In Which I Sum Up Many Rides

A photo of a young ginkgo tree at Mount Mercy BS--before storm. Trees are pretty bare, now.

I’ve been too busy to write on my bike blog lately, so here is a quick update.

We had a rather shocking thunderstorm blow through Wednesday in Iowa. Luckily, it struck Cedar Rapids around 5 p.m., since I had a Vietnam event scheduled for 7 p.m. that night at Mount Mercy. Because of the rain, I got a ride home Wednesday night, leaving my bike in my office. So I missed riding Wednesday night and Thursday morning, but otherwise it was a pretty good week for biking.

The bike club even had an officers’ meeting Tuesday, and the full club meets at the end of this week.

I’ve been using the trail route when I can to get in a few extra miles, and noticed this tree in Noelridge Park, apparently felled by the odd, late seasons thunderstorm that rumbled through. Those were some strong winds!

I think I was on my way home Thursday when I saw this--tree down at Noelridge park. Pretty good size to be blown over like that--you tend to see trees uprooted before you see a trunk snapped like this.

The photo of the ginkgo tree is a new one planted last year at Mount Mercy. It’s a nice looking tree this fall, but I bet most of those leaves blew off mid-week. We’re in the empty tree, brownish part of fall now.

Finally, on my way to MMU late morning today, one brave old grasshopper left crawling slowly on the trail. A few Asian beetles are still around, but even in this odd, warm fall, the frosty mornings are finally catching up to the bugs.

I do miss the green leaves and flowers of spring and fall during my winter biking. But no bugs is a nice bonus!

Slow grasshopper trying to warm up in the weak November sun along the Cedar River Trail at Cedar Lake.