This is the perfect ride for a hot August day. We try to do it once a year. This year August ended earlier than scheduled (it seems), but we’re not so picky that we’d blow off the ride just because it’s September. Besides, during a 9/11 10th anniversary heightened terrorism alert it actually makes sense to get out of town, and to get out using an obscure bridge, as opposed to the usual GWB exit from Manhattan.
The Bronx’s Grand Concourse, where the Madison Avenue Bridge more or less lands you, is pretty much concrete jungle. But we know we are headed for sylvan bliss. The contrast is one of the things we relish about this ride.
As it became greener this morning, the sound of crickets became louder all around us, making us feel like we’d stolen the day in the name of summer, holding off autumn just that much longer.
I meant this ride to be strictly for fun today- the road racing season is over (over!) for me. Nonetheless, the riding got a bit spirited by the time we reached Greenwich. Hitting the turns and rollers on Porchuck road at full throttle cost a bit too much, and made me feel very post-season. It seemed to make Darius feel even more so. It was as though he was changing before our eyes from Cat 3 animal to something considerably slower.
He didn’t seem to be very happy about it. I thought he might snap at me at any moment. He decided to head back on his own, and arguing with him seemed of the question.
Maybe we should have taken this sign, back on the Grand Concourse, as the warning it was clearly meant to be:
Ira and I soldiered on, turning down the pace just slightly, for fear of turning to sloths, or slugs, or whatever fate might await us should we explode our delicate end-of-season legs.
It appeared we were following the route Hurricane Irene had taken, right up the NY/CT line. there were downed trees everywhere, and piles of cut wood at the side of the road, waiting to be carted away.
The streams leading into the Saugatuck Reservoir in Redding CT were carrying off water from all the recent rain, and maybe still from hurricane Irene. The reservoir was full, and the spillway was raging.
I always think of the swimming hole just below the dam as the climax of this ride- after that it’s all denouement. Today there was no one jumping from the rocks. What is ordinarily a pool was a frothing torrent.
Sebastian once dove in here, after the locals warned “don’t dive”. He came out bloody, and I decided then to always trust the locals. So I had ruled out a swim today, and we were about to leave, when one of the couple sitting on the rocks took off his shirt (but not his socks) and launched himself into the void with a running start.
I was sorely tempted. But it was getting a bit late. And I prefer to swim sock-less. So we got back on the bikes, and spent everything we had left motoring from there down to Fairfield. We rolled up the ramp to the Metro North Platform just as the train was sounding it’s horn, pulling into the station. The train was crowded. We were sweaty, smelly, and out of water. But we’d saved ourselves from one additional hour’s worth of of spousal wrath- not to mention an hour of babysitting in my case- by a hair’s breadth.
RouteMap: A Shady Lane (2011)