Discovering New Places

I've been learning to ride a bike. Not the basic part of moving forward without falling down: I mastered that years ago. Rather, with the winding down of my running career I've been looking to cycling as a new form of exercise and have been trying to do some rides of at least moderate length. I have an unrealistic possible goal of riding the metric version of the Seagull Century (100 km, or about 62 mi) this fall; more realistically, I just want to build up my cycling muscles and, um, seat tolerance.

At 18.5 mi today's ride was not one of my longer ones, however it offered lots of hill practice. I started from home, peddled up Sycamore St./Williamsburg Blvd./Glebe Rd. to Chain Bridge. This part of the ride has lots of fun ups and downs over extended hills. To give you some idea, the GPS shows my speed alternating between speeds as high as 27 MPH as I motored downhill and as low as 8 MPH as I granny-geared my way back uphill. From studying the map I found a little trick detour to bypass the suicidal final plunge down to Chain Bridge. It's not perfect, though, as you have to do a slightly less suicidal climb up the Military Road exit ramp and then to the downhill plunge on a quiet side street.

Once across Chain Bridge (a great view, as always) I headed west on the C&O Canal Tow Path. The tow path is packed dirt and so for someone on a thin-tired bike it's slow going. I didn't realize it during my ride but I actually made it out of DC and into Maryland before I turned around at one of the canal locks. On the way back, out of curiosity I decided to explore a side path off the tow path. Why would there be a paved path into the woods off of a dirt main trail? Well, after exploring it I can't explain why it's there but I can say where it leads. Turns out it goes all the way to a neat concrete platform situated above the bank of the Potomac about midway between Chain Bridge and Little Falls. The platform offers a great view of both the bridge and the falls. Now, I kayaked this section of the river a million times back when the Thursday night group used to launch out of Georgetown. In fact, I'd often spend time hanging out in my kayak right about at this spot waiting for the crazier folks who liked to take their sea kayaks up into the falls. I never, however, noticed this platform from the water. I can't believe it. It must be somewhat camouflaged by the rocks and branches along the shoreline.

I didn't pause long at the platform because I wanted to keep my ride going. So, back on my bike I climbed and I continued down the tow path, switching to the paved Capital Crescent trail where the two paths meet at Fletcher's Cove. The CC takes you right onto Water St. in Georgetown, past the Potomac Boat Club, Washington Canoe Club and Jack's Boathouse. I paused at Jack's and watched someone launch a stand-up paddle board. I thought I might say hi to Paul or Anna if they were there but boathouse wasn't open yet, and so I moved on.

Continuing along Water St. took me to Georgetown Waterfront Park. I've watched this park being built from the vantage point of my kayak but had never visited it on land before. It's very well done, a nice place for folks to stroll and connect to the river. It has some neat old photos and maps of the area etched into stones around the park: one showing the old aqueduct bridge, one showing a 1940s (I'm guessing) view of Georgetown, and a bunch of others. The only thing it's missing is a car-top boat launch. I took a five minute break at the park, breaking out the thermos of coffee and piece of biscotti I had brought along. Then it was back on the bike, up across Georgetown, and over Key Bridge back into Virginia.

The ride out the Custis Trail from Rosslyn to home is at a macro level an uphill battle. The combination of the topography of the land and the need for the bike path to cross over a number of roads makes it a rolling ride. Up, down, up, down. A good workout for sure. The good news is that I think I'm getting better at these sections - in fact, I was feeling strong enough at the end of this roller coaster that I added a little dog-leg to the ride, detouring down a side path into Bluemont Park rather than taking the more direct route to the W&OD trail.

Finally, home at about 10:30 AM, just in time to say goodbye to V as she left to get together with a friend.

Next time I try doing this loop twice. OK, maybe once plus a few more add-on segments. Someday, twice.