Deer Island - June 5, 2024

 RIDE REPORT

 

Wednesday, 5 June 2024, Deer Island

Ride Leader:  Tom Allen

39 miles, 10:00 am start from Cambridge, MA

 

Riders (9):  Tom, Bill Perry, David Goldberg, Everett Briggs, Frank Aronson, Jim Campen, Jim White, Robert Rybarczyk, and Wing Chow.

 

On a fine day for a ride all but one of the riders showed up at Danehy Park in Cambridge.  The one absent rider had elected to meet us at the rendezvous point for the short ride (26 miles).  I was surprised at the absence of women on the ride and the guys being mostly "of a certain age".  We could have named ourselves "The GOBs" ("Geezers on Bikes").

 

The group size was just about ideal - enough for company, but compact enough to obviate the need for deployed arrows.  The ride consisted of city streets and various bike paths [of the 39 miles of riding, 18 were bikeways or pedestrian paths.  So, despite the urban setting, we were away from cars a good bit of the way.

 

We returned Jim to his car at the Costco parking lot and the rest of us braved our way across the Alford Street bridge and through the Sullivan Square traffic challenge - fortunately there are marked and protected bike lanes through it.  We then picked up the Somerville Community Path at the East Somerville T station and followed it (with a short detour for construction) to Davis Square for LUNCH.

 

By then we had shed a few riders who could take more direct routes to their homes, but we were five until Jimmy surprised us by driving to Davis to join us for lunch.  I think that everyone enjoyed the ride, its challenges, and its company.

 

The accompanying photo, taken at the tip of Deer Island, shows a large container ship that was just being met by tugs to bring it into port.

Report by Tom Allen.