Sycamore Trail

today brought to an end another week of toiling away in the mines.....being on the night shift i've developed two rituals of note:

1) the beer bath---this is a steaming hot bath (of the bubbly variety) accompanied by a six pack of my favorite overpriced, thick as mud microbrew

2) the friday morning exhaustion ride---working nights means monday starts on sunday night, thus friday ends on friday morning. so being the idiot that i am i have a developed a "unique system", whereby, i get off work in the morning, go home and get some much needed family time, see wifey and son of to work/school and after being awake for 20hrs, go for a ride.......

which brings me to the title line of todays entry.

after a quick visit with my friends  at ironheart tattoo i zipped east on urbandale ave, picking up the trestle to trestle trail for a mile or so, then crossed douglas ave at MLK and dropped onto the sycamore trail. once on sycamore there is a paved trail that parallels the des moines river that stretches from MLK to morningstar dr.....there is also a double track trail the runs between the paved trail and the river.feeling a little adventurous i opted for the double track. i cruised along the slightly damp dirt path for a bit, noting that with each pedal stroke more and more of the world famous iowa clay was collecting at the pitch points on the crosscheck. after a half mile or so i happened along what appeared to be minor stream crossing. it was NOT a minor stream crossing. so after fording the knee deep frozen steam i pressed on only to be reward with an awe inspiring display of wildlife (none of which i was able to capture a picture of ) , i was shadowed by a pair of bald eagles, badgered by a group of canadian geese, buzzed by suicidal squirrels, and spooked by a pair of white tail rocketing across the trail. The animal show inspired me to press on  though the soup and three other stream crossings till i reached a clear cut makeshift trail the followed some power lines running from east

just before crossing the stream in the background

to west...by this time my feet were quazi-frostbitten and my bike was completely covered in muck. with a strict 3:15pm retrieval time for my son, i decided to follow the power lines to some blacktop. a half a mile later the trail intersected the Neal Smith which after a short ride, delivered me to the intersection at nw beaver ave. i grabbed a quick drink snapped a picture at the trail head on the west side of beaver and spun off on what i thought was the neal smith toward saylorville dam. my actual destination was urbandale via johnston by way of an as yet unidentified paved trail. upon arrival in ubandale i happened on a cookie cutter housing development ripe full of mini-vans, this served to remind me that i need to fetch the boy from school. so half frozen and super stoked about the urban adventure i'd had i sprinted back to beaver ave and then home. this was an killer ride....adventure just out of my doorstep, i'm now completely sold on the merits of owning a cyclocross bike. trails that i would normally pass by on my mountain bike are now viable options, it was a welcome lesson in line section as with a 35mm tire small ruts dramatically affect steering. i cant wait for spring!!!! GRAVEL, HERE I COME!!!