to get past this road.

After what seemed like forever (and in reality was probably not more than 45 minutes), I reached the end of the road and there were Tim and Patrick. Timothy was close behind me, and David a bit behind him. We got stretched out a little bit on this road, but not by more than a few minutes.

We crossed the river, which felt like an important benchmark on the return trip. Maybe we were on the home stretch now.

Not long after that, it started raining. It never rained very hard, but it did cool us down for a few minutes — except in sunny spots, where you could feel the steam coming off the road as the rain fell. Wow. Naturally this was happening during a climb. This house was not in the greatest shape, but they did have a nice river view.

Then the road got hillier. My stomach started feeling better. I wasn’t climbing too vigorously, but I felt decent most of the time.

After a few ups and downs, the road got a bit flatter but then we were headed directly into the wind. The hot air blasting in my face made it difficult to breathe at times. I ran out of water a few blocks from the end … much further and I would’ve been in trouble in terms of water. But given that it was a 70-mile ride with only one refueling stop, it worked out perfectly.

This was just a wonderful ride all around. The scenery was great, the terrain challenging, and most importantly, I had a blast riding with these guys. RCCS rides are always fun, but having Patrick and Timothy join us made it that much better. We had a great group of riders with varying gear and philosophies. Never a dull moment with this group.

School starts back up for me in a week, so my riding will probably be more limited after that. I’m hoping to get a ride or two in this weekend, but if not, this was a great way to end the summer.

We rolled out, and I was excited to be back on the trails for only the second time this year, and I felt good, and strong, and the bike felt pretty good, too. I was anxious to see how the bike would do in its new setup. It quickly became obvious that it handles a lot differently from what I’m used to, and that it would take some time to get used to it. It was a warm and extremely humid morning, so much so that my camera lens fogged up and I couldn’t get it to clear up.

The first technical challenge of the day involved a short, but steep, eroded climb with a nasty root at the top. I picked up some speed to help myself clear it. I hit the root pretty hard, and my tire bounced a bit. I didn’t exactly crash, but I sort of fell, and I laid the bike down. When I got back up, I took stock of the situation. I wasn’t hurt at all, except a small bump on the leg. But then I looked in my handlebars, and was shocked at what I saw. These photos are from Dave …  my camera lens was still fogged up.

We were less than a mile into the woods, and my handlebars were severely bent. My ride was over. Actually, it’s probably a good thing that this happened right away, rather than deep in the woods.

Dave snapped this shot of my contemplating my bars … or pouting, perhaps.

Dave walked back to the trailhead with me. As we were walking back, Dave said, “Talk about ridus interruptus!” — thereby naming this post. Dave grabbed his earbuds and headed back out. I drove home. Later, he sent me this shot of a great switchback from the Green Valley trail, to let me know what I was missing. Damn!

So, I was pretty frustrated. I drove home. Once there, I ate some lunch, and then I decided to put the bars from my old mountain bike on The Beast. Within three hours, I was fed, the “new” bars were installed and wrapped, and I was riding once again, this time closer to home.

The Beast was hilarious on paved roads, with knobby tires. It sounded like a helicopter going down the road. I like to imagine that it must be sort of like a mini Pugsley, in that the tires seem oversized relative to the frame.

I explored some nearby parks, covering some familiar ground, and some new trails I found. Sadly my GPS crapped out on me, so I don’t have a map of my exploration. Alas.

Here, you can see my new/old bars. I used these for many years, and they usually work well for me.

I can’t get over the carving in this log — perfect for a singlespeed ride!

T’he Beast looks menacing, from a low angle.

So far, everything had been pretty flat and easy. I found some additional trails off the beaten path and explored. Some parts were wide open, like the photo below, while others were overgrown and not maintained … it was like bushwhacking, on a bike (bikewhacking)?

I practiced some skills like log-hopping, riding over rocks and roots, etc. These trails were tame enough to be ridable, but technical enough to give the bike a good shakedown ride. I learned that climbing on the singlespeed really requires a wide handlebar. The ends of this bar worked perfectly for this, and in fact I could have spent most of the ride holding onto them instead, except that I can’t reach the brake levers from there. I wonder if I could move the levers to the outer portions of the bar, or something.

At one point, I came out of the woods and had a nice view of the gazebo at this park. From the gazebo, you can’t tell the trail is even there.

More bikewhacking …

So, despite the fact that my original plans were foiled, I had a good ride, and these bars are definitely better than the ones I had on there before. I haven’t decided yet if they’re staying or not. My first real offroad ride on the Beast in singlespeed form was illuminating, and a lot of fun. Unfortunately, it was quite hot, and just as humid, later in the day. I was really cooking. I’m glad I rode anyway.

Once I was sure the Beast was doing well, I contacted Dave and we decided to try again at Brown County on Sunday. More on that soon!

Within minutes, I was looking at scenery like this.

The photos above were all on the more familiar (to me), gravel Bloomington Rail Trail. I also spent some time on the paved Clear Creek Trail, where I’ve only ridden a couple of times before.

There were some huge homes right along the trail.

A side excursion on a gravel trail yielded some interesting finds.

I climbed up the gravel trail, and found it intersected with a road. I need to figure out where that road goes. For this ride, once I reached the end of the trail, I turned around. Here, I’m about to bomb back down the hill.

I’m not sure what all the fuzzy stuff is in the photo below, but it captured my attention.

I’m not normally a fan of rail-trails, but it was great to get out for an easier ride for a change, without having to worry about traffic too much. Actually, I was more in riding mode than exploration mode, and didn’t stop too often. I should ride the same trails and stop more to explore. Sometimes it’s amazing what’s right outside your front door, if you take the time to look around.

As planned, the ride was this past Sunday, but there was a much greater turnout than I had imagined. In addition to Jon, Brad, and Bill, we had Tim and Asher come up from Louisville, and my local friend Dave joined us as well. Including me, that meant we had seven riders, most of whom knew each other through blogs but had never met before.

Here is the route we rode:

Sarah prepared quite a spread for breakfast, so everyone was certainly well-fueled when we rolled out. Here are a couple of shots Sarah took of us before the ride.

Here are the riders at the start:

Jon and Brad (the Denver guys), Asher and Tim (the Louisville guys), and me (the Bloomington guy).

Bill (the Fort Wayne guy) is below in the yellow jersey. In the other shot I had of him, his water bottle was covering his face.

The ride started with some rollers to get across/around town, and there was more traffic than I expected, for a Sunday morning. I guess being a holiday weekend may have affected that.

Here we have, from close to far, Brad, Asher, and Tim.

Here, Jon and Bill are getting acquainted in person, but I think of all of us felt like we knew each other already, from conversations on our blogs.

Within a few minutes, we had our first mechanical issue of the day. I think it was a bag snafu, if I recall correctly.

But, we weren’t stopped long. Once we got through the rollers and traffic, we turned into the neighborhood where I grew up. The next mile or so was on mild singletrack, rolling through the woods, which John Mellencamp owns. He bought the land so it wouldn’t be developed. I spent many days back in those woods at the end of my street, as a kid. Everyone loved the shady woods and the fun trails that we rode on. Here we’re all stopped to photograph a box turtle.

Here are Bill and Jon, coming out of the woods.

Next we had a big, paved descent, followed by some flat, but beautiful, bottomland, with fields, creeks, and hills surrounding us.

Now we had the first major climb of the day: Mount Gilead Road. It was paved and very smooth, a bit steep at the bottom but not too bad after that. It does go on for a while, though.

Soon after the climb, we met up with Dave, who was starting from his house. Next we were on State Road 45, with a few ups and downs, open fields and wooded sections. It’s a highway, but we were far enough from town that there was very little traffic.

After a bit of that, we entered Yellowwood State Forest, and finally reached our first gravel of the day. The introduction to the state forest was abrupt, as we turned onto a gravel road and went down a big hill. Now normally I climb this hill, so I am used to having more time to look around and enjoy the scenery. However, it was still just beautiful, with rolling hills, gravel roads, shade, deep green trees above and vinca below, not flowering but the lush green groundcover was lovely.

Here, Asher is approaching.

Tim and Asher rolling out.

And here is Brad, who surprised me with an awesome wheelie for the camera. You can see Bill in the distance, who was having problems with his fender. The bolt wiggled loose, with all the gravel.

Soon we were at the gorgeous Yellowwood Lake. The water level was high and the lake looked wonderful.

Soon we were rolling again, with some gravel rollers, the ride’s only water stop, and then we were back on pavement for a while. Unfortunately during a big downhill, Dave’s rear tire slipped a bit. He managed to stay upright. Upon closer inspection, his rear tire was going flat. He patched it.

While Dave was fixing his tire, I took a moment to document the various bikes people were riding. Here is Jon with his great 29er. I love the handlebars on this bike, and the titanium fork.

Bill’s Specialized Tri-Cross got a good workout on the gravel and trail. Aside from his fender issues, it fared very well.

Asher had borrowed this Cannondale mountain bike from a friend. It was a great bike, but some rear hub issues gave him fits while climbing, at times.

Brad’s Bridgestone XO-3 surprised me. It looks like a bike that’d be good for just tooling around town, and I’m sure it would be good for that, but it handled serious hills and gravel with aplomb. It definitely helps that he’s a strong rider. He could fly on this thing. It also looks shockingly similar to The Beast, making me think that I need to get that bike rolling again.

Brad took a moment to call the wife and daughter while sitting in the shade. Nice.

And of course, here is my Long Haul Trucker. Somehow, I managed to not get a photo of Tim’s LHT at this time.

Jon and Bill chatting. They really hit it off. Also, Bill has lost a ton of weight since the last time I rode with him. He looks great.

Dave, getting ready to ride again.

Paved loveliness awaited.

It wasn’t long before Dave had to put more air in his tire again. Then it was about a mile of riding on the busy State Road 46. It wasn’t fun, but fortunately it was short-lived. Soon we turned onto Crooked Creek Road, which alternates between pavement and gravel. At one point, a lizard scampered across the road, and we just narrowly missed hitting it.

Dave’s tire went flat again, so we stopped again. I turned my attention to the butterflies on some wildflowers.

Soon, we were rolling again. We had a big, steep gravel climb, the kind that goes up for a while, then evens out. Just when you start thinking it’s over, it turns sharply uphill once again. Ouch! There was a steep downhill afterwards, as well, which I took very cautiously. I didn’t feel I had very good traction.

After that we were on pavement for a while, and things were a bit easier.

We stopped by part of Lake Monroe, and just as we pulled up, a Great Blue Heron swooped down into the water just ahead of us. I missed getting a photo of the heron, but I at least got the lake.

Then it was a few more miles of remote, quiet paved roads, followed by another big climb — this time, paved. Tim’s chain snapped as he was riding up the hill. Jon ended up coming partway back down the hill with his chain tool to help. That meant he had to ride back up again. It was a long, steep hill, and it was hot and humid. Tough riding, for sure.

But, all that climbing paid off a few minutes later, with a phenomenal paved descent down T.C. Steele Road, complete with switchbacks and some straight sections where you could really let loose. This was a real highlight of the ride for me; the payoff for a bunch of climbing, and the Trucker descends so well on pavement that it was a real treat. After that, we had flat-to-rolling pavement for a little bit.

The flowers below were particularly beautiful.

Soon we were back on gravel, where we faced a couple of miles of very rough, loose gravel with big chunks that shook me as I rode. Jon definitely had the right bike for this section, with his 29″ knobbies. Then it was a brief stint back on the highway, another short section of rough gravel, and a climb back up toward town. Apparently I stopped taking photos around this time. It was beautiful riding, but I was definitely slowing down.

Once we were nearly back to town, Dave peeled off to ride home. The rest of us continued back to my house, by way of some serious rollers. Jon was having major cramping problems, so he and I hung back. Either we slowed down a lot, or everyone else picked up the pace, because they sure seemed to be flying. I was feeling OK, but not wanting to go fast at all. We all arrived back at my house within a few minutes of each other.

Once there, we broke out the beer and Sarah had prepared a great lunch. We all sat in the shade, drinking cold beer and eating sandwiches, wonderfully fresh fruit, and other items.

It was immensely gratifying to have such a great turnout for this ride, and to meet new friends, and longtime friends who we just happened not to have had the pleasure of riding with before. I also enjoyed showing off the beautiful land in the Bloomington area to people who seemed to appreciate it as much as I do.

I have more photos posted in my set on Flickr for this ride.

Other accounts of this ride (will add more later):

• Asher
• Bill
• Tim

As you might imagine, I was anxious to get out for a good solid bike ride. Tim was game, so on Saturday we met at Muscatatuck National Wildlife Reserve near Seymour, IN, for a solid 56-mile ride. It was mostly paved, but some gravel and a bit of trail, as well. The odd thing about this route was that it was flat-to-rolling most of the time, except one big hill (knob) right around halfway through the ride. Here is a map of our route.

I woke up Saturday to a whole lot of thunder, and heavy rain. One good thing about riding with Tim is that I always know he’s up for riding in any conditions. There wasn’t any question about whether we would ride, just how wet we’d get.

We met at Muscatatuck around 9am, right on the tail end of some rain. The rain basically stopped as we were getting ready to ride. Our first few miles were gravel with some great wildlife — deer, herons, geese, bullfrogs.

Then it was pavement for a while through gently-rolling farmland.

Soon we started to get glimpses of the knobs, where we were headed. Specifically, we were going to Jackson-Washington State Forest, which contains several knobs and is part of the Knobstone Escarpment area in Indiana.

The buggy sign below was hand-made. A nice touch.

Before long we were in Brownstown, IN, a small town that Sarah and I have visited on a few different occasions. We stopped for water and restrooms.

Here’s Tim’s Litespeed, with a few upgrades since the last time I saw it. The bike is even better than before!

And of course, here is my Long Haul Trucker.

The sky grew increasingly ominous. Tim ran into someone he knew there (small world!) and an old man chatted us up. He seemed to be quite a character, but his countrified accent was so thick it was hard to understand what he was saying.

During all this time the clouds got darker and darker. It was clear we were going to get quite wet. We rolled out.

Just a few minutes outside of town, Tim felt his rear tire going flat. We stopped, and he immediately started working on it. I took the opportunity to look around a bit.

The rain finally started. It was coming down pretty hard.

Here’s Tim, working on his tire in the rain. He fixed it rather efficiently but carefully. His work paid off; the fix held.

We rolled out again, only to find our road closed.

Of course, roads that are impassable by car are often easily navigated with a bicycle. We pressed on. Soon we saw why the road was closed. This photo stinks, but you can see the landslide debris on the road.

We made our way over the debris and the climb up the knob started in earnest.

Soon we saw where the landslide had started. An upper portion of the road had washed away.

After a while, we made it to the top. We just took our time and spun up in a low gear. Almost immediately after we reached the top, we were treated to an excellent vista.

We rode further down the road for a few more views.

Then it was a long descent. It had more or less stopped raining at this point. The road down was so steep that Tim walked part of it. I rode it, but I did so very slowly.

Once at the bottom, we continued on and it was back to being flat. We had a great tailwind for a while. Tim wasn’t feeling great, but the wind certainly helped us along.

We could see numerous storm clouds, and as we rode along we were able to watch them grow and change. Very cool.

This wheat field scene captured our attention.

As did this very small church.

We passed a couple of gravel roads that looked they’d be fun to explore, such as the one below, but we stuck to our route.

Eventually, we hit gravel. A downhill, some turns, and some flat riding. The sky was different now but still quite stunning.

Soon we were back near Muscatatuck; a short jaunt on a trail and some gravel roads took us back to our cars. My sandals were funny here, I could feel the wet grass on my toes as I pedaled.

All in all it was a wonderful ride. The weather was spectacular, not in a picture-perfect kind of way, but it was impressive to watch the clouds and experience the rain. We somehow missed the big storms. The rain that we did encounter wasn’t bad at all.

Since this ride was mostly flat and mostly paved, it was a relatively easy 56 miles, except the few miles on the knob. Even so, I was getting pretty tired toward the end. It had been a while since I’d been on long bike ride. I feel I rode well, especially considering how little riding I’ve done lately.

I’ve got a lot of riding planned in July. I am looking forward to it!

I was in a rotten mood earlier today. After spending some time with my wife, while simultaneously working on a photography project, I started feeling a bit better. Then, I managed to sneak out  for maybe 30-45 minutes on the singlespeed. It wasn’t a long ride, but it helped clear the mind and I felt ready to focus on my next project afterwards. Sometimes, it’s surprising how much even a little ride helps.

I’ve made some changes to the singlespeed. The Brooks B17 wasn’t working for me, so I took the saddle off my 29er and put it on the singlespeed. It’s a lot better, although this saddle isn’t great if I’m not wearing biking shorts. So, I still need to figure out the best course of action.  The saddle change also forced a saddle bag change. This saddle will need to go back on the 29er, so I’ll have to buy a saddle for the singlespeed; now I’m leaning toward a WTB like I have on the Trucker.

I also put clipless pedals on it. They’re OK, but my foot placement feels a little awkward. I feel like I’m sitting too far back, maybe, even though the saddle is as far forward on its rails as it will go. This problem might actually be related to the stem, which I haven’t been able to change yet — it’s too long.

Those issues are noticeable, but I really wasn’t bothered by them, or even thinking about them, during my ride. I “just rode” for probably eight miles or so. I didn’t even bring the GPS, which is unusual for me, even on a short ride. Here are a couple of photos from the ride. I was in the 50s today so it killed me that I couldn’t ride longer, but I made the most of the time I had.

Starting at Muscatatuck NWR gave us great scenery, and gravel, from the very start. Even just on the drive there, we all saw an entire field full of sandhill cranes. Beautiful!

We headed out under blue skies, with temperatures probably in the 40s. This was also my birthday ride, of sorts, and I rarely get to ride in these kind of pleasant conditions around my birthday.

We stopped off to visit the beautiful Stanfield Lake. We rode out onto a small, floating pier to get a better view.

Before we left, we saw an otter running along shore. I didn’t get any photos of the otter, sadly.

Soon we were rolling again, reveling in the warm sun and the beauty surrounding us

Here are Kirk and Cathy, a couple, both strong riders. This was their first RCCS ride. They were both on mountain bikes. I very much enjoyed riding with them — they both had positive, adventurous attitudes and seemed to be up for anything.

After a bit, we came across another beautiful, small lake.

Here’s where the riding started to get a little more interesting. The “road” we were on reached this gate.

We took a brief break and then went around the gate. On the other side was grassy doubletrack. Cathy said, “Oh, we’re going offroad?” I think that at this point she started to get a better idea of what an RCCS ride is like. She seemed to enjoy it.

This next shot is blurry from shooting while riding on a bumpy surface, but gives some idea of the experience.

After a bit the trail reached a paved road. We headed south, then east. We were mostly headed into the wind for a while. The wind wasn’t overly strong, but it was noticeable.

The terrain was a lot of fun — moderately rolling hills, enough to make things fun, but no grueling climbs.

We saw a lot of dogs on this ride.  If you enlarge the photo below, you can see several of them chasing us. Fortunately it was all in good fun, none actually seemed to be aggressive.

The hills got  a bit bigger as we headed east.

The road surface alternated between paved and dirt. This particular narrow dirt road was especially lovely.

Soon, the scenery would change from wide open field space …

… to enclosed, and heavily wooded forests, as we entered Crosley State Fish and Wildlife Area. Crosley was bigger than I expected, and offered many miles of wonderful flowing dirt roads. We also noticed a number of side roads, fire roads and trails branching off from the roads we were on. This area definitely warrants further exploration, probably with mountain bikes.

Another narrow dirt road took us down to Crosley Lake.

Smiles abounded.

The lake portion was an out and back. After we headed back we found more absolutely stunning, flowing, narrow dirt roads through the forest.

Including a creek crossing, and some rock formations.

And an incredibly narrow iron bridge over the Muscatatuck River. This is probably the narrowest large iron bridge I’ve seen that was intended for motor vehicle traffic. Definitely a one-lane affair.

By way of more gravel and paved roads …

… we made our way into the small town of Vernon, Indiana. The liquor store was the most convenient place for us to stop and get water and snacks, so that’s what we did. We were all quite amused by this sign.

The courthouse, right across the street, was beautiful.

Here is Kirk’s bike. It seems like a practical rig for a ride like this — a rigid, steel mountain bike with slick tires.

Cathy’s bike was a hardtail. Again, fitting for a ride like this.

Here are the other three bikes — David’s LHT, my LHT, and Tim’s Bleriot.

We turned around to head back.

At this point, I filled up my SD card, so I don’t have any more photos.

The ride back was wonderful. It was similar in some ways but we had the wind at our backs at least part of the time, and the return trip was mostly paved, rolling terrain, which allowed us to cover ground more quickly, and the flow of the roads was just phenomenal. Great riding all around.

Tim and I noticed several excellent-looking gravel side roads along the way. We’ll have to return and explore this area more fully.

This ride was an absolute blast. During the ride, Tim and I mentioned a couple of times the 200k that we had planned on riding, but we both felt we had made the right decision not to do it. We enjoyed ourselves fully the whole time on this ride, instead of what we can only imagine would have been all-day suffering in the 200k.

This ride had it all: beautiful scenery, wildlife, flowing paved roads, wild dirt roads and trails, a small town stop, and great company.

Saturday: 47 miles of mixed terrain with RCCS.

Sunday: Photography.

Sunday evening: Birthday dinner, cake, presents (my birthday is, in reality, today).

More coming later, once I have a chance to work with the photos. I plan on experimenting with some Photoshop techniques. I think I’ll get good results (see first photo above) but it may take a while.

Quickly, I found this creek just off to the side.

And this frozen pond.

I made my way into a rather new subdivision that looked kind of fancy, but it was also a bit odd. The houses all appeared to be basically identical, except a few different-colored panels.

I spotted another trail running behind the houses in this neighborhood.

Considering that it ran right behind a subdivision, the trail had some nice wooded views.

The trail was snowy and icy in spots. The singlespeed has 32mm tires, wide enough to manage well enough.

The trail had been paved to this point, but the pavement ended. The trail was rather muddy, but still ridable. I rode through a field on a thin ribbon of trail.

The trail reconnected with the first trail I had been on, and I rode on. I stopped by this pond, which also happens to be outside my doctor’s office.

Here’s another pond right down the street, but this one was still frozen.

I paused by a field before heading back.

I rode home by way of Olcott/Sherwood Oaks parks. There’s a decent-sized ravine, with one park on top, the other below. This meant a good downhill, followed by a climb.

I stopped at the bottom to admire the creek. As I did, a couple of other guys rode by … both of them were also on Little 500 bikes! They didn’t stop to chat, and I didn’t get a decent shot of them, sadly. I turned my attention back to the creek.

I decided to extend my ride slightly on the Jackson Creek Trail.

Now I had a good climb out of the ravine. I was curious how it’d be on the singlespeed, and it was just fine. Very doable. The gearing on the bike is rather low, at 42×18. It may take a while to figure out the ideal gear ratio.

By the way, here’s a closer shot of the weird rear brake configuration. Mike asked about this and mentioned I might be able to install a long-reach caliper. I *think* the bike was designed with this in mind, but I don’t know. Does the photo help at all? It’s hard to tell, but the rear bridge is drilled right behind the canti straddle cable.

This was a great, if short, ride on the new singlespeed. I hadn’t intended to take it offroad, but it handled fairly well.

I put the bike to a much better test today — more about that soon.