Cold Toes!!

This past weekend turned out to be a good weekend for riding and considering the fact that today is my last day of vacation I was more than happy to be able to get out and ride. Saturday was a good day for time and miles. I logged three hours and fifteen minutes of ride time for just over 30 miles. Temps were in the teens and windchills were in the single digits. This made for very comfortable riding.

I rode primarily the city trail systems and avoided the streets and roads as much as possible. I want the riding to be harder and staying on the trails provides me with that. Although they are snow and ice covered a good set of studded tires provides plenty of traction. Also, I ride the roads all summer and deal with the traffic so I would prefer to avoid that headache in the winter. Plus, there is just something a little more satisfying about pushing a single speed mountain bike over snow and ice covered trails than riding on salt and slop covered streets and roads.

Today's conditions proved to be much different and more challenging. We received several inches of fresh snow which meant slower riding this morning. Also, the air temp when I left the house was -4 F with the windchill hovering around -24 F. The brilliant sunshine provided a false sense of warmth. Within 30 minutes my water bottle had turned into an undrinkable orange ginseng slushy. Maybe a little booze in there would prevent that from happening next time. Hmmm...an orange ginseng martini maybe??

After about an hour or so my toes were pretty cold and painful. I used my last toe warmers on Saturday's ride so I should have had warmer boots on. After an hour and half of riding my toes were now frighteningly painful and I was actually worried about the possibility of some low grade frostbite. The toes turned out fine, but they remained rather painful for awhile after getting into the house. I'll be visiting REI for more toe warmers and ordering some NEOS overshoes before my next trip up north. I have to be able to keep everything warm if I plan on doing any extended rides.

I'm really looking forward to the rest of winter and more riding. Hopefully I'll be able to get in a couple of trips up the North Shore of Lake Superior where I am planning on doing some longer rides on the Sawbill Trail out of Tofte.

Tomorrow...it's back to reality...school begins once again. I'm looking forward to seeing my students, but it will be a tough transition back. I've enjoyed my time off immensely, but it just never seems long enough. I shouldn't complain, but.....