An unexpected commute

Today I had an unexpected commute. Mon/Wed/Fri are my swim days. However, after finishing boot camp, I discovered that I had brought everything for a swim except my suit and goggles! Fortunately, I did have my 'cross bike in the back of my car as Fridays I take my seniors out on a bike ride. So I decided to use my swim time to ride into work.

Bike:  Fuji Cross Comp
Attire:  Fox chamois liner, North Face baggie mountain shorts, Specialized Body Geometry mountain shoes, fingerless gloves, short sleeved jersey, arm warmers
Carriers:  Osprey Backpack

Since I had to improvise, I transferred things I didn't need out of my backpack in order to carry my work essentials with me, including my lunch. Now, I'm not one for commuting with a backpack, as it doesn't carry a whole lot, and you sweat a lot more with a bag on your back. But I wanted to ride, so I did what I could to make it work.

It was a gorgeous morning; deceptively so. I had 3 pairs of gloves to choose from in my car, and picked the wrong ones - at 7:30am, it was still rather chilly out, and my hands were frozen in fingerless gloves (lesson learned!). I'm also one to take it slow going into work to sweat as little as possible - however, the windiness of the Platte coupled with where I parked made the ride a little longer than I expected given my driving route. It added about 3 miles to usual commute on the road. Since I had a client at 8:30am, I had to pick up the pace a bit. Still, I can't complain when my views are of the river, and my 'traffic' is people on the side of the trail photographing to local wildlife!

It's just under 9.5 miles to work from where I started - not a bad ride in, around 45 mins. A little slower than I'm used to riding, given the bike I was on and having to carry a pack. It was a good baseline ride that I can use when planning commutes for the future. The ride home was uneventful, though a little windy at 5pm at night. Nothing that would stop me from riding home. The clouds that had formed reminded me that we're getting into that time of year of afternoon thunderstorms, which means I need to dig out the rain jacket and keep it handy. I've been caught in bad weather before and improvised with a garbage bag when I needed to!

The best part of the day was my late morning ride with my seniors. A nice and easy 7 miler along the Highline with residents of the campus I work at. We had heard there are baby owls at the Flyin' B Park, so we looked for them but didn't locate them. Temps has warmed up since I had ridden in, and it was a pleasant ride. And when I say seniors, well, the oldest person is 90 years old!!! How awesome! The day before we spent a half an hour together as he told me stories of how he rode around New England as a late teen/young man during the summers staying at youth hostels. He would ride 100 miles a day, and would cover 3,000 miles a month!! He did it with only a small knapsack. I love that he's still riding at 90 years old. Goes to show you, you're NEVER "too old".