Monday, February 17, 2014

Stanwood and Lake McMurray (2014-02-15)

I took very different routes outbound and inbound on this ride.

Map: 135 miles
Geotagged Album

More after the break…

Part 1: To Lake McMurray

Part 1: To Lake McMurray

I started at about 05:00 and headed straight north. It was fairly nice out at that point, albeit a tad cold.

After having my local bike shop fix up the issues from last time, I had very few problems. As always, however, the brakes demanded a lot of adjustment throughout the ride, but they seemed to be 'set' by the time I finished my ride later on .

I saw some buses running the 'new' RapidRide E line as I rode along Shoreline's portion of the Interurban Trail, and I managed to get a photo of one at the northern terminus.

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I could swear that there was an old lady feeding them in the dark, but I still am not sure on that; she might've been doing something else.

As I've often done, I took the Manor Way/Admiralty Way route to Everett instead of sticking to the Interurban Trail past Lynnwood.

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The weather gradually warmed up to comfortable levels by the time I reached Everett.

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As I've also found myself doing, I took SR-529 through Marysville and Smokey Point.

After the first hour, I've warmed up enough to get my body acclimated to the riding. Some folks would consider an hour to be a long time to ride alone!

Looking back, I wonder if there really was a northerly prevailing wind at all. The easterly wind might've been playing tricks on me.

The strenuous exercise reduces my mental capacity to the point where I focus on riding and pretty much nothing else. It's good because I don't get distracted, and that promotes happiness.

I was a bit startled when I found the decommissioned US-99 in Google Maps's directions. I wonder how that even got in there!

"US-99": The directions for this said, "Turn left onto US-99/Broadway. Continue to follow US-99."

I then made a left on SR-530, and continued along its former route, called the "Pioneer Highway."

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I stuck to the Pioneer Highway for quite some time, passing through Silvana and Stanwood. A recent time I was in the area, Google Maps took me on a route along a smaller road called, "Normal Road." On a more recent ride than that, I took Marine Drive and SR-532 instead.

Old Routes 1: I followed some routing used before around Stanwood, and these are the routes that came to mind.

Something that caught my eye was this bit of road and bridge that must've formerly connected to the Pioneer Highway.

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I then hit Milltown (too small for even a Wikipedia page!).

She was really happy to have that little apartment, but always found it hard to hold conversations outdoors due to the busy highway and active railway line.

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The sign in the above photo says "POP. 7."

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The older buildings were down that 'primitive' road. I didn't want to risk anything with my narrow tires.

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My last stop in the absolute northbound direction was Conway.

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From there, I started heading to the southeast along SR-534, where I started feeling obvious headwinds.

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And to Lake McMurray, which I consider to be the northern end of any Centennial Trail rides of mine.

I was really happy to see that she remembered. These little shops which are far removed from city life are so nice.

Part 2: Return Home

Part 2: Return Home

While it started off with reasonable levels of rain and wind, as I continued south, so did the weather. I followed the entire length of the Centennial Trail, save for around where I had my slide-out on an earlier ride.

When stopping for some pedestrians who were walking along the trail (there were cyclists coming the other way, albeit slowly), the chord of my brakes really resonated. Even I was surprised!

While stopping to eat on the side of the trail, I was startled by a tree of about twice my height falling five meters or so away. Some folks asked if I had been okay after I mentioned it to them, but I told them it wasn't really near me.

I left the trail when I got to Snohomish and rode to the Rock City Cafe for a triple mocha.

While there, I finally remembered what I had wanted to tweet earlier.

At this point, I'm not sure if it actually was upgraded, but it looked a lot like the upgrades to Everett's Interurban Trail section from earlier.

Apparently there was a wind advisory in effect at that point.

When I left the cafe, instead of sticking to SR-9, I took the parallel route which was familiar from my very first century ride. I stuck to the same road rather than deviating, as I recall riding in the area due to a detour on another previous ride. The winds were particularly awful up until I started climbing out of the valley.

Old Routes 2: I followed some routing used before around SR-9, and these are the routes that came to mind.

Even though the road was lower than SR-9, it was quite a bit hillier. As I got closer to where I would cross SR-522, the rain started to absolutely pour. The noise kept me on edge more than anything. I recall trying to ride along the shoulder when it turned to gravel, which was really hard to see with the rain obscuring my view, the car headlights blinding me, and all of the pavement being equally dark. At that point, I avoided shoulders where possible all the way until Woodinville. At this point, it was even worse than January's ride due to it being dark.

I was relieved when I finally hit Woodinville-Duvall Road as passed through the areas of Woodinville I knew. I think I'll just stick with SR-9 next time.

I finally got to the trailhead in Woodinville, feeling even more relieved as I would be off of the roads for almost the entire way back.

The rain died off between Bothell and Lake Forest Park. I was still fighting some nasty winds, though.

And in Lake City, I came across a large downed tree across the trail, illuminated by the headlights of a car from the road on the other side of the fence.

I was really glad to finally get home after all that.

Unfortunately, my soaked gear caused some really nasty abrasion where I rest on my saddle. There are seams in the compression shorts I've been using for the past several months, but they've never been much of a problem, even during January's soaking. I'm trying out new things since this ride.

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