Shake-down Ride #4

Photos
Cool woods on a warm summer day.

Getting ready to go
OK. Everything I need for our nine-day ride is in two panniers. Because I have cut down on the numbers of certain items, I will have to rinse some things out at night. Which begs the question: how will everything dry? I have my clothesline but may have to leave the clothespins at home. If things don’t dry overnight, what will I do with damp clothing while I ride? If I could put tall thin poles on the front and back of my bike and string my line between them, I could be a mobile clothesline. Thank goodness that scenario won't happen.

I do have a mesh laundry bag that I can lay across my panniers and secure them with bungee cords. That way my damp laundry will be exposed to the (hoped for) sun and air (and everyone in the whole wide world!). Hmmm. Not sure what to do. I’ll figure it out.

Now for actually riding
So, how did the ride go with full panniers? Not bad. After I loaded them with the actual items on my packing list then weighed them, each one weighed 7 lbs, as did the rear rack pack. So I was carrying 21 lbs total.

I rode from Windsor Locks to Windsor center along Route 159 and went back a more circuitous route for a total of 14.52 miles. Time spent pedaling: 1 hr 28 min. Average speed: 9.95. Those figures are almost identical to yesterday’s ride with no load, and today’s route was more difficult because it had hills.

So, all in all, other than having very sore shoulders (after two days in a row of riding) I think today went well. However, I’m going to try and get rid of 4 to 6 lbs of non-clothing weight.