This weekend the club did two rides, one on Friday September 3 and a second on Sunday September 5, 2004.  This article is about the Friday ride.  The weather was great on both days.  It has been a fairly cool summer this year and finally this weekend it felt like summer.  The temperature was in the mid 80’s by midday and the humidity was high all weekend.  I am certainly not complaining, the bike club has truly appreciated the cool summer.   

Bob and I rode on Friday.  We started out around 1:15 pm leaving from Bob’s house.  Since it was just the two of us and a bit later in the day we decided to do a relatively easy and short ride.  We headed toward downtown Rochester.  Without any firm plans we just started riding at a nice leisurely pace.  Before we knew it we were near the new Royal Park Hotel.  We had heard the hotel was now open for business, so we went to check it out.   We parked our bikes right out front next to the main entrance.  Even though we didn’t plan on being long I locked our bikes together.  There was a team of valet and doormen waiting to greet us as we approached the door.  They were very friendly and eager to open the door and welcome us to the new Royal Park.  We were both kind of sweaty from riding and I was wearing a sleeveless wicking shirt.  Needless to say we didn’t look like the majority of people milling around, at least we took off our bike helmets and left them hanging on the handlebars of our bikes.  It was very nice inside.  All the fixtures and appointments are high quality and quite attractive.  After looking at the lunch menu Bob suggested we stop in at the bar to check out the diet coke.  We sat at the Bar and relaxed for a few minutes drinking diet coke.  The quality of the diet coke was very good.  Bob treated and I think it cost him $2.75 for each of our glasses of pop.  The lunch menu had a nice selection of sandwiches and salads.  If I remember correctly a burger was $12.00 and some of the other sandwiches were in the $14 and $15 price range.  A little pricey, but not surprising for a fancy hotel.

After our short break at the hotel we got back on our bikes to continue our ride.  We rode around Rochester Park along the river for a few minutes.  We saw a group of young men and woman posing for pictures in the park.  They appeared to be a wedding party.  They looked like they were of Indian decent and they were dressed in what I would guess is traditional clothing for this type occasion. 

For the trip back home we decided to take PCT and head north all the way to Gunn Road and then cut over to Adams and take it south to home.  For a Friday afternoon I thought the trail might be deserted, but even though there weren’t many walkers there were quite a few people riding bikes.  There is a narrow side trail just before Gunn Road that you can take to avoid having to carry your bike up the steps.  We took this short trail and ended up on Gunn Road.  We headed west toward Adams and then took the bike path on the west side of Adams Road south back toward home.

Following are the statistics from this ride.  Total miles 16.8, max speed 21.5 mph, with a total time moving on bikes of 1 hour and 42 minutes.

Thanks for checking in.

David Lindquist