80 miles of Chip-Seal Heaven

I had my first weekend off in a long long time where I wasn’t traveling home or somewhere else. Carrie’s off with the kids camping, so I was left to my own deviced in Elgin. “Elgin?” you may say…

Seeings how I haven’t posted anything lately, let me bring you up to speed. After 2 weeks of surveying in the badlands, our merry band of archeologists moved to Jamestown ND for a 4-week excavation project on a potentially important and potentially deep site at Jamestown Reservoir. That did not seem to pan out, however. Our lack of archeological success was made up for the legions of ticks that we fed. An average day would see me pull 30-40 ticks off myself. Most of the time only 3-4 would get buried, but that was 3-4 too many. About halfway through the project, the summer heat got turned on, which turned out the mosquito population, who also found our crew to be “yummy.” The blood-letting that ensued kept the bugs happy, the archeologists less so. The highlight of the project, for me, was discovering the nice mountain bike trails at Pipestem Dam. Many kudos to the guys to built and maintain those trails. Please build more granny trails, if not for you, then for me…

That project ended and after a short week at home, I’m back out west, directing a survey project at Heart Butte Reservoir (Lake Tschida). There are virtually no mosquitos, and I’ve only had 2 ticks in the past week. Much better than the last project. So back to my story…

I had this past weekend to myself. My choices were nap, watch the Tour de France on the internet machine, read, sleep, nap, eat leftovers or at the restaurant, etc. I spent 5+ hours of the weekend riding my Franken-road bike. Saturday saw me log 49 km (30 mi) on a ride from Elgin up to the Heart Butte dam and back again. Averaged 24 km/hr, in a just a hair over 2 hours. Sunday saw me ride from Elgin to Mott and back again, for another 78 km (ca. 50 mi). All the roads were chip seal, and they weren’t too terribly sticky. No flats, lots of friendly drivers, and plenty of water and food to keep my blood sugars good. Did the ride in 3 hr, 15 min, or an average of about 24 km/hr (15 mi/hr). Good times.

Here’s a pick of me riding in my new Team Type 1 cycling kit.

Cheers,

Mike