Road bikes are fun. Especially when there are no taxis, buses, tourists, stroller-pushing milfs, dogs on 50-foot leashes and/or potholes the size of Texas trying to kill you every 3 feet.
Rented a house in Columbia County, NY for a week and got out on a few road rides when not on baby patrol, BBQ duty or emptying beer bottles into my facehole. Just grabbed a map, filled the water bottles and went.
A few things I learned: Any road with the word "hill" in its name will have one or more hills. The little white roads on a map are generally unpaved but take you through the best scenery. Cows have the right of way on a road. So do tractors bearing huge freaking metal teeth/thrasher/spinning death things on the front of them. Long twisty downhills make climbing/barfing your way up to the top of any road with the name "hill" in it totally worth it. Road bikes don't 'drift' like a downhill bike, they seem to skid and highside.
All in, I got four rides in between 20-30 miles each. The roads were empty, the scenery amazing and my self-fit, internet-bought, blowout-priced roadbike was fast and comfortable.
Here are a few lame cameraphone pics:
The climb up Jefferson Hill Road.
A white line on the map.
Local megafauna. And one of my fingers.
Rented a house in Columbia County, NY for a week and got out on a few road rides when not on baby patrol, BBQ duty or emptying beer bottles into my facehole. Just grabbed a map, filled the water bottles and went.
A few things I learned: Any road with the word "hill" in its name will have one or more hills. The little white roads on a map are generally unpaved but take you through the best scenery. Cows have the right of way on a road. So do tractors bearing huge freaking metal teeth/thrasher/spinning death things on the front of them. Long twisty downhills make climbing/barfing your way up to the top of any road with the name "hill" in it totally worth it. Road bikes don't 'drift' like a downhill bike, they seem to skid and highside.
All in, I got four rides in between 20-30 miles each. The roads were empty, the scenery amazing and my self-fit, internet-bought, blowout-priced roadbike was fast and comfortable.
Here are a few lame cameraphone pics:
The climb up Jefferson Hill Road.
A white line on the map.
Local megafauna. And one of my fingers.
