That Smell

 Sep 6, 2024

Taking advantage of summer hours at work I headed out on a longer ride today.  Following the Connecticut River I wanted to ride up the New Hampshire side to Fairlee, VT and then back down the Vermont Side.

The ride along the river was absolutely glorious.

I knew there was going to be some dirt along the way. 

I rode through here already and knew this was very tame, compared to some other dirt roads that I rode along the river in which I was cringing while riding.

This is the bridge in Thetford that I found was closed on a previous ride a couple of months ago.

And the dirt continues

but there were cows to be seen

and a covered bridge.

But then disaster struck, another flat!

I found a gash in my tire, probably from when I hit that rock on the Rail Trail the other day.

So I applied the old Dollar Bill trick

and got to try out my new inflator. My first tube didn't inflate, maybe I got a snake bike putting the tire back on the rim but I went through a CO2 cartridge only to find it wasn't holding air. I got the second tire inflated but not to the pressure that I like because I only had 12 gram C02 cartridges. I need to find a bike shop to top off the tube.

I remembered there was a shop in Fairless so I audibled and took the bridge that crosses into Fairlee, VT. I was originally planning on crossing over the Connecticut River to Bradford, VT.

and when I got to the Vermont side the first thing I smelled was marijuana.

I stopped in at Red Clover bikes for a bottle fill and to borrow a floor pump to ensure I had the right pressure in my rear tire.

Nice little rail depot that paralleled Rt 5 but there were no trains running today at this time.

The view looking west was spectacular

and the view of the River from the Vermont side was really nice.

It would have been awesome to have seen a train.