Annual Circling Wachusett Foliage Ride - October 19, 2022

 RIDE REPORT

Wednesday, 19 October 2022, Annual Circling Wachusett Foliage Ride

Ride Leaders:  Richard Vignoni and Judith McMichael

63-mile Remote Start ride, 8:50 am start from Bolton, MA

39-mile Core ride, 10:00 am start from Sterling, MA

Riders – 63 mi (4):  Marc Baskin, Wing Chow, George ???, and a mystery rider.

Riders – 39 mi (17):  Richard, Judith, Bill Lane, Celia Donatio, Ellen Gugel, Elizabeth Wicks, Gene Ho, Herb Kavet, Joanne Samuels, Judith McMichael, Julie Dodd, Ken Weber, Lindy King, Marie Keutmann, Renee Rees, Robin Frain, Sue Amsel, and Zach Woods.

Two sets of two remote start riders arrived at the core ride start, bringing the total number of riders to twenty-one.  The group included four long-time WWs (Bill, Joanne, Marc, and Richard), five e-bikes (up from two last year), and several first-time Circling Wachusett riders.

The hilly nature of the ride tends to spread-out the riders.  Consequently, we decided on having a faster group which was led by Judith, and a slower group led by Richard, and we did not use human arrows.  We also decided to move the lunch stop from the ski area to the visitor center and re-route onto Pine Hill to rejoin the original route.  The change of lunch venue and the associated re-routing tweak will become a permanent part of the route.

After the somewhat lengthy ride orientation talk, the faster group headed out, followed by the slower group.  The route lived up to its billing as being very beautiful, very hilly, and having little car traffic.  The foliage with fallen leaves on the sides of some of the less travelled roads added to the beauty.  Some of the riders biked the extra, hilly miles to the summit, then re-joined the others at the visitor center.   As the ride progressed, the temperature moderated and, with bright blue skies and the foliage, it made for a great day of biking.

Report by Richard Vignoni.