Saturday

After a nice morning with some great coffee, a bike and car wash, and some cocoa coconut chili prep (for the crock pot - thanks for the recipe Heather!), I set out for a little fun with Sante on the trails. The sun was high, the skies were blue, and it was 6C. I had the studded tire set on the bike; with all the melting going on there's a lot of thick ice on the trails.

The trails in the woods are passable and crunchy with lots of traction to be had. There are some glassy spots but they're easy to spot and manage. I tried to do the fun trail along the valley below Silver Springs over to the boulders looking over the river bridges in Bowness. The trail there was decidedly not crunchy. I rode the glassy ice on the decline for a couple minutes but it never improved and I decided my staying-upright luck had held quite a while and I shouldn't push it, so I aborted that plan and headed back east. I tried a favourite climb but again I couldn't get any sustained traction for the climbing. Yep, the only good trails are in the woods where they're not as exposed to the sun melt. So we did some loops on the good stuff and had a fun time.

Nobody was in the park for most of our ride. Ironically, I only saw people, and lots of them, as the big black cloud was rolling over the hills from the west. Blue sky and one giant black cloud! I was wrapping things up anyway and making my way back out of the park but I didn't make it before the wind whipped up and started pelting Sante and I with hard snow. Ha ha! It was actually even more fun with the change of scenery. At one point though I saw a dog (?) through the sheets of blowing snow. No human to be seen so ... I stopped and held Sante's collar. She saw it too and was not at all interested in going to it. I stood there for a minute and started walking the bike towards it assuming if it was a coyote it was going to move on when it spotted us. And then the human came into view through the blizzard. Yep! Doggie. Phew!

We saw Rupert not long after that but his owner was quick to get two hands on his leash and assure me she "had him" this time. Sante didn't believe her I don't think but she eventually snuck by him with a wide berth and hurried to catch up to me on the bike.
So much for that bike wash this morning! Oh well, not much mud so the bike's still pretty clean. Home to Hockey Day in Canada on the TV and some cocoa coconut chili bubbling away in the crock pot. Nice!

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