A good ride today

Yesterday we had rain and rain showers, and I had lots of work to do to support my ride and coordinate with the Idaho Habitat affiliates, so I chose to take a day off from riding. I think I had ridden for the past four days, and a day off felt good.

Today my goal was to do 23 miles, and include some hill work. I drove out onto the Skagit flats, parked at the McLean Road Fire Station, and rode my planned route. That included through LaConner, counterclockwise through the Swinomish Reservation back to LaConner, and back to the car. I did the full route OK, and feel pretty good for doing 23 miles. On the other hand, the two long and steeper hills ate my lunch--I wound up walking both of them. While I suppose I could have geared down and kept riding, there was too much traffic at 50 MPH for me to be wobbling around at low speed. I'm not proud and will walk when I need to. I did manage to do all the other hills, and I'm pleased with that. This route has several short spurts of hills to climb--none too long nor too steep, but just enough to provide some challenge. I need to face the fact that I'm not a good hill person. I can live with that.

I have a minor problem with my rear wheel, and suspect I did not completely get the wheel back on in the correct position when I previously fixed my flat. I have slippage when I'm in 5th, 6th, and sometimes 7th gear, and when I was coming down a hill, I noticed some noise in the rear disc brake. That makes me think the wheel is not correctly aligned. I'll check it out tomorrow, and I'll have a pro look at it next week when I take it back to the dealer for a final checkup before I depart for ID.