Compass Ride & DBTD (Day Before Turkey Day) lunch - 11/23/2016

 RIDE REPORT

Wednesday, 23 November 2016, Compass Rides & Day Before Turkey Day (DBTD) lunch

Ride Leaders:  Jack Donohue & Larry Kernan

30 miles from Bikeway Source, Bedford, MA

Riders (25):  Jack, Larry, Andy Brand, Barbara Martin, Barry Nelson, Bill Lane, Bob Apsler, Bob Wadsworth, Bob Wolf, Curt Dudley-Marling, Don Mannes, Doug Hobkirk, Francie Sparks, Fred Newton, Gene Ho, Ken  Hablow (joined en route), Lindy King, Rich Taylor, Richard Vignoni, Roy Westerberg, Rudge McKenney, Susan Sabin, Tim Wilson, Tom Fortmann, and Wing Chow.

Remoted from home & present at lunch (2):  Bob Sawyer and John Allen.

Also present at lunch:  Mike Hanauer.

Like Foghat, I had promised a "slow ride" (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GcCNcgoyG_0), but then  Larry piped up and offered a faster paced alternative.  Of course, I figured my awesome charisma would prevail, but when the dust settled, two-thirds of the Wheelers present had defected.  Fine, makes my leader job a lot easier.  Barry volunteered to sweep, and off we went.  We stayed together for the most part, no arrows needed.  Whenever I saw Barry at the back in black, I would make the turn.  I used stop signs as a strategic regrouping mechanism, by actually stopping.

One surprising thing was that there was a lot more traffic on the back roads than usual (usual being virtually none).  Maybe there was a Black Wednesday which no one told me about, or maybe it was the hordes of working stiffs being released early from their dead-end jobs.

We ran into the fast riders at the Chelmsford Country Club - they had stopped for some reason, so we joined them.  I thought this would be an excellent opportunity for a group photo, but they had clearly already paused too long and resumed their ride before I had my camera at the ready.

We then enjoyed the new pavement on a couple of our compass points, West Street and South Street in Carlisle.  A couple of more smooth Carlisle roads, then back on Rte 225 for the home stretch.  I was somewhat remiss in not keeping track of folks towards the end of the ride - when we reached our cars, about half the cyclists were missing.  Susan called Don and ascertained that the rest had decided to go directly to the restaurant, so a search party was not required.

Thanks to Barry for sweeping.

Report by Jack Donohue.

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Ken Hablow was supposed to lead the brisk paced ride, but he had a flat shortly after leaving Lincoln.  So I offered to lead the brisk group and Jack warned riders that there would be no arrows, no human arrows, and "no mercy" (my words).

Fourteen riders chose to join the group and we had a very enjoyable ride.  The weather was good - very sunny, little wind, and warmer than previous days.  We stopped at Chelmsford Country Club to regroup after one rider dropped his cell phone.  Jack's group nearly caught us at  that point and word has it that Ken almost rejoined the brisk group, but having already taken our obligatory photos, we got back on the road.

In the end, the group kept up a moderate pace of 14.6 mph and finished with a majority of our initial riders.  Then it was time for our Day Before Turkey Day lunch at Holi Restaurant.

In 1621, the residents of Massachusetts Bay Colony sat down with the Indians to celebrate the first Thanksgiving.  This past Wednesday, on the eve of Thanksgiving, 395 years later, the Wednesday Wheelers celebrated with an Indian feast.  [Editorial note:  Different Indians, you idiot!]

Fifteen of us enjoyed a great buffet.  Among the diners were honored guest, Bob Sawyer, who pedaled over from Carlton Willard on his 95th birthday(!), John Allen who cycled from Waltham, and Mike Hanauer who traveled about three miles from Carlisle in his automobile.

Report by Larry Kernan.

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Here is a link to John Allen's video of Bob Sawyer on his electrically assisted tricycle:

          https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hjxlLtjVE5k

Bob Sawyer

Bob Sawyer on his trike

Wheeler pace riders

Brisk pace riders sans Barbara

Brisk riders sans Larry

At Holi Restaurant

The birthday boy at Holi

Water Row - November 16, 2016

RIDE REPORT

Wednesday, 16 November 2016, Water Row
Ride Leaders:  Larry Kernan, Ken Hablow, & Jack Donohue
41 or 31 miles from Bikeway Source, Bedford, MA

Riders - 41 mi (13):  Larry, Ken, Barbara Martin, Barry Nelson, Curt Dudley-Marling, Elizabeth Wicks, Francie Sparks, Gardner Gray, Julie Dodd, Kaz Zelny, Rich Taylor, Tom Fortmann, and Wing Chow.

Riders - 31 mi (10):   Jack, Butch Pemstein, Chuck McWilliams, David Kobes, James Hsia, Kathy Horvath, Ray Komow, Steve Bogue, Tom Allen, and first-timer Tom Ennis.

The WW long group stayed together nicely and only deployed a human arrow once or twice.  The group showed good bike etiquette and singled up whenever "car back" was called.  However, our relatively large size did keep many vehicles from overtaking on the smaller roads.  Despite the weather, the cyclists enjoyed the route and the ride.

Eight riders enjoyed the buffet at Great Wall, especially the "all you can eat" aspect.

Report by Larry Kernan.

Larry enlisted me to help with this ride, which I was happy to do since it was close to home.  This time Larry and I actually did a dry run beforehand, so I would not be completely in terra incognita.

The weather forecast, which was pretty cheery the day before, had taken a turn for the worse.  Looking out my bedroom window and seeing that it was raining was a clue ("you don't need a weatherman to know which way the wind blows" - Bob Dylan).  Sure enough, NOAA was now saying rain in the morning and possible showers later.  But the prediction was for rain before 10:00 am, as if the weather gods had planned the day with the Wheelers in mind.  And so it was - I rode to the ride start pathologically early and got rained upon, but, by the time of the main event, it had stopped raining.

Butch showed up looking a bit tattered.  Seems he had an FDGB on the way over.  He, nonetheless, soldiered on and did the first part of our ride before returning home to lick his wounds.  Butch and I seem to be star-crossed riders - the last time he showed up for a ride of mine, he discovered that he had a flat tire.

It was good to see Kathy back on her bike, after a long sojourn on the wounded list.

Since we were a small group, I figured we could stay together without human arrows. Tom, our sweep, was pretty easy to spot, though yellow was definitely the color of the day (see photo).

We had to halt a couple of times when I got a "mechanical" alert, which turned out to be a dropped chain, quickly fixable.

We were an exemplary group, calling out "car back" and pulling in to let cars pass.  Gold stars all round. There was, however, one faux pas on my part:  when I'm in sight of Rte 2 and the light is red, I engage sprint mode so that I can be in range of the very short light cycle when it turns green.  Unfortunately, this doesn't work so well when you've got a bunch of other riders in tow.  This time, as I approached the intersection, green had just turned to yellow.  So, rather than slamming on the brakes at that point, I rolled on through.  So I got to wait on the far side of Rte 2, instead of at the light.  Bad leader, bad!!

Our planned pit stop at Lincoln Town Hall turned out to be too early in the ride, so we opted for a stop at the Visitor's Center on Monument Street in Concord, where we had our obligatory group photo.  Tom offered to take one that included your fearless leader, rarely seen.

Thanks to Tom for sweeping and being guest paparazzo.

Report by Jack Donohue.

The whole group at start

Short Ride Group sans Tom

Short Ride Group sans Jack

Many Ponds - November 10, 2016

Thursday, 10 November 2016, Many Ponds
Ride Leaders:  Barry Nelson & Bernie Flynn
40 miles from Weston Town Hall, Weston, MA

Riders (17):  Barry, Bernie, Bob Wadsworth, Butch Pemstein, Dmitry Gorenburg, Dom Jorge, Francie Sparks,, Gene Ho, Julie Dodd, Kim Wach, Mike Byrne, Richard Lawrence, Richard Vignoni, Steve Carlson, Susan Sabin, Wing Chow, and first-timer Maher Elmasri.
Present at ride start & lunch (2):  Bill Widnall and Helen Greitzer.
Present at lunch:  Susan Broome.

Barry asked me if I'd rather lead or sweep the ride, so I agreed to lead.  Barry, who was technically the ride leader, acted as sweep.  We moved along at a reasonable clip and, aside from several missed turns (the bright, angled sun made it hard to see my Garmin), we followed the route.  There were a few regroupings and a geezer stop at Haskell Field about halfway.  Some riders dropped off, but the majority made it back to Weston in one piece and in one group.

There was a round table discussion of the election results, often interrupted by arrows.  Special mention goes out to Dimitry for his cogent analysis of Russian /US relations in the Trump era, and to Steve Carlson for his insight and experience with global manufacturing and the unlikely possibility of Trump being able to "bring back the manufacturing jobs."

Report by Bernie Flynn.

Needham, Dover, & Beyond - November 2, 2016

RIDE REPORT

Wednesday, 2 November 2016, Needham, Dover, & Beyond
Ride Leaders: Susan Sabin & Tom Allen
27 or 41 miles from Cutler Park, Needham, MA


Riders - 27 mi (12):  Susan, Ann Northup, Chuck McWilliams, Dale Ferguson, David Kobes, David Wean, Don Mannes, Ilkka Suvanto, James Hsia, Jim Cant, Maurice King, and Stuart Kaufman.
Riders - 41 mi (16):   Tom, Annemarie Altman, Bob Apsler, Ellen Gugel, Everett Briggs, Fred Newton, Gene Ho, Kathy Horvath, Ray Komow, Roy Westerberg, Rudge McKenney, Selig Saltzman, Stan Kay, Tim Wilson, Veronica Vedensky, and Wing Chow.
Present at lunch (9):  Andrea Leopold, Barbara Jacobs, Brett Serkez, Helen Greitzer, Judi Burten, Larry Kornetsky, Margie Lee, Marie Keutmann, and Tony Lee.

This was a glorious day for a bike ride.  After scrambling for parking space (Cutler Park parking was nearly full when I arrived at 9:30 am), we started just a bit late.  We stopped at a porta potty at about mile 6 while we waited for the sweep.  He and two others took a while to appear - it seems they were sweeping some woman who was out riding on her own - talk about full service sweeping!

Lunch outdoors in Dover was a delight, except for the persistent bees (one of which got inserted in Dale’s mouth as he drank his water bottle) - ouch!!  The leader had to wrangle the troops outta there, sadly, before the next wave of riders who then benefited from the empty seats.

As promised, the ride was at WW speed: 13.4 mph according to my gps, and the group stayed pretty much together.  Thanks to Stuart for sweeping.  And, by the way, I cannot take credit for the weather, the roads, or the regular CRW route which I had simply downloaded.

Report by Susan Sabin.

The long ride set out, first crossing over Rte 128 at the site of new on-ramps on Kendrick Street, then on towards Dover via South Street.  We paused briefly at the divergence of the long and short rides, in case anyone wanted to switch (no one did).  Shortly after, one of our riders experienced a pneumatic failure that Everett (our sweep) dealt with.

There were some ups and downs, but nothing this group is not used to.  One hill slowed the leader, such that several riders forged ahead and distributed themselves along the route as forward deployed arrows until I managed to catch up.  It was all done in a very orderly fashion,

At the lunch stop in Dover center we met Brett, Andrea, and Helen, along with several other familiar faces out on different rides.  Susan's group had departed before we arrived.

I received many compliments on "my" route design.  Of course I deflected those to Susan and add my own on a most scenic ride.

Thanks to Everett for serving as sweep and to Ellen for schlepping the uneaten half of my sandwich back to the parking area.

Report by Tom Allen.

The third ride

Leader: Larry Kornetsky (because he had gps), Participants: Tony Lee, Margie

If you’re a mountain biker in the greater Boston area, you’ve probably heard of  Cutler Park in Needham. But many of us have never been there so this was an opportunity to explore. We started out when the road riders were leaving and headed onto a rooty trail behind the parking lot. After turning onto a double track we ascended up and down a few hills on single track, at some points quite close to Rte. 128. Eventually we found solitude in the woods and rode over a wooden causeway (boardwalk), followed the blue heron trail, diverting along the way for “playgrounds” with built up mounds, and past some teenage hideaways, emerging to city streets and an Entering Boston sign. Thanks to the gps we were able to reconnect with the blue heron trail, riding through Millennium Park, behind office buildings and through parking lots to emerge back where we started. Thanks to Larry for his expertise with Ride with gps, we thoroughly explored and enjoyed Cutler Park. It was fun to get together with the long road cyclists for lunch in Dover and to see Brett and Andrea.

Report by Margie Lee

Colorful Country Collage & ME Seacoast - October 26, 2016

RIDE REPORT

Wednesday, 26 October 2016, Colorful Country Collage & ME Seacoast rides & LUNCH
Ride Leaders:  Joanne Samuels & Ken Hablow
26 & 48 miles, 10:30 am starts from Joanne's house, Portsmouth, NH

Riders - 30 mi (12):  Joanne, Bob Anderson, Carol Anderson Dale Ferguson, Don Mannes, Susan Sabin, Tom Lucas, and first-timers Jackie Terkow, Jane Harrington, Kathy Paradis, Lillian Hurn, and Peter Terkow.  

Riders -48 mi (9):   Ken, Bernie Flynn, Bob Wolf, Curt Dudley-Marling, Dom Jorge, Francie Sparks, Gene Ho, Julie Dodd, and Russ Keene.

Present at ride start & lunch:  Helen Greitzer.

Present at lunch:  Karen Saltus.

The Wednesday short ride this week started at Joanne's house in Portsmouth.  We actually combined some of the members of the Tour de Tuesday group, that rides in NH on Tuesday evenings, with the Wednesday Wheelers to create a group of twelve.  After practicing a few times with the leader-arrow-sweep system, we were well on our way and stayed together without incident.  The weather was a bit on the cool side, with some wind.  However, the sun peeked through and warmed us a bit along the way.

We rode through the towns of Newington, Greenland, North Hampton, and Rye to make a lovely, fall thirty mile route.  The trees were just a tad past peak, but, with many of the trees losing their leaves, we were able to view the scenery which included Great Bay and large expanses of farmland.  The climax of the ride was when we came upon the glistening Atlantic Ocean from atop a slight hill.  The isles of Shoals were in perfect view.  Then we headed home through the town of Rye for more color, on streets with few cars.  There were no mechanical or other difficulties.

Once home, we gathered for three different kinds of soup and lovely salad and dessert contributions.  People stayed for a while to chat and reconnect.  It was a fun afternoon.  Thanks to Helen for warming the soup, so it was ready for us we returned, and to all who contributed such delicious food items.

Report by Joanne Samuels.

There was a chill in the air.  After all, this was the coldest day since last April.  With the temperature for the day hovering around 44 degrees and moderate amounts of sunshine, nine of us started out on a rolling 49 mile ride.  Once we crossed the bridge into Kittery we spent the next 20 miles along the coast up to Ogunquit.  We had a slight headwind and lots of sun along the coast to offset the temperature.

It was near low tide. The beaches were devoid of people. The long expanses of wet sand were quite beautiful and a bit eerie.   It was apparent that after tourist season all the public restrooms are shut down.  Leaving York Beach, we rode up to Ogunquit on Shore Road which is twisty and rolling.  We spied a great place by a pond, where we could get off the road and claim it a DPS (Designated Pee Stop) with a view.

The route back from Ogunquit took us inland on some very quiet roads with a few rolling hills, past the Stonewall Kitchen headquarters, and into a bit of Eliot, ME.  With the promise of a great feed of three homemade soups and assorted salads, combined with the fact we never passed a place to eat that was open, we made a short “lunch” stop so people could eat out of their back pockets.  Okay, Stonewall has a great restaurant, but we wanted to get back in time to miss the afternoon commuter traffic.

I have come to realize that we have two seasons in New England.  Southern NE has Winter and Construction.  That accounted for all the newly paved roads this summer.  The northern states have Construction and Summer.  We hit one single lane site in Portsmouth, going out and coming back.  The next one we encountered was the last turn to Nubble light.  Several of us got to this site before the others and there was a cop on a construction detail right at the turn.  I stopped to ask her if she would direct the other riders in our direction - she laughed and was glad to do so.  Going into Ogunquit we came upon a Road Closed sign which we promptly ignored.  It looked like a water pipe installation and the right side of the road was a mess with lots of big equipment.  There was a large Caterpillar front end loader blocking the left side, but the driver nicely backed out of the road and waved us through.  Only in Maine.

With a small group, all compatible, we only used a few human arrows.  Thanks to Gene for sweeping, which was a good thing since with seven riders in red, one in blue, Gene stood out draped in yellow with a yellow helmet.  Along with his flashing headlight he was quite visible in my mirror.  As long as I could see Gene, I knew that he could see the rest of the riders and where we were going.  We did make a few regrouping stops at critical points.

Thanks to Joanne for the great spread she put out for the after-ride party at her house.

Report by Ken Hablow.

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Long ride photos courtesy of Russ Keene.

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Short riders at lunch (photo by Don Mannes)

Round the Res & the View from Fruitlands - October 19, 2016

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RIDE REPORT

Wednesday, 19 October 2016, Round the Res & the View from Fruitlands rides
Ride Leaders:  Ken Hablow & Jack Donohue
10:00 am starts from Trinity Church parking lot, Bolton, MA

Riders - 46 mi (24):  Ken, Barbara Martin, Bob Apsler, Butch Pemstein, Cecilia Scimia, Curt Dudley-Marling, Fred Newton, Gene Ho, Jody Angevin, Julie Dodd, Kaz Zelny, Kimberly Wach, Larry Kernan, Lindy King, Marc Baskin, Mary Kernan, Michael Byrne, Ray Komow, Richard Lawrence, Rick Carlson, Robert Wilson, Russ Keene, Stanley Kay, and Tim Wilson.  

Riders -36 mi (19):  Jack, Adele Ferreira, Annemarie Altman, Ann Northup, Francie Sparks, Ilkka Suvanto, Jack Mroczkowski, James Hsia, Jeff Smith, Jim Whinfield, Patrick Ward, Rich Taylor, Richard Fortier, Roy Westerberg, Rudge McKenney, Selig Saltzman, Stuart Kaufman, Wing Chow, and Winnie Parker.

It doesn’t get any better than a Wednesday in mid-October at the height of fall foliage, with temperatures in the mid to high 70s, and a ride around the Wachusset Reservoir with a lunch stop at Rota Springs Farm at the top of a hill in Sterling.
 
We had twenty-four riders on the 46 mile ride. Several riders could not wait for the leader and went out ahead, right from the start.  For a while I was “leading from the middle” of the group.  This helped spread out the group so we were not all bunched up.  We were close enough so the “arrows” did not have to wait long.  After a tour through some back roads in Northboro, we hit the major climb at about mile 14. Although the next five miles were mostly uphill, there were a few welcome downhills.  The faster group of about six went on ahead.  The rest of us stopped at about mile 19 to regroup.  Since there were no major hills after that and everyone was compatible, we used very few arrows on the return.

We made a stop in West Boylston for water and stopped for lunch in Sterling where we were surrounded by bright foliage.  Several people were wowed with the “meatball special” and others pigged out on Rota’s great ice cream.  The ride back took us through some back roads in Berlin, with the last three miles being mostly “up,” but we were rewarded with a screaming half-mile downhill finish.

We had one mishap when a rider felt his heart rate escalate more than he wanted - he had the good sense to drop out early.  A later inquiry found him to be fine.

Thanks to Kaz for sweeping, even though, when we were all together, he occasionally swept from the front then dropped back to his assigned duties.  Although we did not need arrows during the entire ride, Tim gets the award for doing the most amount of arrowing.  Thanks to Jack for taking attendance on his very special WW Attendance App on his cell phone.

Report by Ken Hablow.

I once again volunteered to co-lead a ride I'd never been on, but, emboldened by my success last week, I figured it would be a piece of cake.  I was disabused of that idea quite early in the game.

Less than two miles into the ride I was confronted by a fork in the road.  Yes, I'm familiar with the famous Yogi Berra quote, "When you come to a fork in the road, take it."  And so I did.  And again, at the next fork.  I was having an uncanny ability to make the wrong choice.  My phone navigation is pretty good at lefts and rights, but it doesn't say much about slight deviations that could potentially be the true path.  I could turn on the screen, which would show me the route outline quickly, but the rest of the actual roads would appear much later or not at all.  So I had to resort to blundering down one or the other road and comparing the little red line, which is where I was, with the little blue line, which is where I wanted to be.  Having unerringly chosen the wrong one each time, I would then have to stop everyone and order an about face.  Needless to say, this did not instill confidence in my followers.

Fortunately, there were a few others in the group with GPS, so we resorted to crowdsourcing the route, which seemed to work pretty well, and we managed the rest of the ride without incident.

It was a great day for riding.  Orange was the color of the day - between the leaves that had finally turned and the ubiquitous pumpkins.  We passed "Peach Orchard Farm" which could really have been called "Pumpkin Orchard Farm," since that was all that was in evidence, as was the case for every other farm we passed.

Finding a place to pee once again became an issue.  I was trying to hold out for indoor plumbing or even an outdoor portapotty, but there were mighty slim pick'ns.  At one point we spotted a church that looked promising - after trying the front doors unsuccessfully, Roy snuck around back and was gone for a while, so I suspect he accomplished his mission.

Wing got KOM points on the ride for blasting by the leader on every hill.

We had our obligatory photo shoot on Prospect Hill Road near Fruitlands.

The Harvard General Store was the designated lunch stop, but it was seven miles from the end and it was unclear to me what the plan was - to eat en route or return by car.  So I gave the troops the opportunity to eat first and return to the cars after lunch, or soldier on.  Being leader, I felt honor bound to lead my merry band back to the start, but I made sure that the diners had at least a vague idea of how to get back.

Francie stepped in as sweep, since Stuart elected to eat at the store.  I figured Francie's white jersey would be easy to spot, and checked for her periodically in my rear view mirror.  It seemed my party had gotten even smaller than I thought when I realized that the white jersey was not unique, there was another white jersey wearer in the group.

I started out with eighteen riders, but ended up with a lot less.  Several people opted for the twenty mile option.  The early eaters accounted for a few more.  The last regrouping was taking a while and the early arrivals were chafing at the bit.  Bolton was beckoning, so they took off.  I am confident that all my people eventually found their way home.

Thanks to Stuart and Francie for sweeping.

Report by Jack Donohue.

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Coordinator's note:  Photos courtesy of Rick Carlson, Russ Keene, and Jack Donohue.  See all of Russ Keene’s photos at  https://goo.gl/photos/sn9TYo3oCHBrznvo6

Short riders obscuring the view

You can see for miles

Not bad scenery in the parking lot

Circling Wachusett Foliage Ride - October 12, 2016

RIDE REPORT

Wednesday, 12 October 2016, Circling Wachusett Foliage Ride

Ride Leader:  Bob Apsler
Core Ride:  39 miles from West Sterling Athletic Field, Sterling,MA

Remote Start:  62 miles from Forbush Mill Road Soccer Field, Bolton, MA.
Optional climbs – see below (65 miles with all options).

Riders - 39 mi (11):  Dom Jorge, Doug Hobkirk, Ellen Gugel, Francie Sparks, Julie Dodd, Kaz Zelny, Pat Schindeler, Richard Lawrence, Rudge McKenney, Tom Lucas, and Winslow Green.
Riders - 62 mi (5):  Bob, Barbara Martin, Curt Dudley-Marling, Everett Briggs, and Gene Ho.

A perfect, glorious day of riding!  Sun + minimal wind + fall leaves near peak color + temperatures starting at 50 degrees for the remote starters and rising into the mid-60s + lovely routes laid out by Richard Vignoni = an ideal WW outing.

Challenging climbs warmed the self-selected riders, but failed to spread out the group more than a modest amount.  Many riders commented on the lovely route and riding conditions.

All but one rider enjoyed the exhilarating descent to the Wachusett ski area for lunch.  Her chain wrap required more than the usual tug and ended her riding.  Rumor had it that her husband planned on joining her for lunch, though he might have switched from motorcycle to auto in order to pick up the bicycle.

We ate the lunches we brought, sitting in the sun at tables behind the ski lodge.  Core riders waited for the climbers’ return, but justifiably grew impatient after a respectable delay and took advantage of the ride leader’s suggestion that they make their own way back to the start.

Thanks to Kaz for sweeping the core ride.

Report by Bob Apsler.

The remote start offered more of the same superb riding conditions and some other possibilities.

CLIMB TO THE VISITORS CENTER & BACK:  +2 miles (n=8) - Bob, Everett Briggs, Francie Sparks, Gene Ho, Julie Dodd, Pat Schindeler, Rick Lawrence, Tom Lucas.  Climbers who took advantage of this option benefited from a brief rest provided by the lunch stop.  Nevertheless, most of us needed our lowest gear for the entire mile at a reputed 9% grade.

CLIMB FROM VISITORS CENTER TO SUMMIT & BACK:  +2 miles (n=4) - Bob, Everett Briggs, Gene Ho, Rick Lawrence.  At lunch, Everett insisted that riding near Mt. Wachusett during the fall spectacle of color necessitates taking in the view from the summit.  Four riders succumbed to his exhortations and made the demanding trek to the summit.  The clear air and beautiful day easily justified the effort.

CLIMB BACK UP TO THE VISITORS CENTER:  +1 mile (n=3) - Bob, Everett Briggs, Gene Ho.  The summit riders had flown back down to the ski lodge to learn if any core riders remained.  Finding none, Everett persuaded two others that climbing back up to the Visitors Center would reward us with a descent superior to that followed by the core riders.  So back up we went.  And, in fact, we enjoyed yet another exhilarating descent at substantially high velocity.

Reports by Bob Apsler.