This blog is about riding in ALL four seasons. It may be no surprise to many of you winter ranks really high for me. But, fantastic rides can happen in any season. Mid-June can be a really good time as well. I most likely love winter so much because my body is more suited to winter climates. I don’t do well in hot, humid weather. One reason we live in Northeastern Minnesota near Lake Superior is because the summers are very mild. We don’t get the high humidity and high heat index numbers for more than a dozen days each summer. Some years we get none at all.
Right now we’re approaching summer. We’ve had lots of rain. The leaves have been fully out only for about three weeks. And everything is green, green, green, and growing like mad.
It was a wonderful weekend day to get on a longish ride in the country. I did a mix of low traffic roads with wide shoulders and rail trails.
I took my Ellis Cycle. It was designed for light touring and long rides in the country. Really. That’s exactly what I asked Dave Wages to create for me when building this bike. Since there is always a chance of having to take a stretch of gravel to get from A to B in these parts I also requested clearance for 32mm tires with fenders. This was back in 2008 when running a road bike with a tire wider than 28mm wasn’t a thing yet. Or I should say it was just starting to come back. Regardless, it’s a great bike for this type of riding.
I always take a break on this old railroad trestle over a dramatic gorge on the St Louis River. I watched some young people testing their level of invincibility by doing some cliff jumping.
It was a long relaxing ride with one big climb at mile 15. Here’s the route with elevation profile://ridewithgps.com/trips/9416576/embed
four season cycling 