Bikes!

Paul the Painter and I took a little trip to the White Mountains today. Conditions were beautiful, probably hovering between 0°F and -15°F depending on our elevation. The wind was mild in most areas and non-existent in some. Just before we made it past Lee’s cabin we passed a bizarre gaggle of winter locomotion. There were snowmachines, snowmachines towing kids on skis, a skier, a skijorer, and I believe a couple dogs hooked to a sled. As we passed, the skier looked at us in amazement and declared, “Bikes!” It was some hundred yards later that Paul and I realized that the guy was probably disappointed with himself for not bringing someone on a bike. We were the one form of transportation he lacked. Admittedly he would have need two cyclists, one with dogs to really round out the menagerie.


As we passed Lee’s cabin, we had fresh tracks. We stopped to eat something and were nearly run over by two dog teams. While normally quite stealthy, the lead team in this case had an extremely mouthy wheel dog who was kind enough to let us know he was coming through. We dragged ourselves out of the way and received a thanks from the musher, compliments on our quick reflexes and a heads up that there was one more team coming. After all that fun we finished railing the big hill past Lee’s and turned around at the bottom to start back. The one thing about an out and back is that you dread every big hill that you slayed on the way out. Thankfully there will be very little of that come race day.