Tour De Shepard on WNEG #7

After riding with my brother-in-law last weekend Shepard (pictured above in white) reached out to me saying we should get together for a ride and he would really like ride down along the coast. I planned out out a road ride that would follow the Route #7 of the Western New England Greenway (WNEG #7) starting in Bethel, CT. Little did I know, the route on Open Source Maps doesn't correspond to real life.

2023 Roe Jan Roubaix

I usually try to ride Mt Riga once or twice year to prepare for some really dirty, climby event. However, this year everything got screwed up with my back injury and I haven't been riding much gravel. However, my ride gravel ride last month on Father's Day was enough to prove that I am ready for some harder rides, now. 

Father's Day Dirty Thirty

Ridley Crossbow Mullet at the Money Shot

I figured it was about time I take the Crossbow on a real gravel ride, the kind of ride with a lot of climbing and see how it does. I checked with my friends to see if anyone wanted to do a gravel ride and Mike said he would join me.

We got off to a late start because I was taking my son out for breakfast, being Father's Day and all, he got up late, and we drove around looking for somewhere that didn't have a huge line but couldn't find one. We ended up going to Dunkin'.

Overlapping with Pride

If you have ever ridden with me you know I don't like to rider overlaps. I like my routes to be loops and this aversion to overlapping I call Cycling Route OCD or CROC'd. I had been asked to help set up my company's booth for Pride in the Park at Veterans Memorial in Norwalk on Saturday at 11:30 am and I figured I could work in a ride before hand.

The farmer said the road is washed out but you are welcome to try it.

I drove up to Durham, NH early for my son's orientation for University of New Hampshire and went out on the Ridley to ride a few dirt roads near the school. The first one was this Class VI road that checked on the NH Dirt Roads Website/Map as a through road but as you can see on the other side of that pipe it's just a choked trail that's washed out in many places.