June 26, 2024, PPRRN Meet & Eat on the 22nd. and a very HOT ride (96F) on the 25th.

 I have been trying to get the riders from our Facebook, Pikes Peak Region Recumbent Network group to "gather" for a monthly, "Meet and Eat"! LOL, so far it's not caught on well but I will keep trying! A Meet & Eat is where you pick a "location" to meet and eat and let the "riders" figure out what routes they want to ride to get to the destination as so far, we don't have any weekend volunteer "RIDE LEADERS" step forward. I set up the event on our Facebook Page for Saturday June 22nd. at 11 AM at the Red Leg Brewery Complex. It has several different Food Vendors! It was a beautiful morning for a meet up, Jo and I as host's were there about 10 minutes early. Sadly, it was just US but we had an excellent Turkey sandwich from Oliver's Deli with the usual unsweet iced tea. We then headed out to see if the Sinton Trail South was passable, due to road construction closings. Got lucky and the path was open, from there, we headed down the PP Greenway over to the Weber St. bike lane to get more iced tea in a late afternoon stop at the Good Neighbors Meeting House. 20 mile day, hot and sunny, enjoyed it! 

6/25 It was a really HOT day, 96 F degrees for a high temp so we did a shorter ride along the Rock Island Trail, heading east to it's current ending point just before Powers Blvd. Did a turn around and picked up the Academy Blvd Pathway over to the Mavrick Station for iced tea and a brown bag lunch on their patio! Felt great to get out of the burning sun, filled up our 2–24-ounce water bottles with ice and water and headed back down Rock Island Trail over to the Tastee Freeze Drive Inn for, you guessed it "more unsweet iced tea" and afternoon snack homemade trail mix. Too hot to continue, headed back to the storage unit and then a HOT walk back to the air-conditioned apartment! Sorry no new photos or video as it was just "TOO HOT" to shoot them, BJ

June 19, 2024 From HOT to Chilly, Bi-Polar SPRING here in Southern Colorado!

 The weather has gone from HOT 90 F+ to 60 F chilly and lite rain, arrugh! Not a lot new, mainly getting in errand and FOOD rides with a recreational ride here and there. We did a video on what it takes for us to get those food and supplies.

It also shows the 1.2 mile walk, pulling a cart with batteries, etc. to be able to ride. It is a bit of a disadvantage to not have a garage or a closer storage unit. Still, it's a lot easier to not have to drag two recumbent E-trikes up and down 2 flights of stairs and thru several doors to get them into our 2nd. floor apartment!

On Father's Day, June 16, we headed over to the Cottonwood Trail as there is a good amount of shade on that trail. It was a VERY HOT day. 96 F was the high, of course we stopped at the Academy Blvd. & Cottonwood Creek Trail Starbucks for our brown bag lunch and ICED tea! 

On June 18th, we did another Food and Supplies ride but since it was a cooler day, mid 80 F temps, we added a ride down to America the Beautiful park and up the Weber St. bike lane to the Tasty Freeze Drive Inn to get a cold iced tea to go with our afternoon diabetic trail mix! Just 22 miles of cruis'in the greenways and enjoying the "not so hot" weather! Sorry, no photos of videos as we don't normally do them on a Food & Supplies Ride. 

Today is June 19, it's gray, cloudy and lite rain so no ride, tomorrow on the 20th. we have a service appointment at Angletech New front tires for Jo's trike, rear tire for mine, she is also getting a new rear suspension "elastomer", new-used seat cover and an alignment. Then in July, I get two new front tires/alignment, she get's a new rear tire. When you buy and have 6 tires installed it's a bit expensive!! Well that's it for now, the temps start going up again tomorrow, back into the 90's by the upcoming weekend. Sometimes the HEAT is kinda tough on us Seniors but I will take it any day over COLD! ;)

June 12, 2024-HOT Ride in the City!

 It's been several days of Wind and Afternoon Rains! Today was a day with a very small rain chance but the HEAT is back! 90 F, Sunny, breezy. One of our normal rides with the most shade along the route is the Midland Trail. Headed downtown over the Colorado Ave bike lane to America the Beautiful Park, stopped for a shade break and to fill water bottles! Butter'ed up with sunscreen and headed west towards Manitou Springs. We rode the Midland until it turned into the Creek Walk Trail, headed to the current end of the concrete trail, turned around by the Manitou Springs, Chamber of Commerce over a bridge back to the trail.

Headed East back to Schryver Park for break and then headed back along the Creekwalk Trail back to the Midland Trail. 

Stopped at Field's Park to get a photo of the trikes with the new giant flower statue, that's also a "Contemplating Bench" for kids! 

We followed the trail to 25th. Street and got off on back streets till Walnut St. bike lane due to "intersection reconstruction" at 21st. Street and Hwy. 24. Walnut Street bike lane to the Mesa Springs Greenway, took the pedestrian bridge over I-25 to Monument Valley Park, potty break, then found a bench in the shade and ate our homemade, diabetic trail mix. Picked up the bike lane by Colorado College to the Cascade St. bike lane heading North. Took that all the way to the turn off for our Storage Unit, put the trikes in the unit and then took a HOT walk back to the apartment! 

Note: we noticed that "Sunscreen" doesn't last half as long in 90 F heat, suppose to last, 80 minutes we put on more every 30-40 minutes and that worked well but uses a LOT of sunscreen!! Thursday, we have to go Food and Supplies, shopping, going to get and get going early to avoid the afternoon heat, 95 F is tomorrow's forecasted temps, YIKES, we now know how a piece of "frying bacon" feels like! ;)  

Early June 2024, The heat is on, finally!

 Sunday June 2, Well it's finally deciding to go from Spring to Summer, here in Southern Colorado! Sunny and warm, infact HOT! Time for short's and short sleeves, Sun Screen and lot's of fluids! Our ride was kinda a "couple of bridges to nowhere" affair, heading up the Pikes Peak Greenway, just across from the BMX track there is an old bridge, falling apart and I don't know it's history? 

Heading north we rode up to the Cottonwood Creek Trail to get to the Vincent Frontage Road Trail, Another old bridge to nowhere is the old Denver Highway bridge above the trail.

You will see it in the video above! We didn't turn left to continue on the Cottonwood Creek Trail, headed right and made our way to the Dublin Blvd/Nevada Ave trail heading over to the University Colorado Village Center and Panera Bread for iced tea and our brown bag lunch. 

We then headed down to America the Beautiful Park in downtown Colorado Springs to add to the ride. Great day out and about on the Recumbents!

 

From there we headed over to the Weber St. bike lane, heading north over to Cascade Ave and back to the storage unit, tucked in the trikes and went home.

June 3, We rode on the Templeton Gap Trail up to the Flintridge Road bike lane over to Academy Blvd and McDonalds, one of the few left with "outside" seating for again our iced tea and brown bag lunch. Heading back the way we came we headed over to Nancy Lewis Park off the Templeton Gap Road bike lane. Just stopped for a break, took some photos of the park.

Then we used back streets and the Fontanero St. bike lane to work our way over to Monument Valley Park and ate our snack, filled water bottle and sat in the shade by the YMCA pool by Stanley Lake.

From here, we picked up the Mesa Springs Greenway back over to the Pikes Peak Greenway and Popcycle Bridge, back streets over to Cascade Ave bike lane and back to the storage area, calling it a day! High 80's F and sunny, ah feel's like "SUMMER"! 

June 4, 2024, On yesterday's ride, the "mount" for the "speed sensor" for my e-assist system Broke, had to ride up to Angletech and have Kirk attach a new mount! Lucky for me I "ALWAYS" carry a few cable ties in my rack bag so I got the sensor to go back into place but had to go to the shop to get a new "mount" installed. From there to McDonalds on Garden of the Gods Rd. for a cheap hamburger and small iced tea for lunch, it was already hot so I called it a day and rode back to the storage unit, tucked in my "fixed" trike and walked home. Some rides are just errands or maintenance needed in nature so just 10 miles total but it's alway good to RIDE! :)