Today’s ride was a rinse and repeat—similar to yesterday.  Forecasts varied from moderate to heavy rain to morning only to morning and afternoon.  Building off yesterday’s confidence, I decided to go for it.

After about 10 miles of mostly climbing, the heavens opened up.  I needed to stop because heavy rain makes my bike computer go haywire. I took shelter under a large tree. I stopped for about an hour when the heavy rain subsided.

Here a picture:

Here’s the radar I was watching:

I climbed a lot of hills today.  This picture provides some perspective:

I did take note of some of the points of interest: Prettyboy Dam (built in 1933), the first commercial ice cream company founded in Seven Valleys, PA, in 1851, and this cool artwork near York College:

The last 11 miles of the journey was on a rails-to-trails unpaved road. The trail has the best compacted base I’ve ever ridden on. The heavy rain had minimal impact on the trail’s ride-ability.  I did encounter a couple of down trees:

This tree required me to lift the bike—up and over!

As I rode along, I heard a loud crack. A tree was snapping as I was passing it.  I instinctively pedaled madly, hearing the large branch crash to the ground.

I felt better today than yesterday. Muscle memory is kicking in.