This Ride Was Good

All rides are good.

At least, I can't think of any bike ride I wish I hadn't taken.   And I've been riding for a lot of years!

Some would say that some rides are "better" than others.  Of course, "better", when it comes to rides is subjective:  Some want to climb as many steep hills as possible; others prefer land flatter than their dinner tables.  Some of us love riding by an ocean or a lake; another cyclist's idea of a "dream ride" takes him or her through deserts or prairies.

You might to ride in the hottest weather with the brightest sunshine; I like it cooler with a mix of sun and clouds.  Your friend might not go anywhere near a bike if there's a single cloud, let alone if a single drop falls from the sky; his or her club-mate believes that if you don't get wet, it's not a "real" ride.

I'll admit there are a few conditions I'll avoid if possible. For example, I don't mind the cold or even rain, but I prefer not to have both together when I'm riding.  (Snow, on the other hand, can be fun.)  And, while traffic doesn't scare me, I prefer not to cross entrances to, and exits from, highways:  When I ride to the Rockaways or Point Lookout, I take a detour through the side-streets of Howard Beach so I can avoid having to traverse the on- and off- ramps of the Long Island Expressway and Belt Parkway that feed into, or lead away from, Woodhaven and Cross-Bay Boulevards.

I took a similar diversion yesterday after I crossed the Victory Bridge over the Raritan River in New Jersey.  On the Sayreville side, I zigged and zagged through an industrial area and residential streets simply to avoid a stretch where State Route 35 (of which the Bridge is a part), US 1 and US 9 merge and are one for about five miles.  There, it's a four-lane road which, at times, sees surprisingly little traffic but, at times, really seems to be carrying the load of three major highways.  

That wouldn't be so bad if there was a shoulder for the whole length.  Unfortunately, the shoulder appears and disappears, much like those bike lanes to nowhere that I see too often.  Worse, a large part of the traffic consists of trucks, which aren't allowed on the stretch of the Garden State Parkway that parallels the section of Route 35/US 1 and 9 in question.  

My detour, naturally, added some distance to my ride, which I'd started in the afternoon.  I didn't mind:  I avoided that potentially-bad section of road and wandered through a couple of historic districts and other areas with cute little gingerbread houses by lakes, streams, Raritan Bay (with great views of New York City) and the ocean.

Starting my ride in mid-afternoon and taking a circuitous route had its advantages, including this:

Now, if you've been reading this blog regularly, that I love descending bridges that lead to the ocean.  I coasted down this one, after pedaling up the hills on Route 36 (They don't call it the Atlantic Highlands for nothing!) for the first time when I was about 13 or 14 years old--either the year my family moved to New Jersey, or not long afterward.  

Call me sentimental, but I still get goose-bumps, especially when it's late in the day and the sun, through a scrim of clouds and haze, begins to tint the blue sea and sky with shades of violet and orange.  Once I reached the base of that bridge--in Sea Bright, on a strip of land not much wider than a football field with the ocean lapping up one side and the river on the other--I was floating.  My bike was a cloud; I had wings.  I felt that within an instant, I'd sailed--on two wheels--into Long Branch, some 8 kilometers down the road--without effort, and that every drop of surf mist, every ripple of wind, and every step of people walking with their partners, their children and their dogs along, had become a part of me.  

In Long Branch, I saw the soft twilight colors darken into the night that would engulf the streets as well as the sky and sea.  All rides are good; this, like so many others, made me happy in its own way.

Trek To The Sea

Yesterday the Trek project got another rite of initiation, if you will:  I took it on a ride I have experienced with all of my Mercians--and some of the bikes of my youth.

I pedaled down to Long Branch, NJ.   I am glad I went there yesterday, when it was overcast and windy--and turned chilly.  Today is summer-like and, of course, it is Easter Sunday, so lots of families will be taking their post-church service or pre- (or post-) prandial strolls on the boardwalk.  Some may even venture onto the beach, even though it's still  too cold for just about any land, and even most amphibious, animals to swim.

Vehicular traffic  was pretty light throughout the ride, except in one spot where it's almost always congested:  Just past the Victory Bridge, where US 9 and New Jersey Route 35 converge for a couple of miles--which is near the point where the New Jersey Turnpike (the Jersey stretch of I-95) crosses the Garden State Parkway.  But until that stretch, and after it, I didn't see many cars or trucks, even in Newark.

I rode down to the World Trade Center and descended through three levels of "upscale" (i.e., glossy and overpriced) shopping and "fine" (i.e., see above) "dining" (i.e., eating) "expriences" to the PATH train platform.  If Dante's Inferno had been made of glass, steel and faux marble, and the people spent more money for clothes with names on them but weren't really any better-dressed than I was (if I do say so myself), it would have looked like that place.

And, the train parked itself in Journal Square, about halfway through the trip, for a "schedule adjustment".  Hmm...I'll try that the next time I have a deadline to meet. Anyway, a trip that normally takes about 20 minutes took double that amount of time: longer than it took me to ride from my apartment to the World Trade Center.

Once I got out of Newark Penn Station, which smells as if someone's been brewing the same pot of coffee since the day it opened (It's a WPA building.), I was about to swing my leg over my bike when one of the most charming homeless men I've ever encountered asked me for a dollar to help him buy some fried chicken.  Who doesn't like fried chicken?  How could I deny such a request?  Certainly not I, even if he wasn't telling me the truth!

I think, subconsciously, I chose to ride the Trek today because I knew its colors would mirror, more or less, the sea and sky.  It's almost as if the Trek wanted to be there today.  

The last part of the ride--from the Azzolina Bridge to Long Branch--was the flattest and, paradoxically, the most difficult part of the ride.   It took me longer to cover that distance than to ride nearly double that distance, from the intersections of Route 35 and 36 in Matawan to the bridge.  Once I got off the bridge, I was riding right into the teeth of the wind and the temperature felt as it had dropped about twenty degrees F.  When I finally stopped, at the Long Branch boardwalk, it might been good to be a polar bear.

Speaking of which:

I think it's the first time that place has been painted in about 45 years.  My first reaction was "Uh-oh!  They're turning it into a Cold Stone Creamery clone--with CSC prices.    Turns out, I had nothing to fear.  It's still an old-school Jersey Shore roadside ice cream stand.  You won't find exotic flavors there (unless you consider Yuengling Black and Tan exotic), just the stuff you remember from your childhood.  And it's just as good, maybe better, and reasonably priced.  I ordered a cone with vanilla-chocolate twist ice cream and a cherry topping.  Definitely old-school Jersey shore.  

It was good.  Real good.  So was my ride.  So was the day.