Finally sailing

My good friend Bobby and I finally got to get out on his boat. We had a great day with clear sky and good wind, Bobby and I have sailed together for years cruising and racing.Bobby
We even dusted off the spinnaker and took off on a couple of long reaches, perfect.

I almost always carry a fishing pole when near the water and in my ditty bag I carry a piece of PVC pipe and a couple of short lines to set up a rod holder for trolling, it was a good day to fish too.

Leading the peloton

The bicycle rides have been hard to get in but we had a good 67 mile ride with the club last Saturday, we broke out the tandem and had a fast hard ride. We rode part of the Bluebonnet trail and the flowers were starting to look good. This is part of the ride our bicycle club puts on each year called The Lancaster Country Ride.

Tonight is the clubs fast ride, last week it was 34 miles at a 20.7 true average, I haven't been on the bike since then and I hope I can still hang in towards the front. It gets harder to stay in decent shape every year.

I just returned yesterday from an overnight backpacking trip on the Cross Timbers Trail where I camped at the 5 mile trail campsite, great time but my legs are pretty sore.

Dennis

Its been all about the bike

I have not had a chance to go sailing for a while now but since our trip to Palo Duro Canyon I have been on some great bicycle rides. On Thursday I met Heath and Jeannie for an afternoon ride on a sunny and very windy day. We rode 55 miles with about a 17.5 average, which was really hard with wind gusts up to 30 mph and sustained winds over 20. The picture below is after the ride, I'm on the right.

On Saturday I rode the GDB Airport ride and got in 59 miles on another windy day, I rode the entire ride with the fast group but I did get dropped on the last few miles around the airport. The 20 mile loop around the airport is where it is a free for all and you usually catch all the lights green so it is fast and hard. This day we formed a rotating pace line at about 26 and I stayed in it as long as I could. our group of 20 + slowly got smaller and there were maybe 6 or 7 left when I went off the back.

Tuesday was the First ride of the year at REI and I once again went with the renegade group, this group rides fast but safe and I managed to stay with the group the entire way with a second and third place in the city limit sign sprints that I was in position to go for. We got in 25 miles with a 19.9 mph average and it rained on us , this was a very fast average for wet roads as we had to really slow for the turns.

It has been raining for 24 hours as I write this and shows no sign of stopping, when this finally blows over I am going to try and go sailing, but it may be next week before that can happen.

MAKE THE BEST OF WHAT YOU HAVE

Dennis

Cycling Palo Duro Canyon

We have been getting a few more miles on the road bikes but when we get a chance to ride the wind and cold has been a killer. Last Saturday Michele and I rode the Tandem to the meeting place for a club ride and all but 2 of the group did not ride but went to breakfast, to cold and windy. We did about 40 miles with wind gusts to 30mph.

Michele thought for a minute she had lost her driver as I dreamed of a warm breakfast.

We decided to take off Friday and go camp at Palo Duro Canyon this weekend, since it was going to be cold and windy we would ride mountain bikes down in the Canyons. This worked out nice and we hiked and biked roads and trails and were covered up with wildlife. The mtb trails are great and you can find rides for any level of rider from easy to very technical or you can ride the road out of the canyon(several miles of 10% grade). Due to the high winds on this road I did not do the climb out of the canyon but I will return and do it. My favorite trail was the Lighthouse Trail.

This was our first time here and it was a pleasant surprise, nice campsites out of the wind and clear sunny cool days to hike and bike. In the picture below I took an over the shoulder shot of a herd of deer, we saw hundreds of deer and wild turkey as well as a coyote And I will depart with another over the shoulder shot of another small group of weekday riders.


Palo Duro Rocks

Dennis