Civilized Saturday Morning Ride Sans Ben

I have ridden in December before, but usually it entailed many layers of fleece, Lycra and wool. Not today. The weather was perfect. However, the fear of rain must have dampened the enthusiasm for riding as we had one of the lowest turn outs for a Saturday morning ride that we have had since I started riding with the HACC. John, Jim, Bryant, Marianne, Habi, Steve L. and I arrived at parking area with about every form of road bike manufactured today. John had is touring bike with full finders, Jim his cross bike, Bryant his tri/timetrial ride and the rest of us on traditional road bikes, mine with bolt on aero bars. The weather turned out to be perfect. It was clear at the parking lot but as we climbed KoleKole pass a blanket of fog rolled keeping the road nice and damp for the decent.

We kept a very civilized pace as we road up Kam highway. Almost berried on in a deep ditch on the side of the road was a car. After we passed the car we decided that we should go back to make sure no one was trapped in the car. We turned around and stopped at the car. On closer inspection we noticed the purple mustang was missing it's wheels and tires. Either the folks who slid into the ditch blew all four tires and took them off with the hope of getting them patched or the car was placed in the ditch by after it had been stripped for the used parts business. The car wasn't the only vehicle on the road to experience problems with it's tires. Bryant experienced a flat at Dillingham field. Unfortunately his spare tube fared no better than the original as the CO2 from his quick pump froze the stem as it leaked out of the hole in the his spare tube. Luckily Habi had 2 tubes and loaned Bryant one. This was especially luck as Habi also experienced a flat on the ride. We stopped at the lovely Mokuleia beach park. This hidden gem is not found on many travel brochures. It is a traditional watering hole for our Saturday rides. The shower stand is the always a hub of activity. Today we were entertained by some kids having more fun that should be allowed while washing dishes.

Due to the popularity of data mining and graphs in our circle of blogs, we decided to track our caffeine levels for this ride. Here is the graph.

To boost the levels we stopped at the Coffee Gallery in Haleiwa.

After a cup of Jo we headed up Pineapple hill then back to Schofield keeping a mild pace and enjoying the scenery and the conversation. MII (Missing in Inaction) were Ben, Casey, Scott, Aaron, Amy, Julie, Dave and a few others of our regular riders who must of decided that the comfort of their beds was more important than riding on the 1st of December. Unfortunately for them, they missed a great ride.