2024 - Our Rides in Words, Photos, Maps and Videos

[dodgeman]

Rab, hope you didn’t hurt yourself on that cracking descent. On our trip to Ireland our tour director explained how the tern “crack” is used. More of a good time with good conversation at the pup for example. We told her in the USA crack is illegal and you smoke it.

 

[BlackHand]

You can't be human, you must be some kind of alien life form

Yup, he's a Scotsman!

 

[Jeremy McCreary]

Yup, he's a Scotsman!

I hear they have a lot of dilithium in Scotland. Maybe @RabH sprinkles it in his smoothies.
;^}

 

[Stefan Mikes]

"To Look Like Stefan After Him Having Emerged From Rawka Singletrack"
Corpus Christi 2024 Ride

It is such a fun and pleasure to ride together with Staszek C.! He "Rides. Navigates. Communicates". His group rides are meticulously planned in advance, including the detailed weather situation. He actually monitors the weather as he rides (on a weather radar app), which helps avoiding to ride into the rain or a thunderstorm! His ride plan even takes the railway connections in the account! And he is such a great ride leader and companion! (Fancy him as the pilot both flying and monitoring, with the full assistance of the ATC and the airline - all in one person!)

I asked Staszek how come we are riding at a brisk but not racing speed. He said: 'I have had my long time share of ultramarathons and races. Now I know I want to expedite my body energy in a controlled manner. For instance, I monitor my heart-rate, which allows me riding long distances without getting tired'. He is an ideal riding buddy for me as he rides at the speed of my e-bikes at a reasonably low assistance. Other riders are either too slow or to too fast for me!

I've recently understood the difference between the English words "forest" and "woods". Rest assured both Bolimów Landscape Park (BPK) and Kampinos National Park (KPN) are both "forests" The main difference is the BPK is packed with premium gravel roads while the KPN is the MTB domain. This time, Staszek said: "Would we try a rare singletrack of the BPK?" I admit I was as stupid as to agree to that...

On the perfect gravel fire-roads of the BPK. This time, Staszek set a deadline: the return train from Łowicz at 13:46. The number of stops was minimal, mostly letting Staszek eat yet another sandwich to restore his body energy I had a little advantage over him: My Vado SL has a sort of front/rear suspension, which turned out to be important much later. Assistance modes I used: ECO SL 60/60 (primary), SPORT SL 70/70, TURBO SL 100/100.

'How beautiful!' exclaimed Staszek when we entered the singletrack along River Rawka. I had my own doubts, to become confirmed very soon!

It actually was a full blown MTB technical singletrack! Leading directly along the river gorge, on wet tree roots, constantly extremely up and down and up... I admit I walked my Vado SL for the most of that trail!

Although I had to smile once there

As I emerged from that dreadful singletrack, I must have looked like a walking dead I must have been dark red in my face, I was dripping with sweat, and my eyes were certainly full of horror I said to Staszek: 'I have agreed to go through this ordeal once; if the Mazovian Gravel race would be held in a similar terrain, I'm out! I signed in for gravel, not MTB!'

After we took a short rest for another sandwich, intense pedalling restarted. As we were only pedalling gravel or asphalt or a bike path now, I calmly resigned from having stops and had the fun of cycling with my buddy. As we reached Łowicz well before the train departure, I took Staszek for the best ice-cream in Łowicz!

Łowicz is known for its Corpus Christi procession (30th May this year). Most of young girls and women wear traditional folk dress there (not pictured, sorry!)

The entire centre of Łowicz is paved with cobblestone... And it was my sweet revenge for the singletrack! As I noticed Staszek slacking behind me, I merrily asked 'What's wrong with you mate? Aren't you a gravel cyclist? Why are you slacking?' to which he replied 'My bike has no suspension!' to which I merrily answered 'If I can have it, you can have it too!' We returned by train, and when we were saying our good-byes before I left the train, Staszek gave me a thunderstorm heads-up! I pedalled the last 6 km in the Turbo mode to escape the danger!

83 km total for the day.

 

[Watana Bob]

"To Look Like Stefan After Him Having Emerged From Rawka Singletrack"
Corpus Christi 2024 Ride

It is such a fun and pleasure to ride together with Staszek C.! He "Rides. Navigates. Communicates". His group rides are meticulously planned in advance, including the detailed weather situation. He actually monitors the weather as he rides (on a weather radar app), which helps avoiding to ride into the rain or a thunderstorm! His ride plan even takes the railway connections in the account! And he is such a great ride leader and companion! (Fancy him as the pilot both flying and monitoring, with the full assistance of the ATC and the airline - all in one person!)

I asked Staszek how come we are riding at a brisk but not racing speed. He said: 'I have had my long time share of ultramarathons and races. Now I know I want to expedite my body energy in a controlled manner. For instance, I monitor my heart-rate, which allows me riding long distances without getting tired'. He is an ideal riding buddy for me as he rides at the speed of my e-bikes at a reasonably low assistance. Other riders are either too slow or to too fast for me!

I've recently understood the difference between the English words "forest" and "woods". Rest assured both Bolimów Landscape Park (BPK) and Kampinos National Park (KPN) are both "forests" The main difference is the BPK is packed with premium gravel roads while the KPN is the MTB domain. This time, Staszek said: "Would we try a rare singletrack of the BPK?" I admit I was as stupid as to agree to that...

View attachment 176825
On the perfect gravel fire-roads of the BPK. This time, Staszek set a deadline: the return train from Łowicz at 13:46. The number of stops was minimal, mostly letting Staszek eat yet another sandwich to restore his body energy I had a little advantage over him: My Vado SL has a sort of front/rear suspension, which turned out to be important much later. Assistance modes I used: ECO SL 60/60 (primary), SPORT SL 70/70, TURBO SL 100/100.

View attachment 176826
'How beautiful!' exclaimed Staszek when we entered the singletrack along River Rawka. I had my own doubts, to become confirmed very soon!

View attachment 176827
It actually was a full blown MTB technical singletrack! Leading directly along the river gorge, on wet tree roots, constantly extremely up and down and up... I admit I walked my Vado SL for the most of that trail!

View attachment 176828
Although I had to smile once there

As I emerged from that dreadful singletrack, I must have looked like a walking dead I must have been dark red in my face, I was dripping with sweat, and my eyes were certainly full of horror I said to Staszek: 'I have agreed to go through this ordeal once; if the Mazovian Gravel race would be held in a similar terrain, I'm out! I signed in for gravel, not MTB!'

After we took a short rest for another sandwich, intense pedalling restarted. As we were only pedalling gravel or asphalt or a bike path now, I calmly resigned from having stops and had the fun of cycling with my buddy. As we reached Łowicz well before the train departure, I took Staszek for the best ice-cream in Łowicz!

View attachment 176829
Łowicz is known for its Corpus Christi procession (30th May this year). Most of young girls and women wear traditional folk dress there (not pictured, sorry!)

The entire centre of Łowicz is paved with cobblestone... And it was my sweet revenge for the singletrack! As I noticed Staszek slacking behind me, I merrily asked 'What's wrong with you mate? Aren't you a gravel cyclist? Why are you slacking?' to which he replied 'My bike has no suspension!' to which I merrily answered 'If I can have it, you can have it too!' We returned by train, and when we were saying our good-byes before I left the train, Staszek gave me a thunderstorm heads-up! I pedalled the last 6 km in the Turbo mode to escape the danger!

View attachment 176831
83 km total for the day.

Looks like time to add a turbo levo to the stable Stefan. Good job surviving that ride, I’d be laying in the brush with broken bones waiting for a helicopter rescue.

 

[Stefan Mikes]

Looks like time to add a turbo levo to the stable Stefan.

Did you know why I just gave this wonderful e-MTB to my brother after a year of use, Bob?

It was because I discovered I was unable to ride technical singletracks and such an excellent Trail e-bike would be a waste on me!

I’d be laying in the brush with broken bones waiting for a helicopter rescue.

That is exactly my point. I miss technical skills required to ride such trails and do not want to get killed or injured. Such trails are ridden either by skilled MTB-ers or by younger people who think they are immortal, making them brave and lucky. For me, "gravel cycling" means long fast rides on gravel, stretches of asphalt, and in mild off-road. Unfortunately, our province Mazovia has few gravel roads, forcing the gravel race organizers to route the races or group rides through woods, deep sand or technical singletracks

 

[Rás Cnoic]

Rab, hope you didn’t hurt yourself on that cracking descent. On our trip to Ireland our tour director explained how the tern “crack” is used. More of a good time with good conversation at the pup for example. We told her in the USA crack is illegal and you smoke it.

It’s spelt craic. From the Irish, meaning good fun or enjoyable. In Donegal it’s always “wild craic”. And yeah we know about crack!

 

[RabH]

Gorgeous ride! SoCal is semi-arid at best. San Diego County gets pretty green in the inland mountains above about 4,000 ft elevation, but it's a darker conifer kind of green on the forested slopes — never the lush bright green as far as the eye can see like you have.

When you get as much rain as us you can expect green pastures...

Holy cow, what a ride, beautiful scenery. Rab you must have some of those Clydesdale legs hooked to your carcass to do these kind of rides. If I do 30 miles with 1000 feet of climbing I think I'm Lance Armstrong jr. You can't be human, you must be some kind of alien life form

I am blessed with some of the best cycling roads in the world and I love cycling so long rides have been my thing for many years, I just can't get enough when the weather allows me!

 

[dodgeman]

It’s spelt craic. From the Irish, meaning good fun or enjoyable. In Donegal it’s always “wild craic”. And yeah we know about crack!

Thank you, now I can say I learned something today.

 

[Chargeride]

Im amazed how few ebikes there are here, in fact there are practically no bikes at all, it seems a scooter is the first form of transport for kids.
This is the first hub drive Ive seen on the whole Island.

These Islands are practically mini Disneylands, so completely morphed by tourism they have almost entirely lost their original culture.
Every beach is bar ...sunbeds , boat hire, paddleboard.
Every garage has 50 quads and mopeds for hire parked all over the forecourt.
Every boat in the harbour is for hire and you are agressively targetted by a sea of touts all day and night.
The front is bar..rental..bar..rental.
The gorgeous backstreets are staged photo -ops so they can nab you to buy something, tiny fisherman houses turned into fronts for expensive brands.

Its totally not my kind of place, in fact I hate the heat, the pool outside our apartment is just every sunbed adorned with a semi burnt, ultra wrinkly brit who lay there from dusk till dawn.

Anyway ebike hired for Sunday.

 

[Stefan Mikes]

Second Time Around!
(A The Damned Song Ride)

With raining and thunderstorms forecast for the weekend (incorrect at the moment!), I wanted yet another Bolimów Landscape Park (BPK) ride on Friday. My own terms: No singletracks, a powerful e-bike, and only short (but many) stops for taking photos. At 11:42 a.m. (late!) I started my Vado 6.0 ride from the Jesionka train stop.

I wanted to start my ride possibly close to the Fireroad #33, which is dubbed "Gravel Bike Freeway". It is a 11 km long, almost straight stretch of hard rolled gravel where you can safely ride at a high speed!

At the Twin Swamp. When the water is high, the two swamps try to break across the 33. To prevent that, the forest service are continually reinforcing the spot with a lot of pebble.

I just wanted to take a photo of the tourist shelter (and the wild-animal-proof dustbins) at the Bolimów Sawmill. As two cyclists were inside the shelter, I asked those people for a permission to take a photo. The man said: 'Sure, I don't mind. Especially as we know each other and even were on a group ride together here!' Ha! That was one of my cycling mates Wojtek with a friend! Instead of a short stop, we spent some 10 minutes chatting!

On the Gravel Bike Freeway #34. As I was approaching a big crossroads, I spotted a strange man standing by his bicycle. Not young but not old, with a bare torso and a big stomach, wearing long hair and eyeglasses. I fancied it was a Forest Devil, so I accelerated and rode forward! Soon, I reached a landmark I call "The Bend" but from the wrong direction! Now, I got confused! My route plan turned out corrupted! When I was standing totally confused and trying to rectify the ride plan, the disguised Devil approached me and started confusing me even more, trying to offer wrong directions! I thanked the man, escaped back to the crossroads and eventually was on my proper course again. That was a long loop!

I approached another big recreation area. Didn't intend to stop as there were some people there again. But I took a closer look at their bikes... Impossible! It was Wojtek and Ada again! While they had taken the shortest path to that place, I was riding the long loop around! Haha! (Another 10 minutes wasted on chatting!)

This is The Bend, this time approached from the correct side. (It is a lovely photographic spot to document big gravel cycling groups riding!)

I took a somewhat longer rest for eating, hydrating, and nicotinizing myself by the Bolimów Lake.

I was hoping Ada and Wojtek would catch up with me but they were riding the Rawka Singletrack instead. So I restarted my ride.

As I was approaching the Rawka Gangway, some creepers with sharp thorns tried to stop my Roadrunner by the handlebars and throw me off the bike! I maintained the balance though. (The day before, the same plants actually hurt Staszek so he had blood on his forearms!)

The Road Race
Now I was riding paved surfaces for some 6 km, against headwind and with slight elevation gain. As I spotted a 18-20 yo road cyclist and determined he was not a very strong rider, I overtook him, and he started pursuing me! It turned into a full blown race! As I stopped at my logical finish line, I started counting seconds. The boy caught up with me 13 seconds behind. I gave him thumbs up, and he revenged with the same!

Yet another beautiful gravel road, the Łowicz Road. As I stood there, a gravel cyclist overtook me. 'Ahaa'... I jumped on my e-bike and pedalled hard. After several km I caught up with the man, greeted him, we started chatting, and I was keeping a decent constant speed of 30 km/h (in ECO mode!) When he told me he was on a ride from Falenica, I almost lost my breath! He said: 'Yes, 102 km already ridden today!' I asked him for his plans; well, he wanted to reach Łowicz before 13:40 to catch a direct train home. (My plan was to catch the next train at 17:02). The fast ride saved me a lot of time!

I stopped at my last waypoint, the Bednary Inn. Ordered the smallest meal from the menu (it was trout) and a small glass of craft beer from the local brewery, and started nervously looking at my watch. When I got my meal, I paid the bill immediately, and started eating as fast as I could! I finished the lunch in 7 minutes, downed the ale, and sprinted towards the train station...

I will never undestand it. How come a small village has a full blown and not a small train station? And yes, I got on the 15:47 train! A very short and effective riding day!

Ride Map with POI. 67 km for the day!

 

[Chargeride]

Foods back

 

[Jeremy McCreary]

Foods back

Please elaborate.

 

[Stefan Mikes]

Please elaborate.

Jeremy, CR is always getting hungry after seeing my food photos As he is never pedalling his e-bikes, he's afraid to become obese

 

[dodgeman]

I rode 21 miles today at what for me is a high speed of 15 mph. Light winds and the threat of rain had me pedaling a little harder. A typical roadway picture and a Dollar General Store I ride by often. For those of you that have never been in a Dollar General picture a store crappier than Walmart. It’s like all the stuff Walmart can’t sell gets stuffed in one of these. They do serve a purpose as this one is in a town that doesn’t really have any type of grocery store.

 

[Prairie Dog]

With the wind gusting at times over 50 kph yesterday, better judgement prevailed and I hit the trails instead though the winds didn’t prevent my better half from heading out for a 55K road ride. It’s always nice to have options.

It never fails….

My favorite perch and riverside hangout.

My second favorite perch.

Not quite the ‘On Golden Pond’ moment that I was hoping for ie, no loons, but earlier on I did spot a heron that was being chased by a pair of blackbirds.

Distant view of city’s north end from a high point along the Riverbend trail.

From today’s 55k road ride. We head south along RR 273 passing a bike monument dedicated to an avid cyclist and mother of two who was tragically killed almost two years ago in a hit and run at this very spot. The police have yet to find the person responsible. The shoulders along this stretch of hwy are rather narrow but we’ve found that the majority of motorists give us plenty of room and some even slow down as they approach.

Speaking of misfortunes, a sad moment as Sai hit a northern Flicker that flew out of nowhere. She had no time to react as the bird flew right underneath her front wheel. She gently picked up the large woodpecker it’s body still warm and placed it further off the shoulder.

Despite a stiff NW wind, it was a glorious day to be out riding. Second time is a charm for Sai as she rode the same route yesterday.

Max vehicle speed limit on 273 is 90 kph but there will always be some exceptions to the rule.

Spring planting appears to be off to a good start in which case a bumper crop might cause these silos to ex-seed their limits.

 

[Stefan Mikes]

Max vehicle speed limit on 273 is 90 kph but there will always be some exceptions to the rule.

Can the tractors in your area move pretty fast? I am impressed with the speed of modern huge tractors as these are decently fast on paved roads! On the other hand, I made an E-Bike KOM in a rural neighbourhood here as I had to overtake a small tractor and then a cyclist in a series on some ride

It’s spelt craic. From the Irish, meaning good fun or enjoyable. In Donegal it’s always “wild craic”. And yeah we know about crack!

Ireland is an interesting country where "whisky" simply means "water"

No need to explain the difference between the regular water and "water of life" though It is so similar to Italy where ordering "latte" gets you a glass of milk!

 

[Prairie Dog]

Can the tractors in your area move pretty fast? I am impressed with the speed of modern huge tractors as these are decently fast on paved roads! On the other hand, I made an E-Bike KOM in a rural neighbourhood here as I had to overtake a small tractor and then a cyclist in a series on some ride

Oh Deere, I would like to think so. A bit of sarcasm on my part Stefan. The ones pulling loads tend to lead a train of anxious motorists behind them particularly on busy two lane roads. Tractors here are considered SMV (slow moving vehicles) and are often limited to 40 kph and most will have signage indicating this.

 

[Stefan Mikes]

Greetings from Skierniewice-Rawka to all of you! As I covered 20 km from Bednary in one hour and started enjoying ice-cream, it started raining I'm sitting under a big umbrella next to the ice-cream shop and am waiting for the rain to stop!


A news to one @Gionnirocket: the man who you jeered at for riding in 44-44T gearing in a race - has just become the Champion of Poland in Gravel Ultra Racing! A good friend of mine, by the way

 

[Chargeride]

UK tractors are lkmited by suspension...without it 20mph, or up to 40 I think with full suspension.