FLCC> Cayuta Lake-Odessa Ride notes

[John Dennis]

A surprisingly large group departed the Professional Building about 10:15am
this morning in a light rain that had more or less stopped.  Those riding
near the front consisted of Stewart Wolsh, Gary Hodges, David Sahn,  Alex
Deyhim,  and Jim Millar. As I recall, riding more to the rear were Evan
Palmer-Young, Steve  Bowman, Steve Powell, Eva Tarcsai, Jason Stilwell, and
Tom Sage from the Enwell-Binghamton area.  As per usual, I floated about a
bit.    Heavy ominous clouds hung at about 750 feet with a bit of light off
at the margins.  For better or worse, I had left my gortex cycling suit in
my car along with neoprene booties.  Jason had firmly declined offers of
additional clothing and many of us were in awe of his ruggedness, cycling as
he was in a tee-shirt, shorts, and no gloves with temps in the mid-50s.  At
Mecklenberg, we picked up Brenda (one of my cycling scribe rivals-:)   After
the 9.8 miles to Mecklenberg, we proceeded due south on CR 6 with its
several large dairy farms.  Andrejs’ notes describe this portion of the
ride: 

 

“This stretch on CR6 is the heart of this ride. It meanders into the
Cayutaville valley and finally ends in a T at CR 10 opposite the cemetery --
a good place for a rest stop.”  

 

It was during this long section, before dropping into the Cayutaville
Valley, that Steve Powell  explained to me that we are nearing the end of an
11-year period of relatively little sun spot activity.   “Sun spots can
disrupt the GPS satellite communications which in turn can hamper aircraft
navigation based on GPS. Luckily, they didn’t scrap some of the older
navigation technologies.”  

 

At the Cemetery T, Eva, Jason, Tom, and Steve Powell headed down to Odessa
to check out the “Carry-Out Café” which specializes in Belgian Waffles and
eggs.   Steve tells me he had both. This is a cycling friendly diner, so
much so that the wait staff set up an electric heater to provide extra
warmth for our four wet cyclists.   Eight other cyclists, visiting from
Canada, also arrived for food and warmth. 

 

The rest of us pushed on and within minutes the rain had picked up.   We
were soon very wet—at least I know I was—and temps were falling.   Steve
Bowman and Brenda dropped back and the rest of us rode without stop back to
the Prof. Building, Stewart peeling off for Tburg and home where we turned
East.   David and I realized that each of us had some hypothermia as we
cranked up the heat in my car.    I later learned that the Odessa diner
group returned by the most direct route and did suffer some cold feet and
hands on the way back.  Surely Jason Stilwell deserves the “most rugged
cyclist” award. 

 

Ride safe,   John 

 

 

 

 

-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: http://icycle.org/pipermail/flcc_icycle.org/attachments/20080518/17c854a4/attachment.html