Tour de Heifer Part II: American Toads, Summer Cyberia, Holy Shit Descents

Beware the gentle amphibian

At several points riding along the Green River we heard a distinct ringing/singing sound, sort of a cross between a cicada, a cricket, and the lightly struck note of a xylophone. If Ben hadn't just encountered this same ringing phenomenon a few days earlier while kayaking down the Deerfield River we might not have know what it was. But because he did, and because he investigated then, he informed me that what we were hearing was a hatching of American toads, an amphibious birthing of considerable volume. And tasty to some apparently as at one point above us flutter'd and croaked a pair of ravens that, I assumed, were making a meal of the newly hatched.

Raven  in the hunt for the hatchlings

There were several sections of today's ride that traversed wood roads and worse; wannabe Cyberias that recalled the infamous stretch of the Rasputitsa dubbed "Cyberia"(which proved to be a cruel section of icy mountain run-off that couldn't be ridden and that went on for close to a mile, mostly UP). Today's offerings, though bereft of ice and snow, offered challenges of their own: rutted woods paths, rocky dray carts, petered out dead end roads beyond the "road closed" indicators. We met them straight on, determinedly, craftily, warily, precariously.

Craftily

Warily

Precariously

Much of the wood road mileage was, of course, up hill. That was great actually because it required that you be fully in the moment and to practice a disciplined attention at all times. Of course with the off road climbing too came some friendly competition between The Virginian and I, friendly being the operative word here. We tested each other and pushed ourselves. The below sequence shows The Virginian moving off the front on one of the big climbs after lunch, either Old County Rd or just after that when the route lead into woods.

"Turn right onto woods road. BE CAREFUL ON THIS SECTION 36.08"

The Virginian on the attack

The Virginian seeming to pull away

Only to be reeled in and passed

There were sections (and I forget where these were, which dray paths they might have been a part of) that we couldn't traverse. Perhaps with mountain bikes we could have conquered the rockiest sections but, for my own part, I wasn't risking injury by taking mad chances on my fitness and latent mountain biking skills to get me through the gnarliest sections. So we hoofed it a couple times for short distances.

Leaving Tucker Rd for the wood road ramble

Daunting

The section Dubstoevsky failed to conquer

The age old truism "what goes up, must come down" aptly suits the ride today because as much climbing as there was, we enjoyed a surfeit of downhills as well, some of which I came to categorize as "HOLY SHIT downhills." Screaming fast, ridiculous long-running descents on dirt roads. The kind of descents that, when you get to the bottom, your forearms and hands are sore from maintaining control and you're exhilarated with the rush of plummeting 40 miles per hour into the unknown. No margin of error. You get to the bottom and shout.

Whoosh canopy as I streak past, descending

End of Part II
Go to Part III
See Part I