It is Saturday night on Memorial Day weekend. We are in Vermont. And it is snowing outside. It is really starting to accumulate now. We take turns running out onto the porch to snap pictures. We do not know what to do with ourselves, other than look at each other with a helpless giddiness as if to say "This is really happening and you are my witness, right?" Surely twenty or thirty years from now we will each be telling some bored youngster in our family about that time it snowed on Memorial Day weekend. But what to do with these emotions now that it's happening? Well, there is always instagram.
The people I am with, they drink like Europeans - lots, as a matter of course, and, seemingly without getting drunk. There is also a great deal of eating. Tray after tray is passed around. I decline second helpings. I push half of my dessert onto a neighbour's plate. And still I feel close to being sick, while the others seem to thrive. I look around the table with admiration. I cannot eat like this, despite having ridden the same miles. Not that those miles seem like much to brag about in retrospect.
I slept straight through the night and opened my eyes at 8:30am. A heavy pile of comforters. Wooden beams all around. The air smells of outdoors and feels just as crisp. At first I marvel at how quiet it is. But then I realise that I'd simply grown used to the rain beating against the metal roof as background noise. It is raining as hard as last night, and it is almost as dark.
Downstairs, some of the others are awake already, quietly eating breakfast in different parts of the room. I step out onto the porch and see a watery mess in the dirt driveway. It is raw-cold out, and I duck back indoors. There is coffee and I pour myself some. I settle down with a bowl of cereal and listen to the rain.
Pamela is at the table with her laptop. Extreme weather warnings are in effect.She suggests that those who want to ride wait till mid-day, when the rain might ease up.And she proposes we do a short route - one that's designed as a half-day ride and is only 30 miles long, called the Victory Loop. Pamela and John debate whether the steep descent toward the end might be washed out and could be dangerous. They decide that today the route should be ridden backwards. "It is steeper in reverse, but safer."
I copy the route and glance at the metrics: 30 miles, 3600 feet of climbing. All dirt. I eat my cereal and don't allow the figures to register.
"The Victory Loop in reverse... doesn't that make it the Loop of Defeat?"
More people are awake now, but there is no talk of riding.
"I am fine right here," someone says. "Any board games in the house?"
The RSC boys continue to work on John Bayley's bike. They are now opening the bleed kit for the hydraulic brakes. Matt Roy - an immunologist and pro bike mechanic - is wielding the syringe picturesquely as we all take pictures.
But finally I am restless. Am I crazy for wanting to ride on a day like this?
At noon, Mo Bruno-Roy appears in a colourfully mismatched ensemble. She is going on a short mountain bike ride in the woods. After she sets off, I can take it no longer.
I go upstairs and put on my cycling clothes. Fleece winter tights, baselayer, long sleeve jersey, winter jacket, neck warmer, full finger gloves, shoes, and those fetishistic-looking booties I'd been too intimidated to try all winter. I walk downstairs and amuse everyone.
Before I can change my mind,I drag my bike outdoors and set off. The rain is like a waterfall.By the time I reach the end of the dirt driveway, my glasses fog up so completely that I must take them off.At the main road I turn right.
As it is later remarked, there is no foreplay in the routes around Burke, Vermont. "They begin to fuck with you right away."
The first climb happens immediately and it is 3 miles long, starting out paved and turning to dirt. One of those roads with the truck-on-triangle "Steep Grade" sign. I feel like someone hit me over the head with a hammer. I see stars.Blood rushes to my face.My mouth goes dry. My head starts to pound. And my legs feel like led.I grind in my 1:1 gear.I cannot climb like this starting at mile zero, I just can't.
The dirt roads are beige and gritty. It has been raining for days. But remarkably, it is not muddy. Streams of clay-tinted water over wet dirt, but no mud. The ground is soft though, not unlike tightly packed wet sand. It gives under the weight of me and the bike. My tires stick to it, sinking just enough to sap my energy. Crawling uphill, I feel like a caterpillar, a snail.
At the top I stop and take out my camera. But really I stop because I am out of breath and my heart is pounding and my vision is blurry. There is nothing to photograph here. A farm surrounded by fog. Dark clouds pressing down on the soaked landscape. A cluster of sad, broken lilac bushes. Rain, rain, rain. My legs are trembling from the climb; I cannot handle an entire route like this. What am I doing here?
I get back on the bike and hope to rest on a flat stretch, but immediately I start to descend. There are some ruts and washboards now. The bike starts bouncing. I stop and lower the pressure in my tires. That helps. Letting the bike go, I steer around the bends and feather the brakes.
At the bottom, I see that another uphill stretch awaits. But I go off course and take a different road, one that looks like it might offer some rolling hills. But no, that road goes up as well. I stop when my computer registers a 20% grade, turn around and ride back down. Later I will do the same several more times, with similar results. There are no gentle roads here. Explore all you want, but expect at least 1,000 feet of elevation gain for every 10 miles.
Back on course now, the road goes up again, but at a gentler grade than before. The rain eases up. I sip my water and spin, feeling almost energetic.
Now the directions say to turn onto Victory Road. It is a much narrower road, almost a trail, that runs though dense woods. It is gravely and rocky. The pitch steepens horrendously, almost comically. I put my water back in the bottle cage and keep pedaling, clicking through my gears until once again I run out. Then I grind. At this moment I can imagine few things more humiliating than grinding in a gear as low as mine. I don't belong here.
I am crawling up a wall of gravel.My mind wanders. I have imaginary conversations with myself. I can't feel my legs, but somehow rotate the pedals anyway. Water and sweat stream down my face.
Ahead, things get worse. I see that the sides of the road have caved in and are flanked by rushing streams of water.I remember that this is the road with potentially washed-out descent that caused Pamela to reverse the route. As I climb further, ravine-like formations begin to take shape down the center, with streams of water flowing through them. I pick a line to avoid them, but this becomes progressively harder, until finally one ravine intersects the other. I ride over this in slow motion at a 16% grade. I try to keep going, but now the road is truly ravaged. Gravel starts to spill out in clumps under my front tire and I slide backwards. The grade steepens still and I get off to push my bike the rest of the way up, barely upright. My arms and shoulders hurt from the effort. I space out until I reach the top.
The descent is not much better at first and I keep walking. I can't pick out a line; it is all rutted out, or in the process of caving in. But finally I get on the bike, launch it downhill and hope for the best. There are large, sharp rocks and I steer around them. It is a 4 mile descent. I am falling and falling and falling. A free-fall.
At the bottom I am suddenly jolted into alertness. Not by the end of the descent, but by the realisation that I am pedaling along a flat stretch. Having gotten used to vertical roads, it is downright disconcerting. And again, I feel as if my tires stick to the ground, as if I am riding in slow motion. The rain stopped. There is a lake - or maybe a flooded field - and I stop to take a break. I look at the time and see how late it is grown. I've added some extra miles to the route, but still have barely done over 20 so far, and it took me nearly 3 hours. I wonder whether the others, setting out to ride the same route later, might have passed me during one of the times I'd gone off course. I try to get a move on.
Next comes a long, winding paved climb with no end in sight. Once again I am crawling. Surely this cannot be called cycling, not at this speed. The grade steepens yet again and once again I consider walking. But just then I suddenly sense a presence beside me, and I see Ted. Pamela and Emily are not far behind. They tell me they left soon after I did, but I doubt that very much - it would not have taken them this long to catch me.
Briefly we ride together. Nearly breaking my knees, I push myself to keep up, but they gently slip away. And when I see them disappear, it is through a veil of snowflakes. At first I think I am hallucinating, but it is unmistakable. Snowflakes on my handlebar bag, on my gloves, on the sleeves of my jacket.
It is not a soft, fluffy snowfall, but a sharp and sleety one. When the next long descent begins, it hits me in the face like needles; it stabs me in the eyes. I try to put my glasses on, but they fog up. So I squint, resisting closing my eyes completely. My face hurts, really hurts. I can see where I am going only approximately. The road is winding and steep. It feels as if I get through it by putting my bike on autopilot.
Finally, a quieter, gentler road, and I am on dirt again. Tall trees shelter me from the vicious snow-needles. I check my computer and see I am 6 miles from the end. I pedal hard and try to get it over with.
Nearly home now, from the corner of my eye I notice a car slowing down beside me. There is no one else on the road but us, and for a moment I panic. A serial killer on the prowl, preying on slow cyclists. But it is John Bayley and Matt Roy. "Can we give you a lift home?" I am confused, then slightly outraged. "In the car?! Why?" They point at the sky. "We were worried!" I assure them I am doing wonderfully, and wave them away.Some minutes later I drag my bike into the cabin, to the sound of applause.
All this for 37 miles. But they were the hardest I've ever done. My legs are shot and my upper body is aching. I cannot imagine walking tomorrow, let alone riding. Feeling dejected, elated and utterly ridiculous, I go upstairs to wash and change for dinner. Out of the bedroom window I notice the snow again. Maybe I am dreaming all of this up.
This prairie dog figurine came from Prairie Dog Town some where on the road between Pampa, TX and Amarillo, TX. In about 1955 my mom, my grandmother, and I made the trip from Pampa to Amarillo about once a month or more often when I mom was pregnant with my sister. We were living in Pampa and the Air Force base where my mom had to go for her appointments was near Amarillo. My dad was stationed in England at that time. The Prairie Dog Town made a nice stop for all of us. There was a cafe, gift shop, and a fenced area out back that was full of prairie dogs for the guest to watch as they went about their prairie dog lives. They were feed by the people that ran the place and were a great attraction especially to me. For those that don't know a prairie dog is not a dog, they are a rodent (rat) but are cute. They dig long tunnels through an area that becomes the dog town. When one of them is startled it will stand on it's hind legs give a sharp squeak and dive down the hole with all the others then doing the same thing. They are also very dangerous to livestock and people who have stepped in their holes and broken legs. At one time there was a bounty on them over most of the southwest. We have a few out here on the desert near where we live. They are so leery of humans I have never seen one but have found the towns with the many holes leading to the tunnels.
Bike against the Harvard Square skyline.
Self-portrait with bike in shop window. (You can see the outline of my hat on the far left.)
In that spirit, we stopped by the opening of the 
The painted frames made me think of Anna from 
In the comments section of a post from a couple of days ago, I made a remark suggesting that bike shops have financial incentive to sell bikes and accessories separately, as opposed to bikes that do not need additional accessories. I have since received emails asking to expand on that, so let me give it a try.
Consider first, that the retail mark-up on bicycles is usually less, percentage-wise, than the retail mark-up on components and accessories. The better made the bicycle, the more this is so, as production costs for that bike are high and there is a ceiling to what most customers are willing to pay.
So, what incentive is there for bike shops to stock high quality, complete city bicycles and to be motivated to sell them to customers in leu of maximising profits by selling bikes and accessories separately? The way I see it, it is about short-term versus long-term profits - In other words, about building enduring relationships with customers. By acting in a customer's best interest - both in terms of the kind of bicycles they choose to stock in the first place, and in terms of the purchasing suggestions they make to those who walk in off the street - the bike shop is sacrificing immediate profits for the benefits of repeat business and word of mouth advertisement that could result from this customer.
The Park remains closed until further notice. For updated information, call 360 569 2211 ext 9. 
Aside from the rage of the Nisqually River, Longmire is a relatively quiet place. The NPS has closed its offices, and only essential personnel are allowed in through a backroad (which is largely washed out and requires shuttles). See image above, taken near the Eagle Peak Trailhead...
Longmire is isolated by washouts and mudflows, so it feels like a safe little island. Well, "safe" unless you're in the Emergency Operations Center (pictured left) which is being undermined by the Nisqually River... Oh, and some of the electrical and water systems are also damaged, but most of the facilities will probably survive the storm. 
The Feathers.
High desert.
Columbia River boat ramp.
Today was the first time in two months that I went on what can even remotely be described as a "recreational" ride. Having finished my errands, I continued onto the Charles River trail for a half hour - then turned around and rode back. The wind was brutal and the temperature around 30
It felt weird to cycle "for no reason" after not having done it for so long! I kept thinking "wait, where am I going again?" before remembering that I wasn't headed anywhere in particular. But I'm sure I'll get used to it soon.
The Charles River trail now has less snow on it than the roads do - which is odd, because I didn't think they'd even plowed it all winter. Maybe it's warmer next to the river. As for the roads, the snow has mostly melted - but hardened snowbanks still pop up when you least expect them, making transportation cycling like an obstacle course that requires constant merging in and out of traffic. I keep looking out the window and hoping that finally, today cycling will be normal again. But it isn't quite there yet.You take what you can get.
On the road, I had a conversation with a motorist at an intersection that I've had several times before (not with the same motorist, mind you). The light had just turned red and the driver began signaling a right turn. Since I was already on his right, I positioned myself slightly ahead of him and waited for the light to change.
With his latest project, our neighbour Somervillain is quickly establishing himself as Vintage Bicycle Refurbisher Extraordinaire. This dreamy creature began life as a 1984 Shogun 1500 - a good, yet unremarkable touring bike. It has now been transformed into something quite exquisite.
The 25" frame was stripped of its original paint and powdercoated a creamy "almond," the lugwork then outlined in copper.
I think that it's pretty difficult to get the perfect shade of cream: If it's too pale, the bicycle looks bland and if it's too saturated the bicycle looks yellow. This shade looks just right to me: classic, soft and a little mysterious.
The Shogun frame had a high bottom bracket and sufficient clearance for wide tires with fenders, making it a great candidate for a 650B conversion. However, the cantilever bosses had to be relocated in order to accommodate the new wheel size. Both this and the powdercoating were done by Sugarcoat/ Geekhouse. Notice also the internal routing for the dynamo lighting.
Internal routing exit for the tail light. I will not even try to describe the routing, but Somervillain shows the step-by-step processhere.
Rear cantilever bosses, Mafac brakes, KoolStop brake pads.
The headlight is the Bausch & Mueller Lumoteq IQ (I have this light on two of my bikesand love it), and the DIY bracket is fashioned out of a caliper brake.
The tail light is a vintage Soubitez converted to LED with Bausch & Mueller innards.
Tires are the red Grand Bois Hetres, with Zeppelin fenders from Velo Orange. I have this same set-up on my Rivendell, only with the cream version of the tires. TheGrand BoisHetres are absolutely magical in their cushiness and a 650B conversion is worth it just for them alone.
Shimano dynamo hub (which Somervillain says causes slight vibration at high speeds when the light is on, so he is considering changing it to a Schmidt SON).
Huret rear derailleur. I forgot the details of the cassette, so perhaps Somervillain will remind me or post the specs.
Huret front derailleur.
Beautiful TA crankset.
VO Moderniste bottle cages.
Belleri Randonneur bars, VO Pass Hunter front rack,Ostrich handlebar bag.
And Brooks B17 saddle.
Having tested this bicycle out on a metric century ride last weekend, the owner is well pleased with its comfort and performance. Sadly, I am not tall enough for this 25" frame, so I will have to take his word for it. Given that Somervillain has other beautiful bicycles, I am curious how this one compares and what role he ultimately sees it occupying. Will it be his long-distance tourer? Time will tell. Either way, this project was a major accomplishment in its marriage of vintage and custom elements. The frame, the modifications, colour, the components - simply dreamy.