A Christmas adventure with Ruby

I started out relatively early, but getting the bike unloaded from the car, loaded with the essentials and dressed into the required number of layers for temps in the teens took much longer than I had anticipated and I didn't get rolling until 10:30.

 

Ruby's all set.

Some interesting graffiti along the Eliza Furnace trail

 I set off to see the Bald Eagles nesting in Hays. I managed to find a geocache not far from the nest and heard the telltale screeches of the pair while I was logging the geocache. Crows were mobbing them across the river.

When I got to the nest, they were performing some courtship displays while in flight above the ridge. This made me happy beyond description. I never did spot the nest, but who cares? I heard and saw BALD EAGLES!


I went down to the Waterfront complex in Homestead looking for a bathroom. No port-o-pottys, no stores were open on Christmas! I was getting desperate. I kindly asked to use one at one of the hotels there. Whew.

 On the way back, I decided to look for the remaining  Toynbee tile I had missed along Smithfield and to my delight, there were THREE NEW ones!

Smithfield and First

Smithfield and Third

Smithfield and Fourth. I LOVE the homage to the originals with the legs framing the tile. This is splendid.

My target was this original at Smithfield and Forbes. The other three were icing on my Toynbee cake!

Soupaneuring #4 was this bowl of tomato daal that I'd made the night before with 3 different types of daals. Yellow daal, red daal and moong daal with a masala that I'd made in a huge batch and frozen months prior.

Still-lingering bike fit issues

This was the first ride I'd taken since my fitting. I was concerned initially that my saddle was still wrong and after a few miles into my ride, I tried to readjust it. No go. My fitter had tightened that bolt with man-strength that I just wasn't able to undo. Fortunately, it wasn't an issue after a 22 mile, 3.75 hour ride. My neck was *really* angry and still miffed hours later. I do NOT like riding all hunched over, bending my neck at an awkward angle to see where I'm going. I *really* want my handlebars further back and/or higher. I will mention this to my fitter with our follow-up. All of Europe rides in an upright position, this doesn't seem to be an issue for them!

With my new rear-mounted basket, I can no longer tip the bike to one side to mount her. I have to grab my leg and hoist it over the bike. Rickety joints suck.

YTD Miles: 576

BMI: 26.1 

ARRRGH! Damn you, delicious, tempting holiday foods!