Father's Day Ride

I had intended to do a long ride somewhere away from the city but the sandman and some bike maintenance stole most of the morning hours. I spent about an hour adjusting the seat on my Tour Easy recumbent.  On a normal bike adjusting the seat position takes a couple of minutes. On the Tour Easy, it takes a half hour or more. On a normal bike, the saddle adjusts with 2 bolts; on a Tour Easy 8 bolts are involved, including 2 that are low to the ground that require lying down.  Long story short, it's not a lot of fun.

Once the seat, I rode off at what my bicycle computer said was 40 miles per hour. Damn, I'm in shape! Well, maybe not. I replaced the battery in the computer yesterday and it scrubbed the previous settings, one of which is the wheel diameter.  I looked up the setting online and, lo and behold, After 20 minutes I realized that the computer is metric. What is this world coming to! I multiplied the setting my 0.62 and I was good to go.  

I rode the Mount Vernon Trail to Fort Belvoir then along the scenic okay, not really) Fairfax County Parkway.   I made my way back home via the equally scenic Springfield Mall area and made my way all the way to South Arlington before returning home.  Most of the ride was through soulless suburbia. Someday Americans will wake up to the fact that they have turned their lives into driving to one big box store after another where the minimum wage workers could give a rats ass what the customers want to buy. 

I am pretty sure that suburban planning is what college students do when the fail freshman English.

The ride wasn't a total loss. It was the longest ride on my Tour Easy in a year and it was infinitely easier than riding either of my upright bikes.  My foot problems continue (they are much worse when I ride this bike for some inexplicable reason).  And much of the ride was actually in some pretty bike friendly areas like the Mount Vernon Trail, Fort Hunt Park, and Fort Belvoir.  About 5 miles from home I came across this critter along the MVT.  I love turtles. They don't smell. They leave you alone. And, as long as you don't handle them, they won't harm you.

I wished him a happy Father's Day. No. I didn't check to see if it was a male. If it was a she, she didn't appear to be offended.