Central Ohio is HILLY

Day 25, May 17 Marysville to Wooster, Ohio

Data: 107.3 miles Riding time 7:00 (15.4 mph avg)

Note: I wrote a journal entry for Day 25 last night, as usual, but it wouldn't save, so I lost the entire thing. I spent a lot of time on it because the ride (yesterday's) was super. There's no way I can rewrite it as I did last night (one can't recreate a masterpiece - haha). But, I'll try to summarize before writing today's entry.

I love this shot with my shadow that Mike Munk took yesterday.

The roads on which they have us riding through Ohio are absolutely fabulous. Most of it has been on what they call the Cardinal Trail, so it's been laid out as a bike route. The scenery and terrain are so varied -- rolling hills, steep hills, forest, farmland. That's me at the back of the paceline.

And the terrain can change in an instant. One time it reminded me of when, in the Wizard of Oz, they leave the dense forest and suddenly Emerald City is in front of them on a flat plain. Another thing I remember commenting on was how most of the homes have those inviting big front porches, with stuffed chairs and wooden swinging chairs. Here's a "cute" house I stopped to photo.

The day started out with rain, and stayed cold the whole day. As we left Marysville in the morning, we soon rode through the town of Delaware still bunched together in our peloton. I wonder what drivers in town think when they approach an intersection with a long line of bicyclists waiting for a left turn?

After the first break, I rode alone and therefore stopped to take lots of photos. Here's one of a tree trunk carving. I've seen several, and most have been of carvings of eagles. I liked this one for a change.

I came across three silos for storing feed corn that I thought was interesting.

The tour leader kept talking about how much we were going to like Road 603. I thought he meant the scenery, but it turned out to be extremely hilly. Just check out this photo of Road 603 in front of us!

Here's a photo I took at the top of one of the hills looking back at other riders. The man in the photo came down to talk to me. He's retired, and a runner and biker, and will compete in the Senior Olympics in June, just like Dad always did. He had been working in his flower and vegetable gardens most of the day.

We saw alpacas several times today; they're popular for their wool. On one of my rides from Simi Valley, I pass two alpaca farms. We also passed what I understood were "veal" farms, whereby each calf had its own little abode. A few of them peeked out at me as I got off my bike to take this picture.

I just had to include this picture of some of us "having our fun" along the way of our all-day bike rides. Gotta break up the monotony as best we can!

When we got to Wooster, I was surprised to see it was Ohio's best hometown, since I'd never heard of Wooster.

A group of us had dinner at an Italian restaurant called El Rancho Grande. Sounds Mexican, doesn't it? They served no alcohol, so Kasper got on his bike and rode a couple blocks and bought a bottle of wine and a corkscrew and rode them back for us. Here we are, with Kasper, Pam, Brian, Brian's sister Elizabeth, and Greg.

P.S. I seem to have lost my cellphone while taking Brian out to dinner in Marysville. Neither the restaurant nor Brian had it, so it's a mystery.

No comments:

Post a Comment