Saturday May 27, 2006 was another nice day for a bike ride.  Again, this was going to be my second solo ride in a row.  The weather was just about perfect, not too hot or cold with clear skies.     

I was planning to ride to Greek Island for breakfast and I tried to talk Diane into riding with me.  I couldn’t convince Diane to ride, but she was interested in joining me for breakfast.  Max’s little league baseball team was scheduled to have batting practice at Hart Middle School, so Diane would just meet me at Greek Island after dropping off Max.  I left home on my bike a little early so as to time my arrival at the Greek Island to match Diane’s arrival time.  I always forget how quickly I can get places on my bike, especially heading south which is overall slightly downhill. 

I got to the corner of Livernois and Walton and from there I called Diane to see where she was.  She was just pulling out of the driveway so I knew I had time to ride further.  I stayed on Livernois and just kept going south to Avon.  When I got to Avon I turned right around and started heading right back where I had just come from.  I rode on the bike path on the west side of Livernois heading back toward Walton.  Since I was riding by myself I felt like I was maintaining a decent pace. 

When I got to Greek Island I still had to wait about ten minutes before Diane pulled up.  That gave me just enough time to stand outside and cool off for a few minutes before going inside to eat.  We each ordered the breakfast special and we enjoyed a good meal.  Diane was planning on killing time and pick up Max on the way home.  Since we weren’t in a hurry we took our time and hung out for a while just talking after we finished eating.  

Once we finally left the restaurant Diane got back in the van and I unlocked my bike and put my helmet on for the ride home.  I decided to try something a little different for the ride home.  I wondered if I could keep pedaling all the way.  I wouldn’t coast at all.  I planned to just keep pedaling no matter what.  It is only about 4.5 miles from the Greek island to home, so I figured this wouldn’t be too hard.  I ended up doing it fairly easily.  When I came to an intersection with cross traffic I just circled around until it was clear and then I kept going.  Now that I think about pedaling all the way, it seems kind of silly, but it helped pass the time and gave me something to focus on while riding home. 

This was definitely a short ride, less than one hour of total ride time, but still enjoyable on a nice day.   

Following are the statistics from this ride, 11.1 miles total, 23.5 max mph, 51 minutes time on bikes and 13.0 average mph.   
David Lindquist