Yorktown Battlefield National Historic Park (9/1/2014)

Labor Day weekend was spent as a Briedé family triathlon.  On Saturday we sailed, on Sunday we split wood, and on Monday we biked 28 miles (45 km) in preparation of a century ride we will be doing at the end of September.  Although it seems that spring is finally over and summer started, the ride was fun.  (If you live in our neck of the woods, you know what I mean: we had a very mild summer, and temperatures are finally going above 90°F.)  I am sure that many climate change deniers have a lot of fun with our mild weather, but it looks like it was a warmer July for many on the globe except in the eastern US, Siberia and northern Italy.  I am not sure what August will look like.  Oh well, it seems that a lot of us try to grab at straws to prove their point and I am probably one of them, but there is nothing as aggravating to me as people just following what the pundits say on radio and television without researching it themselves.

The photo below was taking during our ride from a bridge in the colonial battlefield park.  I took pictures here before of the lizard tail, but this was such an idyllic sight: a heron standing on a fallen tree.  I did not have my SLR with me, so you cannot really zoom in on the heron, but it is still nice.  Moreover, it is tough to carry a heavy camera on the bike, so my phone will have to do.  As I mentioned before biking itself is sometimes taking you life in your own hands.  Roads are narrow and drivers seem aggravated by cyclist and don’t respect them.  On almost every ride we come by areas where bikers were killed or hurt by a vehicle; although in not every circumstance was the driver at fault.  Cyclists need to be careful, as well.  But it always gives me chills driving by a site where a cyclist was killed.

I was struck by a letter to the editor in this morning’s newspaper (not yet published, but it should appear here).  In this letter the author wrote about a cross country running team from a local high school and how they were running along a narrow road without a sidewalk, where drivers can drive 55 miles per hour.  I think that is so common for our area, nowhere for citizens to go from one place to another to go without the mighty car, truck, minivan or motorcycle.  Life would be so much nicer if we could walk, bike, or use public transportation.