"Interesting" in the same way your do it yourself Flock of Seagulls hairdo was interesting, or interesting the way Aunt Dottie gets after her third cocktail.
I was half dreading 4am went I went to sleep the night before. Hurricane Hanna was in full effect on the eastern seaboard, and as much as I enjoy cycling, cycling a hundred miles in a raging storm is not my idea of something you do voluntarily.
Even I had to admit it was obviously going to be a perfect day when I checked the weather and walked my confused dog.
I got myself together, got myself to the subway, and boarded the bicycle express to the Upper West Side.
There's nothing quite like the combination of spandex-clad, sunblock covered cyclists packed on the same subway as night-shift workers and drunk yuppies who only wish they were doing the walk of shame.
I wish I could accurately quote some of the conversations that I overheard, but they all boiled down to the same general topic:
Drunk Dude #1 "Yo, what's with the bike?" Cyclist "The NYC Century is today" Drunk Dude #2 "Huh, What's that?" Cyclist "You bike a hundred miles around NYC" Drunk Dude #1 "A hundred miles? No Shit." Drunk Dude #2 to Drunk Dude #1 "Sounds stupid"
Thankfully, I made it to the start without getting barfed on, got my cue sheet and was on my way.
I love the first part of the NYC Century. Starting in the dark. Bombing down Riverside Drive and then through Times Square. No traffic, just the whirr of a hundred bikes coasting down the hills. Then across the Brooklyn Bridge at dawn and into Prospect Park.
The things I remember are random; The guy in the orange 'You don't have to be the best, you just have to try the hardest' tee shirt that spotted as I was leaving the top of Central Park and then rode with for about 50 miles, the two unicyclists doing the whole hundred, the weird twists and turns the route took through Brooklyn - both across the Carroll Street Bridge (odd choice) and right past the subway station I was at two hours before, but most of all, I remember how I felt after mile 30.
Why mile 30?
Well at about mile 25 on the Shore Parkway Bike Path, right around Gerritsen Beach (at least I think that's Gerritsen Beach - you know, where it's all twisty-turny and there's sand all over the path and there's a little port-a-potty stop?) Well, right there as I slowed to take a 'natural break', I got broadsided by another cyclist. Now I've never been in an accident with another cyclist. I've been doored by cars and I've hit things and fallen, mostly I slow speed topple over while trying to do dumb things, but I've never actually been in a high speed crash. I wish I could describe what happened, but I can't. One minute I was on my bike and the next, I was all the way across the road on my back. I got hit so hard, I was thrown clear of my bike and didn't even get a scrape. I checked myself, I checked my bike, I checked the guy (he said he was fine, although I think he knocked the wind out by slamming his stem into his own sternum) I got back on my bike and continued down the path. Five miles later the adrenaline high wore off and I've never felt worse in my life. Everything hurt, every mile was agony. I was thirsty no matter how much I drank, and hungry no matter how much I ate, I was tired no matter how slow I went, and I was depressed no matter how beautiful the day was.
I struggled on through to Queens. Gamely did my loop around the Velodrome. And then at the absolute stinkiest part of the bike path along Flushing Bay - you know which part I'm talking about...
This happened.
I managed to get my tire fixed, rode 20 feet and - don't ask how, it's too embarrassing - broke the tip off the brand new tire nozzle.
A couple of Marshalls stopped to help me and give me a new tube, and I stumbled unhappily into Astoria Park.
Then the person who was supposed to be watching my dog called to tell me they were sick and couldn't get to my house and I just gave up.
I was out of shape, out of spare tires, and out of gas.
I crawled back to the park, picked up my tee shirt and cookie and headed home.
When I finally stripped out of my riding gear, I found a bruise the width of a tire perfectly imprinted on my right upper thigh.
I count myself lucky it wasn't worse. I hope that guy is ok. And I owe that Marshall a drink.
I had an amazing time doing this last year, but when I tried to find a good you tube video of the event to post, all I came up with were these long, music video, it was happiness and light, everyone had a great time and waved at the camera, videos.
This bears no resemblance to my finish line experience. I was hot and miserable and everything hurt. By the time I got back to Central Park I never wanted to get back on my bike again.
What do cyclists, and surveyors have in common? We spend a lot of time looking down at things that other people ignore.
This a small selection of the thousands of enigmatic symbols one finds spray painted onto the streets of New York. The blue double arrows on the right appeared all over the place just last week. I never actually noticed any of these until I rode in last year's NYC Century, when, about a week before the ride, these started showing up.
I have come to realize that they mark the roads for everything. I was just never looking for it.
So, a few days ago, I started seeing these as well -
I don't know about you, but I thought they were freakin' brilliant. What do you think of when you see this blue glyph? I think waterfall. And what do you think of when you think of waterfalls in New York City?
Well, unless you've been living under a rock, you think of Olafur Eliasson's NYC Waterfall Public Art Installation which is due to open in less than a week.
They've been building the scaffolds in four locations around Brooklyn and Lower Manhattan for the last few months, and they've been testing the falls for the last few days.
There's a festival, a temporary park at Pier 1 next to the Brooklyn Bridge, and major goings on all along the waterfront in Dumbo.
The DOT has even put together a plan for a bike tour of the falls - which leads me back to the mystery glyphs that are appearing all over the place. Just follow the blue arrows for a pre-planned tour of the official waterfall viewing locations.
The NYC Five Boro Bike Tour is marketed as "The biggest recreational cycling event in the United States" - and it certainly feels that way as you wait for the start. 30,000 people on bicycles, all in one place, all at one time, is a lot.
This year, I cheated.
Before you get all crazy on me about fairplay and sportsmanship, I will point out that A: there were extenuating circumstances, and B: it's not like I pulled a Rosie Ruiz.
I've been trying to ride this tour with a good friend of mine for the last two years, and as she is quick to point out, SHE is the one who got me interested in riding it to begin with. But it just doesn't seem to happen. She's very active, works out, does martial arts, but she doesn't bike. She used to as a kid, but not any more. Now, she's a motorist, and though she says she wants to ride the tour, I don't think she actually wants to be on a bicycle.
I think urban car drivers are far less likely to be comfortable riding a bike in traffic than anyone else. Their vision of traffic is so frustrating and full of bizarre hazards, that the thought of being on the street minus all the sheet metal gives them the heebeegeebees.
But that's the point of the bike tour, no traffic. For this one and only day each year, NYC allows some of it's streets to close, and the cyclists descend from everywhere to take advantage of it. (Hmm, imagine if it happened more than once a year?) So, it's not the traffic that keeps her from doing it, but each year something happens - and she can't make it.
I made a back up plan this year just in case, and two days before the tour, when she said she wasn't going to be able to go, I called another friend who has said for the last two years that he wished he had known before hand, because he would absolutely love to ride in it. He was happy, I was happy - until I got the email at midnight the night before...
Maybe he can meet me, but he won't know until morning. Maybe at the top of Central Park? I should call him.
This is where the pathetic excuse kicks in.
I just couldn't do it again.
Last year, I lined up all by myself, even though all my friends had dropped out or stood me up. I waited patiently in the freezing cold from 7 am until after 9 am when my part of the line finally started moving. I waited alone, listening to the couples and the families and the friends with Christmas garland hanging from their helmets, and I was bummed.
So this year, I rode in across the Brooklyn Bridge, hung a right instead of a left, rode up to 30th street, and then joined into the group. I still got caught in the pre-central park traffic jam, but at least there was a sense of movement, and less of a third wheel on a date kind of a feeling.
Once we started to move, I could feel how different this time was going to be from last year. I'm no triathlete, but I did ride more in the last year than I have at any point in my life. And I did most of it on these same rutted, crappy, city streets.
I felt strong. I felt fast. I felt happy, and I wasn't waiting for anybody.
I caught some fast riders and strung in behind them, letting them clear a path for the most part. Not too fast, we were getting passed by the 'super-bombers', but fast enough to feel good. Stopped for a banana and bathroom break at Astoria Park, hit the road again, and Holy Chiquita, Batman... I was in SI by 11:40 am!
Where, last year, I could barely move until the 'halfwayers' started to bail out at the Brooklyn Bridge, and I waited for hours until I could get on a ferry back to Manhattan, this year, we cooked along at an average speed of about 15 mph (topping out at 30 mph on the downhill section of the BQE), there was no wait for the ferry at all, and I was passing people going the other way back across the Brooklyn Bridge as I headed for home.
Would I go stand in line at the start next year? Sure, if I was with friends. But it's kind of like going to a football game. Tailgating is half the fun, but not if you're doing it by yourself.
For those of you still trying to figure out what's going on on Sunday, here's a great source of Bike info in NYC. Click on the map or follow the link below.
These guys are a great source and I feel shamed not to have mentioned them before now. (Although honestly, there's been a link to their site from this one for about a year.)
I rode in the 2007 5Boro - AKA the Commerce Bank Five Boro Bike Tour (although why they can't spell 'borough' correctly, I'll never know.) Some people call it the New York City Bicycle Marathon, but I think that's pushing it a bit - it's only 42 miles long.
What it was, was very fun, and very cold, and from the weather report, it looks like more of the same. Last year I had the pleasure of A: being stood up by every single person who was going to ride with me, and B: ending up so far back in line at the start that I was 'blessed' by the priests of Trinity Church who came out onto the overpass a swung a censor over my head while I shivered in the cold.
I stood alone, freezing, waiting to move for what seemed like hours. From the start time at the head of the field, to the time I actually got to move, was endless and my lips were turning blue.
It doesn't look like it will be significantly warmer this year, so I'm trying to figure out what to wear that will be ok for standing around in the cold at 6:30 am, cruising along at around 18 to 20 mph on the BQE after all the 'halfwayers' leave the field at the base of the Brooklyn Bridge, and then keep out the wind on the ferry ride back to Manhattan. I must admit that I'm stumped.
I know, I know. Layers. But layers of what?
If you are not already signed up, you're sort of out of luck. Registration closed about a month ago and the ride is full, but I know from experience that around this many days before, a lot of people who were gung ho a month ago start developing strange ailments that 'force' them to drop out. If you still want to go, try getting an ID number off craig's list, I would guess there are people looking to re-sell or give away theirs. The thing is, you can't ride without one.
This is a very well attended, and therefore, very well organized ride. It is heavily staffed and the marshals will divert you from the route if you don't have a number. So what, you say? Well, you can ride 42 miles around NYC any old time you want to, but on Sunday, more than 30,000 of us will be closing this city down to automobile traffic. That's what makes it fun.
How often do you get to ride on the FDR or the BQE? Other than Critical Mass, how often do you get to share the streets with thousands of cyclists and watch the car drivers shaking their fists in the vain hope that someday they will get to move? And my very favorite part? How often do you get to ride a bicycle across the Verrazano Narrows Bridge? Other than this ride? - Never.
View of sunrise over Coney Island from the deck of the SeaStreak Ferry, en route to the start of the 2007, Bike New York, Twin Lights, Monmouth County Century. (You'd think with a name this long it would be a bigger ride than it is, but more on that later.)
I don't know why I decided to do this Century - maybe to prove that I could, maybe to see what it felt like to actually ride 100 miles instead of survive the 100 which is how I felt about the NYC Century, or maybe just because the days are going to get shorter and every opportunity for a beautiful ride seems like a good idea.
The day started well. The forecast was perfect for a ride and I made it to the pick up point at Pier 11 with time to spare.
The SeaStreak Ferry runs to NJ year-round, but this route gets busy during the summer when smart city dwellers run away to the beautiful, clean, uncrowded beaches at Sandy Hook State Park. The ferry ride itself was beautiful and relaxing. I chilled out for the 45 minute ride, and even had a cup of COFFEE.
The start was two minutes away from the ferry landing in Highlands NJ. The sun was up. The day was looking grand. All was right with the world.
The longer distance riders all looked pretty homogeneous. Not that there weren't many colors of people, but not that many different 'types'. Everyone was riding a 'nice' road bike, there were one or two exceptions to the spandex, but we stood out like sore thumbs, and the median age felt like it was about 45.
I checked in (again) and went to get my 100 mile cue sheet. Considering how few people there were, it seemed chaotic at the start. The nice man who I asked for the 100 mile cue sheet, kindly offered me a 50 mile sheet in case I wanted to back out. I very nicely declined and even resisted the urge to drop-kick him for patronizing me before 8am.
I set off down the road, a little nervous about riding in a completely unfamiliar area, but that's one of the best reasons to do these rides - they are plotted, planned, marked, and fully supported, so if you run into trouble, you've got help coming.
I arrived at the Oceanport Rest Stop with a group of riders who left at about 8am - and it wasn't set up yet. OK. I have no idea what the 7:30 riders did, my guess is they just skipped it. It was only about 10 miles in, so fine. Got to the Sunnyside Rest Stop - and this is where my memory fails me because they all melt together at a certain point - either here, or at the Shark River Rest Stop they had no water. No Water. I filled my water bottle out of a sink that said "Please, only use sink to wash hands". I'm assuming (mostly because I didn't get sick) that if the water wasn't drinkable, it would have specifically said - "Don't Drink The Water". As it was, the water was warm, I was unhappy, and the rest stops were about 20 miles from each other - out in BF NJ, so water seemed pretty important. Oh, for those of you who wanted a PBJ - I took the last half they had. Sorry.
Somewhere around the 70 mile mark, I saw my first marshal. He asked me what I was doing so far behind him and I commented that if he was supposed to be sweeping the tail of the ride, I had just left a large bunch at the last rest stop. No idea what that was about. The he asked me how I was enjoying the ride. I said, "Eh". I thought I was just being cranky at the time. Don't ask me if I'm enjoying myself at mile 70. Until 50 or 60, I'm usually feeling pretty good. More than 60 miles is where the Century turns into more than the average ride for me and it becomes work. Like a work horse, at about 85 miles, I can smell the stables and start sprinting for home. Between the two, I'm cranky.
The total climb for the 100 is 4,058 feet. Most of that falls into the final 20 miles.
I made it almost all the way to the end and then had to walk the final hill at mile 100 that led past the turnoff to the ferry landing. There's a sadist laughing somewhere in Monmouth County.
The Twin Lights Century is much much smaller that the NYC Century and I'm not sure if that's the problem, or if that's what makes their lack of preparation even worse. I have much more respect for the organizers of the NYC Century now than I did when I rode it. It's tough to get it together the way they did and the Twin Lights proved that. I saw one marshal, no SAG wagon, and spent at least a half hour wandering around various rest stops looking for some water to drink, or something that wasn't a cookie to eat.
In the end, I didn't enjoy this as much as the NYC Century, but it was a good experience. It made me think about what I like about biking, and what I'm less than fond of. I don't like going around in circles. I like seeing new things. I like to focus on a goal. I don't like hills. I like drinking cold water. I don't like mealy cookies. I liked the parkour aspect of the NYC century, I was less enamored with the 85 of 100 miles through suburban NJ.
This has nothing to do with how the ride was organized but man, New Jersey People, what is it with the roadkill? I saw so much roadkill that I'm surprised there are any living things left in Jersey. For a while I was keeping count and making up modes of categorizing the different types, but I gave up at about 35 carcasses and shouldn't a whole deer count as more?
I would absolutely do this ride again, but either I would only do the 30, which is a lovely loop around the most picturesque areas, or I would try to talk someone into going with me. It's just not interesting enough to do alone.
I finished in 8.5 hours including rest stops and missed the 4:30 ferry by minutes.
Slow and Steady did not win the race. But I did finish my first century.
For all my planning and list making, I was too nervous to sleep. I felt the beginnings of a cold coming on on Friday which I promised myself I could have later if it would just go away until after Sunday. Instead, it put me in bed for most of Saturday which made it really difficult to get to sleep (as opposed to bed) at a reasonable time. I awoke before my alarm, walked my very confused dog, picked up my carefully prepared bike bag, and then decided to ride to a different subway stop because mine is a little lonely at the best of times, and I don't count 5am as the best of times. I was already running late - and I hadn't even left Brooklyn. There were a bunch of cyclists on the platform, and many more on the train. I ended up in a conversation with a guy on a mountain bike and no helmet who said he was going to ride the 100. He was very polite, and kept insisting he didn't need a helmet, so I gave him some safety pins for his number and wished him luck. By the time we all managed to haul our bikes up and out of the subway, it was 6:15 am and I was not feeling too happy with myself. Considering how little sleep I got, I could have been there by 5. Starting on time didn't seem too much to ask. I got myself a cue sheet, stuffed it in my trunk and took off with a bunch of other late arrivals. My first surprise was the long swoop down Riverside Drive. I don't know why I thought we were going through the park, but obviously, we weren't. I wish I'd taken a picture of Times Square at dawn. There is something refreshingly sleazy about Times Square when it is empty that the tourists and the Disneyland gentrification have stolen from it over the years. Sort of like catching the prom queen on her early morning walk of shame. The early parts of the ride were frenetic and full of moments of panic. I was riding with people who were much faster than me, and the effort it took not to get dropped at every light was making me wonder how I would finish the 100. A lot of the people starting early seemed to come from bike clubs. Lots of hand signals and yelling 'Clear' and 'Passing'. Endless clicking in and out of clipless pedals at stoplights. I'm not used to riding in a group, so the argot was both strange, annoying, and oddly compelling. Fairly quickly, I was joining in - pointing at holes, signaling turns, and motoring along a little faster than I would have gone on my own. Ain't peer pressure grand?
Crossed the Brooklyn Bridge as the sun was rising, curved around through Dumbo, and then off to Prospect Park. The route through Brooklyn is very familiar to me, so I settled down a bit and found a more natural pace. I was getting passed a lot, but I no longer felt like I was getting 'dropped'. I peeled off to use the rest room at Coney Island and for one shining moment had the early morning world all to myself. I didn't remember there being a generous number of bathrooms at the Canarsie Pier, and I just couldn't face the long lines. Ate bananas one and two, bemoaned the lack of things NOT made of chocolate, recognized a couple of people from the subway, and took off toward Queens. The section through Queens was the least familiar part of the route for me. And now I know why. I hate to say this. It's really quite rude. But... I never want to see Queens again. The ride into Flushing was beautiful. In all my years in NY, I've never seen the Unisphere's fountains turned on. It is an awe inspiring sight. Flushing is about at the halfway point on the 100 mile ride, and I felt pretty optimistic about my chances. Brooklyn had seemed easy, Manhattan went by so fast, it was barely a memory, Queens would pass into the Triborough Bridge, and I would only have the Bronx to finish. Oh, no, no, no. Queens sucked. Forest Hills. Jackson Heights. Richmond Hill. Are you seeing the pattern? From Flushing to Alley Pond Park and back again to Astoria, all I did was ride up and down, up and down. Hills, hills, hills. I hate hills. My lowest moment came in Alley Pond Park, where after what felt like miles of hills, I was finally flying down a long, steep, downhill to the rest stop, when I saw riders struggling back up the hill toward me. I realized at that moment that every foot I descended I was going to have to fight my way back up, and I crumbled inside. Things were starting to hurt, the day was getting hot, and that Godforsaken corner of Queens felt like the end of the earth. I decided to call my family and friends to inform them that I would now be living at the Alley Pond Park Rest Stop - because there was no way in hell that I was getting back up that hill. One powerbar later... I decided to leave. There's no use living at a rest stop where you have to wait on line to get a banana, and I was in no mood for a line. So I took off toward Astoria in hopes that getting back on a recognizable route would perk me up. Some parts of the ride back across Queens were lovely. There are stretches of waterfront promenade that are breathtakingly beautiful. However, there are also seemingly endless stretches of hilly, asphalty, sun beating down on you, cars trying to run you over, semi - suburban streets, that I am not likely to revisit anytime soon. I arrived at Astoria park and was heartened to see some familiar faces. - Not that I actually knew any of them, but I kept finding and losing the same basic group of riders. - The bunnies to my tortoise. Ate bananas three and four. PBJ number one and orange number three. Was momentarily confused by the sign that said, "55 milers - 5 miles to go. 100 milers - 28 miles to go. 75 milers - (scribble out) 28 miles to go."
Huh? I rode this part of the route on Monday. It goes over the Triborough to Randall's Island, across to the Bronx, and then East across Bruckner Boulevard. I thought the 75 milers had been riding with us up until this point and were almost done. Confused. Maybe delirious. Went over the Triborough, which didn't back up as badly as I expected, but I think it probably sucked earlier in the day given that you have to carry your bike up and down three sets of stairs. Onto Randall's Island, and then - across the pedestrian bridge to 106th street? Wait a minute. This isn't how it's supposed to go. But there are the green C's. Pointing North. Right smack into a Saint's Day Parade.
So, off I went, across the Willis Avenue Bridge and into the Bronx. I really enjoy riding in the Bronx. There are some bike paths that are true hidden gems. But I was not enjoying myself this time. My back hurt, my left hand was going numb from clutching my handlebars too tightly, and all of a sudden, I developed a blinding, shooting pain in my knee every time I had to put pressure on the pedal to grind up a hill. My odometer said 90 miles. I was almost home. I fought my way to Van Cortland Park, dreaming of Advil and cold water. Ate bananas five and six, and orange number four. Compared odometers with a guy who got lost in Queens and somehow managed to shave three miles off the route. I was going to make it. The volunteers were giving advice and pep talks. "Last rest stop before the finish in the park. Remember to use the rest room. Only eleven more miles to go." WHAT? My odometer read 96 miles. How was that possible? Maybe my odometer is set wrong and I just never noticed because it's a cumulative discrepancy. Oh God. Riding 10 miles in pain is one thing. Riding 17 was way too much. ...But I had already done 6 of those miles. I only had 11 more to go. ...I was so close...How could I give up now?
That little voice is really annoying sometimes.
I saddled up and took off. This time, there were no groups to go with. We were stretched out too thin, and the faster riders were already done. I know this part of the ride really well. Which is a good thing, because, going up a hill in Washington Heights, I had my first mechanical failure of the day. My chain slipped, and I tumbled onto a parked car. Some nice marshals made sure I was OK, and I hopped onto the back of their group and let them lead me back down to the park. 110th Street seemed like a foreign land. Bright and crowded, with blaring music and daytime park users. It was like crossing the international date line and landing the day before you left. I saw the guy whose classic Italian racing jersey I had admired in Bayridge, and the kid who I passed in Flushing riding what looked like a food delivery bike, complete with metal basket. There was the 'hotter 'en hell' chick who left me in the dust at Alley Pond Park, and finally, the guy in the green t-shirt who I saw for the first time at 5:30 in the morning on the subway platform in Brooklyn. Just then, I felt that I knew them all. I stood for a moment the the afternoon sun and wondered if it had all been a dream.
I just figured out that the NYC Century is in less than a month. I know this comes as no surprise to people who a: have been training for it, or b: can read a calendar, but I, apparently don't fall into either of those categories because it came as a shock to me last weekend when I realized how little time I had left. So in classic Bike Dummy form, I chilled out on the pier for a while with my dog and a friend, had some coffee, read the paper - and then decided to go for my 'long ride' of the week. It's hard for me to plan rides. Everyone in the NYC area seems to go on the training ride up to Nyack on the Jersey side of the Hudson. I'd love to do that sometime, but my schedule's sort of crazy and I don't know any other cyclists who want to do distances, so at the moment, that means going alone. The thought of cycling by myself through unknown parts of Jersey freaks me out. It's like traveling to a foreign country where I don't know the customs and can't speak the language. At least in most of NYC, if I run into a problem I can hop on the subway and get myself home. Once I cross the George Washington Bridge and start heading north I get visions of dark misty roads, with me holding my crooked wheel in one hand, a flickering flashlight in the other, calling out softly into the dark..."Hello?...Is there anybody out there?..." So I decided to go the other way. My first stop was Red Hook. I've been reading a lot about how quickly the IKEA is going up on the waterfront down there and decided to take a look at the 'progress'. Without starting a blog war about development, I will say that I wish as a city we would look to our own historical examples of expanding the beauty and enjoyment of our extensive waterfront, ie. the west side promenade and bike path or the Bay Ridge shore parkway promenade and bike path, instead of forgetting the examples of our waterfront failures, ie. the west side promenade's 125th street detour under the highway to avoid the Fairway Supermarket, or the shore parkway's ignominious end in the parking lot of Kohl's department store just before it reaches Coney Island. Can't we make a plan for public use of the waterfront BEFORE we give it all away to big box stores? I'm not arguing against IKEA, I'd just like to see the possibility of continuous public loops around the waterfront. Every new store that builds at the water increases the probability that the greenways of the city will remain isolated from each other. OK, stepping down off of the soapbox. So, Red Hook. I went down around Fairway and tried to get up near the IKEA, but there were roadblocks and the streets to get around the other side are all cobbles, so I decided to leave that for another day. For those who don't know, Rocky Sullivan's, the long-lived east side Irish bar lost its lease and has moved down to Red Hook. If any of you thought you still might find a real estate 'bargain' down there, I suggest you revisit that. Red Hook has been bought and paid for. It's a great neighborhood, but possibly better for walking than biking. The street surfaces are way too uneven for it to be pleasant on a road bike.
Next stop, across the mouth of the Gowanus and onto Third Avenue. Third Avenue is pretty gross to bike on and normally I would avoid it altogether, but it's the quickest way between Red Hook and Bay Ridge where I was going to pick up the shore parkway bike path. The saving grace of Third Avenue is that you are riding under the Gowanus Expressway, so on a hot day it's shaded. I didn't see much visible damage in Sunset Park or Bay Ridge from the tornado that touched down earlier this week. They've done an amazing job of clearing most of the downed trees and branches already. The view from the Veteran's Memorial Pier in Bay Ridge is one of my favorites and on Saturday it did not disappoint. The refinished (until the bridge) bike path is smooth and usually uncrowded. Even with the headwind, it's a great place to let rip for about 2 miles before the surface gets crappy again. The next 3 miles are cracked, bumpy, narrow and occasionally covered in broken glass, but the view is lovely, and the alternate would be Cropsy Avenue (which bites). The end of the shore parkway bike path is an example of one my favorite urban planning snafus - greenways that end at malls. On Saturday, it was the site of some kind of indeterminate demonstration that involved some megaphones and people milling about.
I went online after I got home and discovered this:
DATE: SATURDAY, AUGUST 11, 2007 NATIONAL MARINA DAY TIME: 11:30 A.M. PLACE: Bay Parkway and Gravesend Bay (near Kohl’s Shopping Center): The entrance to the Bensonhurst Promenade along Gravesend Bay
PROPOSED WASTE PLANT CHURNS UP THE FIRST EVER FLOTILLA IN BENSONHURST ON NATIONAL MARINA DAY
ASSEMBLYMAN WILLIAM COLTON VOWS TO FIGHT THE PROPOSED SOUTHWEST BROOKLYN WASTE TRANSFER STATION BY LAND AND BY SEA WITH LAUNCHING BENSONHURST=92S FIRST EVER FLOTILLA PROTEST SPECTACLE
AS BOATERS WILL CONVERGE IN THE WATERS OF GRAVESEND BAY IN A SHOW OF UNITY, PROTESTERS WILL GATHER ON LAND OVERLOOKING THE BAY TO CONDUCT A SIMULTANEOUS DEMONSTRATION OPPOSING A PROPOSED WASTE TRANSFER STATION SLATED TO OPEN IN BENSONHURST
Point#1 - Who knew there was a national marina day? Point#2 - I must have blinked, because I totally didn't see a flotilla of anything. Point#3 - I'm sorry that I did miss the flotilla, because it was probably really cool.
To see my route, click on the map to go to bikely.com. For part two of the ride, tune in tomorrow.
Secondhand, steel framed, mid 80's LeMans RS Centurion in bumblebee black and yellow. I recently put baby blue Michelin tires on it and now I look like a colorblind mess - but they make me feel zippy.
