It was a sunny day, crisp cool air (40 degrees as we left Bryans Road at 10 am, 47 when we returned at 1:30) contrasting with the warmth of the sun. It's hard to overstate the importance of the sun: it was cooler today than it was on Saturday, but it was lovely, a joy to be outdoors, while Saturday was as miserable a day as one could possibly imagine.
The group was a small one for such a pretty day: Larry Peed, Roger Cubbage, Paul and Linda Bankerd, Richard Harrington, Sharon Miller, Loretta Troen and Karen Morgan and leader Steve Palincsar.
The theme of today's ride was views of the Mattawoman Creek / Mad Woman/Old Woman Run. Not knowing for sure how it would feel, I planned the ride to stay close to home so we could cut things short at several places. We took Pomfret to the IHRT and followed Mattawoman Creek down towards Indian Head, taking a short break at the portolet at Bumpy Oak (where Linda Bankerd shared her improvised binder-clip-field-fix for sunglass lenses that won't stay in place with Karen Morgan), toured the neighborhoods south of the trail at Blair en route to Mattingly Park and the waterfront along Mattawoman Creek, stopping at the park and the portolets at the end of the road.
We took Mattingly to Indian Head, then Strauss, Hawthorne and Chicamuxen to Smallwood Park and took another break at the Mattawoman Creek. Passing up another shortcut opportunity, the group took a novel return route along Sweetman and Bicknell to Pisgah Marbury and Mason Spring where we experienced some gentle undulations (in truth, that's all they were, really) on the way back to Hawthorne and Chapman's Landing and some more undulations there.
The group stayed together, and although my computer is no longer giving accurate AMS readings, the Pace Arrow seemed to indicate a Used2Bee average in the mid-to-high 13s for the entire 32 miles.
Sharon posted
photos on Facebook:
