The votes are in; this weekend’s race will be a local one. Vicky T. (another cool canadian cx'r) invited me to Roubaix for the world cup, but at this point that’s 2 more days of travel, and 2 days less riding and getting a good groove in. It would have been great had the logistics gone a little more my way, but o’well. Tim and his gang are stick’n around to do the local event too. I’m still expecting to see the same Dutch flavour as the last race. Hoping for that homemade liquorice at sign on.
We seem to be getting the hang of things around here. The driving will still scare the crap out of us sometimes. It’s two-way traffic on roads that are one car wide. I’m still not sure what all the road rules are... like who yields for who? At this point I think whoever has the biggest hunk of metal on wheels gets the right away. :P but so far no crashes. The road maps aren’t the easiest to understand. I can’t pronounce 90% of the towns we drive through, so asking for directions is fun. I’m getting the hang of it. ROCKOUT!!
We spent the last two days venturing out to a national park for some riding. We could ride the road till rubber wore off, but I mean really? Who wants to ride the road... really? So me and Mangey (Tim and the gang were out later today) have been hitting up a mix of Single track/double track/ sheep track/horse track.... and wagon track? Lost? Yup, a lot. But it’s easy to get lost and not be lost if that makes any sense. We have found some really wicked trails. Not super technical, but fast and full of curves and tiny little aggressive climbs. The chip/gravel trails are actually a base of crunched sea shells. I guess most of the part at one time was sea bottom. We even rode through one area that pretty much consisted entirely of sand dunes (which has been the extent of any sort of hills in the area). Wildlife.... not really any yet. Sheep, haha I never actually heard a sheep bleat in real life, haha, they sound awesome. Lots of Ducks, and the occasional deer.
We are not sure what the two signs are actually indicating. But they look like bike wheels, so we followed them, and so far so good.
I’ve yet to be in a place that's as bike comfortable as here in the Netherlands. The bike path network seems endless, and it’s a very very common form of transportation. There are riders everywhere on old looking singlespeeds, with baskets and pedal powered handlebar lights. Haha, one older dude riding with the KOOOL wooden shoes. Everywhere you drive its “Yield to cyclist or watch out for bicycles.” It’s pretty sweet to be in an area where cars and bikes get along.
The weather is perfect for me. It will range from -6 to plus 6ish this time of year. My body is pretty comfortable in those temps so it hasn’t been hard to get out riding. It is very consistently wet around here though. Foggy mornings, rains, mists. I don’t mind, but it can be gloomy. I did a night ride a few days ago on a chip trail close to where we are staying. It was foggy, and I could barely see about 5 meters in front of me. Was eerie feeling, but AWESOME! Hard to get scared when I’m not at all sure what to be worried about. I don’t think there are killer sheep, and the lockness monster is not from here..... Maybe there are killer garden Gnomes.... where was Rumplestiltsken from again? Pffft! I could out ride him anyway.
You all thought I was joking, but chocolate covered waffles are amazing! Along with fresh Stroopwaffel and good baked things everywhere... yes imp eating in moderation, but c’mon.... chocolate covered waffles.
Tomorrow we are taking a bit of a tourist day after the ride. Time to get in some urban action, and down town city driving. Maybe pick up my own set of wooden shoes. I have been feeling great; my legs feel awesome. I laid down some huge sprints in the trails today and didn’t want to stop. After 3hrs we eventually got hungry and called’r a day. Not before I (accidently) rode Mangey off the trail and into a ditch. Hahah, she’s riding my second bike, and didn’t want to wreck it, so she pretty much launched herself off the bike into this trench thing. Haha, my bike is ok!! She’s okay too...
We seem to be getting the hang of things around here. The driving will still scare the crap out of us sometimes. It’s two-way traffic on roads that are one car wide. I’m still not sure what all the road rules are... like who yields for who? At this point I think whoever has the biggest hunk of metal on wheels gets the right away. :P but so far no crashes. The road maps aren’t the easiest to understand. I can’t pronounce 90% of the towns we drive through, so asking for directions is fun. I’m getting the hang of it. ROCKOUT!!
We spent the last two days venturing out to a national park for some riding. We could ride the road till rubber wore off, but I mean really? Who wants to ride the road... really? So me and Mangey (Tim and the gang were out later today) have been hitting up a mix of Single track/double track/ sheep track/horse track.... and wagon track? Lost? Yup, a lot. But it’s easy to get lost and not be lost if that makes any sense. We have found some really wicked trails. Not super technical, but fast and full of curves and tiny little aggressive climbs. The chip/gravel trails are actually a base of crunched sea shells. I guess most of the part at one time was sea bottom. We even rode through one area that pretty much consisted entirely of sand dunes (which has been the extent of any sort of hills in the area). Wildlife.... not really any yet. Sheep, haha I never actually heard a sheep bleat in real life, haha, they sound awesome. Lots of Ducks, and the occasional deer.
We are not sure what the two signs are actually indicating. But they look like bike wheels, so we followed them, and so far so good.
I’ve yet to be in a place that's as bike comfortable as here in the Netherlands. The bike path network seems endless, and it’s a very very common form of transportation. There are riders everywhere on old looking singlespeeds, with baskets and pedal powered handlebar lights. Haha, one older dude riding with the KOOOL wooden shoes. Everywhere you drive its “Yield to cyclist or watch out for bicycles.” It’s pretty sweet to be in an area where cars and bikes get along.
The weather is perfect for me. It will range from -6 to plus 6ish this time of year. My body is pretty comfortable in those temps so it hasn’t been hard to get out riding. It is very consistently wet around here though. Foggy mornings, rains, mists. I don’t mind, but it can be gloomy. I did a night ride a few days ago on a chip trail close to where we are staying. It was foggy, and I could barely see about 5 meters in front of me. Was eerie feeling, but AWESOME! Hard to get scared when I’m not at all sure what to be worried about. I don’t think there are killer sheep, and the lockness monster is not from here..... Maybe there are killer garden Gnomes.... where was Rumplestiltsken from again? Pffft! I could out ride him anyway.
You all thought I was joking, but chocolate covered waffles are amazing! Along with fresh Stroopwaffel and good baked things everywhere... yes imp eating in moderation, but c’mon.... chocolate covered waffles.
Tomorrow we are taking a bit of a tourist day after the ride. Time to get in some urban action, and down town city driving. Maybe pick up my own set of wooden shoes. I have been feeling great; my legs feel awesome. I laid down some huge sprints in the trails today and didn’t want to stop. After 3hrs we eventually got hungry and called’r a day. Not before I (accidently) rode Mangey off the trail and into a ditch. Hahah, she’s riding my second bike, and didn’t want to wreck it, so she pretty much launched herself off the bike into this trench thing. Haha, my bike is ok!! She’s okay too...
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