It’s been several times this summer that I got out of work and just had an urge to go out and ride my bike, for as long as I felt like, with no plan of where I was going. Yet again tonight I got that urge. After 6 hours of staring a screen trying to get one small piece of functionality working for the virtual museum project I’m working on, I was ready to do anything other than sit at a computer more.
Went back to my apartment for a minute, ate half the banana I had in fridge, tossed a few things into my backpack and then took off. I made my way down to the waterfront, because I had promised myself I would ride north on the Burlington Bikeway before summer ended. I’d ridden to the end of it the bikeway to the south, and I’d had a burning desire to the end of the trail to the north.
Because I’m a nerd and I like to see exactly where I went, you can click this link to see the exact route I rode today.
Yup… really didn’t plan on riding 20 miles. I got to the northern head of the Burlington Bikeway. It was still light out, and suddenly that wasn’t good enough for me. I saw a sign for the Champlain Bikeway. Obviously I had no idea where I was at this point, but hey, it was another bikeway! I kept riding. My legs were feeling great today and I was pedaling steady in 5th gear. In the very back of my mind I was thinking that it was getting too dark for me to keep riding, buttttttttttt I kept riding.
At this point I was on Colchester Point Road. And hey, Colchester is right up the road from Winooski, and I was pretty positive I was heading south again, so it had to come out eventually. Well, after riding on Colchester Point Road for 15 minutes or so, I saw water off to my left. Bad. The lake should have been on my right. It was at this point I turned around. Unfortunately, too, because had I know the area better I would have realized that I was on a peninsula, and it probably would have been quicker to just stay on the road I was on and just get back to Route 7 and go south back to Winooski.
But that’s not what happened. So instead, I rode for about an hour backtracking on the Burlington Bikeway. In near complete darkness. The night ended quite well though. I finally got back to North Beach and hopped the railing down on the beach walkway and rode out the main entrance up past BHS, and then back into the north end on North Ave. Stopped at a gas station and sat outside to enjoy an Arizona. And then as I was riding up North Street, I saw China Express, and… well… I hadn’t eat yet, so I stopped and got general tso’s tofu with mushrooms and brocoli.
Long winded stories aside, what got me thinking tonight was the fact that times like the one I experienced tonight, moments of complete uncertainty and a bit of concern (see: me riding down a pitch-black path in the middle of the woods with no bike light for an hour), are ones that I end up cherishing and reliving. Experiences that make us uncomfortable are healthier than we realize, and especially feelings of being lost or disoriented are so rewarding when you eventually find your way out of that experience. Perhaps I’m just rambling. It’s almost 1am now and my body is, needless to say, pretty beat.
Farewell until next time, internet users.
