The daily commute: week one

Wed (afternoon, to home): 65 minutes. (5 less than Tuesday and about 25 less than Monday). The other direction is more uphill, but this way has some gnarly hills too. Rough headwind for the first part of the ride. Tonnes of downed branches from the storms this morning. My left leg felt tight at first, but it loosened up as I rode and it felt pretty easy overall.

I'd like to find a better way to get from my office to the rest of the route, as this is the worst part of my ride. But it's in the suburbs and only the major roads connect to anything. I tried to take the Trout Brook/Gateway Trails into St. Paul, but the entrance was closed. I crossed over it on a bridge and it looked like a really nice trail; I'll try to enter it from the other end tomorrow.

Thurs (morning, to work): 99 minutes. The trail does not exist. I never saw the entrance and went the opposite direction for some distance before figuring it out and heading back, then tried to find it again when I got back to where it should have been, and failed. Got lost and went in a wrongish direction but eventually found my way to work.

At least when I was on the wrong trail (eastbound Gateway) it was really quiet and pretty, and I saw lots of bounding forest creatures. One little furball was hard to identify, but I decided that it was a baby rabbit. My legs are angry.

Fri (back home for the weekend): about two hours. Road closed due to construction; had to follow traffic-jammed detour around to trail opening, rained the whole time. Once I got on the trail, the rain stopped and I had a great ride home. This route would work except for the construction. I need to find a way around it.

Five days of commuting under my belt! I need this weekend to relax and prepare for next week.