Holy Cross, Recommended Only on Sunday: Ride 5

For some reason, I had this idea that I could get to Holy Cross relatively easily, without too much traffic and without traversing too much urban waste land. Bone head thinking. Once across Main St, I tried to go past Union Station but the intersection was packed and the light was against me, so I went back and picked up Salem St and then Southbridge St and rode across the long crappy flats alongside a giant DPW or RR lot, some kind of fenced-in industrial site, and finally onto Cambridge St. Lots of traffic the entire way. Dangerous, tense, noisy, angry. I didn't stop to make photographs.

Though at one point I did stop, on a side street just off Cambridge St and just before beginning the first ascent of the day. I had that street to myself.

Pitt St, I think

Pitt St in the other direction

Finally I'm able to pick up McKeon Rd and pass under rt 290 and along the base of the backside of Holy Cross Hill. It's a massively steep climb on Loyola Rd, including one sweeping switchback, until you come to the top of the hill and an expanse of college parking. I feel good the whole way, standing up and powering steadily upward, maintaining my cadence the entire climb.

The top of Holy Cross hill

But as terrific as the climb is, getting there sucks, and so does leaving it. I realized that the best, perhaps the only, time to incorporate Holy Cross in a ride is on a Sunday morning when traffic on the major roads you have to take to get there are traffic-free. Otherwise, it's a nightmare.

From there I picked my way through busy intersections and found myself not infrequently having to choose between a bad option and a worse option. Eventually, I wove my way to Clark University, then across Park St to Lovell St and up into the neighborhoods near Worcester State University. Except for not being able to go for long distances before encountering some busy cross street, the riding in the these neighborhoods isn't bad. The streets are largely quiet and mostly of good surface quality.

One of the quiet neighborhood streets

The goal at this point was Newton Hill and the cart track through the woods and the disc golf course. A few spots of ice spilling across the way were all that inhibited an otherwise excellent off road jaunt up and around Newton Hill to the wide open grassy crown. Traversing through a few technical spots my mind strayed to the Rasputitsa and I thought, yes, I need to train on this kind of terrain. I need to climb on earth and deal with roots and rocks and soft places and occasional single track.

Nearing the top of Newton Hill

Atop the second of the three Worcester Hills climbed today
January 22, 2015

I'd wasted a lot of time getting to Holy Cross and the light was beginning to fade but I had one more hill to ascend, Salisbury Park and the climb to Bancroft Tower. I picked my way off Newton Hill (had to carry the bike over a couple icy sections), crossed Highland St onto Haviland St, then climbed steadily up to the rocky monument. I arrived just as the sun was falling below the horizon.

Bancroft Tower atop the third hill of the day

Time to head toward Shad HQ

Instead of heading directly home, I opted to descend around the back of the tower, down Hall St (a short dirt road) and circle back to climb the hill a second time, this time up Farnum St, certainly one of the steepest climbs of all. I should have done it a third time but the light was fading quickly so I went back to headquarters and called it a ride.

Ride Summary: Strava indicates an elevation gain of 1,429 feet over 16.2 miles. I'll take that.