Sarah and I had a great weekend. On Saturday, we slept in, had lunch with my sister, and then went to the Morgan-Monroe State Forest. We mostly just drove around there, but we did stop at a cemetery there that’s notorious in this area for being haunted: Stepp Cemetery. We took some photos there. More on that later, once I post some photos.

I hadn’t been in that state forest for years, and I never spent much time there before. I think Stepp Cemetery is the only part of it I had been to. I definitely want to go back and do some hiking and possibly camping there. It’s more rugged and not as groomed as the state parks, so it feels more remote and I think we could connect with nature better there.

We debated what to do next, hiking was an option, but I really wanted to go for a bike ride. We ended up heading to Brown County State Park — I rode the North Tower Loop and the Aynes loop, and Sarah sat in the North Tower and read. I was worried she might get bored, but she really enjoys reading there, and needed to do some reading for class anyway. As she puts it (I’m paraphrasing here): “If you have to read, why not do it in a log cabin with a beautiful view?”

My ride was incredible. I was just flying, all these road miles pay off in ways that aren’t always obvious. But since I hadn’t ridden on the trails in almost a month, I felt a huge difference. I was climbing better than ever, and my average speed for the ride was about 7.8 … very fast for me for trail riding. The trail conditions were great, too, parts were so dry they were dusty. I am digging the new tires I’m running on my mountain bike, a Kenda Blue Groove on the front and a Nevegal on the rear. They grip very well, and I have more confidence in turns and whatnot. I might switch out the Nevegal for something a little less aggressive in the rear at some point, but for now I’m very satisfied. I had to hurry a bit toward the end of the ride, because the sun was setting and I didn’t have lights with me.

Sunday was another great day; I rode at Brown County again, this time with Dave. I had been planning a road ride one day this weekend, but my trail ride on Saturday felt so good that I wanted to do another one. Plus, I hadn’t ridden with Dave for a while. We had a great ride, although I was feeling Saturday’s ride more than I would’ve expected. Mountain biking really does take a lot more out of you. We kept a pretty good pace, although it was slower than Saturday’s. We took our time and took several breaks. It’s good to be out there and not be in a hurry.

On our way back to the parking lot, we saw a kid with a flat tire and tried to help him fix it. I had a pump, and we tried to see if we could just inflate the tire, but it definitely had a puncture. There wasn’t much we could do. The kid said his dad was around but went to ride some more.

When we got back to the parking lot, I saw a couple unloading some bikes, one with a child seat on the back of it. They asked if the “moderate” trail was a good one to take a baby on, and I immediately told them no. Dave agreed with me, but proceeded to tell them the part of the trail that is the flattest and smoothest. When he finished, I reiterated, “But I wouldn’t do it with a baby.” They didn’t listen. At least the baby had a helmet, but the parents weren’t wearing any, and their bikes were really insufficient for trail riding.

It always astounds me when I see people doing stuff like this. I’m glad they want to ride their bikes, and want to ride on trails, but I see a lot of people with inadequate bikes, not wearing helmets, simply being reckless. I’m not one of those guys who thinks everyone needs a $1000 bike (hell, I don’t have one myself), but still, the bikes you get at Wal-mart are not safe for mountain biking. And it’s one thing to take risks if you’re an adult, but putting children at risk is something else entirely. In this case, we’re talking about a baby on a mountain bike trail. These trails have rocks, roots, sticks, logs, and other hazards on them. We’re not talking rails-to-trails smoothness here. Even the “easy” trails are physically demanding and technically challenging. They’re no place for a baby.

Finally, we took Rob for a hike in the woods yesterday afternoon. I only took Sarah’s old point & shoot digital camera, so the shots aren’t great. Rob was a lot more into it this time around, and did more running and sniffing and checking things out. I tried to play fetch with him with a stick, but it couldn’t hold his interest. He really wanted to drink out of the pond, but it’s pretty nasty, and we stopped him.

Rob thinking about drinking from the pond

Rob loved running in the creek bed. I threw some sticks to get him to run, and while he didn’t fetch them, he did take them as a cue to run in that direction. He slipped a couple of times, but just loved splashing and getting wet and muddy.

Running in the creek bed

The woods are really looking like spring, with lots of budding trees, green ground cover, some flowers and other things.

Fiddlehead ferns

Mayapples

Small yellow flowers that lined part of the trail

Again, we had a great hike. This was in “my woods” in the neighborhood where I grew up. Some parts of the trails are in pretty good shape, but others really need some TLC. I used to go mountain biking back there fairly frequently, I should do so again, even though there are only a couple of miles of suitable trails.

Particularly rugged part of the trail with big protruding roots and erosion

I wish I knew how to fix the above section of trail. I suspect some of the roots aren’t doing any good anyway and could be cut out, and then maybe things would smooth out. But I don’t know the proper way to do it, and I don’t have any way of getting permission to work on these trails, as far as I know. Rumor has it they’re private property owned by John “Cougar” Mellencamp.

Sarah and I both have a renewed interest in hiking after all that, and we’re hoping to do more of it soon. We are thinking about possibly hiking with the Bloomington Hikers.

I’ve ridden my bike a lot this week — so far, a little over 45 miles. I rode to work yesterday and today, and did rides after work on Monday and Tuesday. I felt like a badass riding to and from work yesterday, and then riding another 20+ miles after that. I rode out to the Monroe County Water Purification Plant again, which is a route that I enjoy a lot. The plant itself may not be scenic, but it’s still kind of cool to see. I snapped some photos with my point & shoot film camera, which I’ve been using this week. I would have ridden down the big hill to the park by the lake, but I was worried I’d run out of sunlight, and instead turned around and went home.

I encountered an asshole in a van. I was approaching an intersection with a stop sign, and the guy in the van clearly wanted to pass me, but there wasn’t much space before the stop sign. I got into the middle of the lane to prepare to make a left turn, and stuck out my left hand to signal. My hand almost grazed the window of the van, which was now passing me in the other (wrong) lane! Then, the guy cut me off, because there wasn’t room for him to move over before reaching a car stopped at the stop sign. I resisted the temptation to flip him off, instead waving a fist at him and cursing him under my breath.

Some geese flew over me, they were flying low and at a bit of a slower pace than I was going. They honked at me as I rode by (I’m sure they were really honking at each other, but it seemed like a greeting, so that’s what I’m going to assume). I saw some other very large birds, as I have on most of my recent rides, some circling in the sky. Sometimes, they seem to take an interest in me when I stop; I hope they don’t have anything sinister in mind. It’s too bad I can’t bring Marty on some of these rides; I’m sure that he’d get to see some cool stuff, and I could learn a lot. At the very least, Marty’s bird photos have piqued my interest in at least being more aware of the kinds of birds around me.

This morning’s commute wasn’t that great; I was running a bit late, and it was a little too warm to wear a jacket, but too cool not to — so I was sweating more than usual by the time I got to work. One thing I had forgotten about IU students is how they’ll walk into the street without looking in either direction. They just keep staring straight ahead, completely oblivious or not caring that there are cars, bikes, and other pedestrians that could run into them. What makes matters worse is that most of them have iPods or other mp3 players, so there’s no way to get their attention.

All of this made my commute this morning very interesting. I had to dodge pedestrians, and sometimes try to anticipate how fast they were moving and speed up or slow down to make sure I could go far enough in front of or behind them. It felt almost like playing a game of Frogger.

After I got home today, I suggested to Sarah that we take Rob (the dog) for a hike in the woods in my old neighborhood — so we did. This was the first time we had taken Rob for a real hike, and he was very well-behaved. Actually, he was too well-behaved. After a while, we let him off the leash, and he just walked behind us most of the time. This dog needs to learn how to do certain dog things, like running. He’s great at other dog things, such as napping, but running is one area where he needs work. He did run a few times, but not as much as I had hoped he would. Don’t get me wrong, he’s a great dog, and we had a great time. But I think we need to get him more exercise.

When we got to the pond, we noticed some dead salamanders in the shallow water toward the edge of the pond. There may have been more in the deeper water as well, I’m not sure about that — but we saw at least 10-20 dead salamanders. I was pretty puzzled by this, and found a couple of articles about a virus that sometimes kills salamanders. Neither of them mentions Indiana, or even the midwest, though, so I’m not sure what to think about that.

I brought my point & shoot film camera and took a few photos of Rob in the woods. I put the camera in my pocket for a while, and later, when I tried to take it out, I accidentally opened the film door, exposing/ruining all the film! I am pretty pissed, and I need to find a way to prevent that from happening in the future. I lost all the photos I took on my rides this week, and the ones I had just taken in the woods.

We got a dog! Sarah and I had been thinking about getting a dog for some time. So far, we’d avoided actually looking at any, because it’s very hard to look and not get one. Well, on Saturday, we saw a poster from a the shelter at one of our favorite restaurants with pictures of available dogs on it. We skirted the issue of whether to go to the shelter, and ultimately decided to go.

We weren’t necessarily planning to get a dog, but after looking at all of the dogs and spending some time with Rob, a laid back brownish orange mutt, we decided to take him home. Sarah mostly picked him out, I wasn’t that impressed with him while he was in his cage, but she said we should get him out.  Once we started hanging out with him, he turned out to be really cool.

Our new dog, Rob

They tell us that Rob is a labrador retriever/hound mix. Who knows if that’s really true, but he’s a great find. Very affectionate, friendly, and so far very well-behaved. He’s 2 1/2 years old and housebroken and knows “sit.” Really the only mischievous thing he’s done so far was to gather a bunch of our shoes together on the couch with him while we were gone. He didn’t chew on them at all. Tomorrow will be the true test, as he’ll be home alone from about 8:30-5:30.

Rob has incredibly deep brown eyes

On Saturday, Dave and I tried to ride on the trails at Brown County, but the 3-4 inches or so of snow was too much — we couldn’t get enough traction. We started riding, and our bikes were fishtailing all over the place. We didn’t get far at all before turning back — we just didn’t have much control. There were a couple of tire tracks there already, and if the snow had been more packed, we would’ve been able to ride. But it just wasn’t working.

Instead, we rode on the roads in the park. This was better than nothing, but it was really cold and the air was cutting right through us. Also, Brown County is extremely hilly, to the point where we were pretty much climbing all the way to Hesitation Point, and going downhill almost the whole way back. It made for a lot of climbing and a very short, very cold ride back. Still, I’m glad we rode.

Today was warmer, so I decided to do a proper road ride. This was the first real ride on my road bike, which I’ve been dying to ride. It was pretty great. I set out at around 2:00 this afternoon, at which time it was 34 degrees. I took State Road 45 to Mount Gilead Rd., and rode that until it looped back around to 45, taking the highway home. I went 13.7 miles at an average speed of 14.5 mph — pretty good for me at this fitness level.

The new bike has a really smooth ride, and it’s so much more lightweight and efficient than my mountain bike — I can really feel the power being transferred directly to the road. I’m not 100% sure if the stem length/angle are right. I had them put a fixed stem on instead of the adjustable one that was on there — in hindsight, maybe I should’ve stuck with the adjustable one long enough to make sure everything was right.

The shifting is buttery-smooth for the most part, there were a few hiccups, but nothing major. It’s a lot slicker than the drivetrain on my mountain bike. I had some trouble at times with the shifters since I had thick gloves on and it was hard to push the smaller lever.

I want to plan out some other road routes in the near future. That’s one thing I can do while the weather is crappy that’ll get my psyched to ride more, and then when I get a good opportunity, I can pick a route and ride it. Some routes I want to do are to/past Lake Monroe (Paynetown and across the Causeway), out Smith Road to Snoddy Road and to another part of the lake there, to Brown County State Park from my apartment (that one will have a lot of killer hills), out SR 135, and countless others. It’ll be fun to plan some routes.