White Clay again

Last night I chose an office bldg parking lot, adjacent was a medical office. The medical was opened today but the office was quiet. What luck.

Set up GPS last night. This AM I searched for grocery stores and it guided me to one just across the street. Hot damn. Figured out intersection of mansion TH and it navigated me right to it. Sold on it. Letting go of challenging thinking & reasoning is hard to give up to a device that does all the thinking. Will learn how to make it pick my roads.

Beautiful day and very warm. Ben & Greg from Hershey, PA drove into parking lot & we struck up a conversation, and true to form, I globbed onto their ride. They had the same better trail map that the Susans had making decision making more informed. Shorts but knee warmers for good measure.

Wandered around, great riding, trails are mostly smooth but twisty & lots of little ups & downs. trail construction created loose dirt so it was piled on trail to make small humps that I could launch off for some air. Regrowth forest of lots of beech. No pictures when ride with others and the trails look like other broadleaf forests.

Plan after ride was to score a shower and fill the propane. No GPS work here, just blind groping. Hit gas station to ask for phone book. Attendant told me of propane down the street. I wrote info on 2 XGs & headed down street. Passed fitness & racket club. Bought shower for $10. I am now enjoyably clean.

Roads here don’t permit left turns so the driver finds an intersection and U turn around. What a chore to drive into gas station w/ propane. 4.5 gallons in a week. Used heater all night several times. Cold weather refill every maybe 10 days.

Temp hit 71. Somewhat sweaty after shower.

Drove to Fair Hill Natural Area, Maryland where tomorrow’s ride will be. No camping. Drove a bit further down highway to newly opened bank building right alongside highway. parked under parking lot lights, just out in the open. May I have a peaceful night.

14.36 miles & 1400′. Liked the ride so much I did it a second time and still did not ride all trails. More people both riders & hikers today. Rode a section to trail that had the dirt mounds as a downhill. We passed a lesser skilled group of riders before the whoops. I know I had some launching and recovery fun. We stopped alongside trail after the whoops and listened to the hooting of those riders. You think they were celebrating 8 seconds on a bronco.

Oh, Postville, IA is in the news again, this time the son of the founder is in jail for harboring illegal aliens for financial gain. Something about it all. The author wrote about his knowledge of operation & published back in like ’06. Took till summer of ’08 for feds to move in.