Today may be the day to break my winter cycling hibernation. I was out for a run yesterday and had a chance to assess some of the paved and dirt trails.  There are enough good ones to give it a go and with a high of 12C forecast for this afternoon the only thing standing in my way is getting the bike ready. This is what has held me off so far more than the road/trail conditions. I will need to clean and lube my chain which even with the ease of modern products tend to put me into procrastination mode.
Here is how trails through  Dawson Park looked yesterday:

Caution required on deteriorated path

And on the dirt trails east of Dawson Park to Capilano Bridge and on towards the 50th Street Bridge it looked like this:

Beside the trail, looking east towards Capilano Bridge

Dry gravel path

Looking across the river

While the sun-exposed north bank of the river valley is nicely dried, shaded areas such as Kinnaird Ravine, up from the east end of Dawson Park are ugly. I had trouble walking here a day earlier and wouldn’t chance it on two wheels.

Kinnaird Ravine's icy/slushy trail

Enjoy your ride – maybe I’ll see you on the trails and road.

I haven’t had my bike out yet this year (it’s been 15 weeks since my last ride) but I feel the time is getting near. I did get out for a walk in Edmonton’s river valley yesterday, that gave me a good indication of what to expect on the cycling paths. I walked through Dawson Park and for the most part, the paths are very rideable.  There is a lot of sand and frequent wet spots (that shouldn’t be a problem as long as the temperature is above freezing and/or exposed to the sun). There are however a few hazards that mean a cyclist must not yet adopt the more carefree mindset of summer riding. Here is what I saw:

This path through Dawson Park is typical of the sun-exposed north side of the river valley,  – again, wet and sandy but quite passable

There is however one habitually bad stretch of the path, 50+ meters north of Dawson Bridge, where it is wet/icy/slushy and extreme caution is required:

The dogwood beside the path adding some color to an otherwise rather blaek late-winter landscape:

Another low spot on the path through Dawson Park creates this pond across 90% of the path:

While the path on the sunny north side of the river valley seem ready for fair weather cyclists (i.e. not those riding fat bikes or studded tires), the paths are the south bank of the valley, I will be avoiding for a least another month. This is a section of path, just west of Capilano bridge on the south side – pretty much coated in a few centimeters of ice:

I am encouraged about getting an earlier start to this year’s cycling season. After a mild winter without much snow, we seem to be at least a couple of weeks ahead of recent years. I could ride today but at best I will try to locate all of cool weather clothing and do a quick check of the bike (air in tires, chain lubrication etc.)

Soon…

Here it is November 22nd and I managed to sneak in another ride. Although we had a bit of snow one night this week it had mostly disappeared by this weekend. This Sunday afternoon the sun was out, the temperature around 4C and the paths were dry and clean. No problem for cycling through the river valley but with the North Saskatchewan River clogging up with ice, it would have been a poor day for kayaking (not that I do – not that I wouldn’t like to – but not at this time of year in any case! I digress.)

The Icy North Saskatchewan River in central Edmonton

The only problem with riding at this time of year is that by mid-afternoon when it is warmest, the sun is already on its way down in the southwest sky making it difficult to see.

3:15 pm in Edmonton’s Rundle Park

There were not a lot of cyclists out on this November afternoon, but I did see a few.

Dawson Park

While the paths were for the most part very dry and clean one does need to keep there eyes open  for the occasional ice patch.

Icy spot in Dawson Park

Contrasting the icy river with the nice clean bike path.

I post these images mainly for the benefit of anyone who is not familiar with Edmonton and thinking that surely no one could be cycling that far north in November. Sure this is turning out to be an exceptional month but it shows that cycling is possible and the river valley beautiful enough to make the effort worthwhile.

Me – to prove I really was out there on Nov 22nd 2015.

Happy November Cyclist

I figure anytime I can be out on my bike in November that is pretty good and today, November 7th I did just that. It was a lovely afternoon – sunny with a temperature of around 5C. Fortunately there has been no snow yet this year so the trails were dry.

I did about 15km, on my mountain bike taking the paved trail through Dawson Park, then the dirt trail beside the river to the 50th Street footbridge. On the way back I took the trail up and down the Kinnaird Ravine and then the paths on the north slope of Dawson Park.

Although it was not a long ride by any means, I ended up being out for a couple of hours as I was stopping so often to take pictures. I will just let those pictures tell the story of my afternoon:

Trail beside river, east of Dawson Park

50th Street Bridge with ice on the North Saskatchewan River

Trail beside Highlands Golf Course

Kinnaird Ravine Trail (east end)

Kinnaird Ravine Trail

Top (west end) of Kinnaird Ravine Trail

Trail on North Bank of Dawson Park (east end)

River Valley from Upper Dawson Trail

Pedal's View of the Trail

Trail through the Trees

Fallen Trees Across the Path

All in all, a very enjoyable afternoon ride and hopefully not my last one for November or 2011.

Two weeks ago when I last rode I developed a slow leak in my rear tire. Over the last couple of kilometers, the pressure fell and the riding got increasingly difficult – but I was able to ride home. The tire did go completely flat, so it had to be repaired before I could take the bike out on the road again. On Saturday, I gave the tire a thorough inspection looking for any obvious sign of a puncture – there was nothing obvious. There were a number of grains of sand stuck in little  grooves in the almost slick tires but those would have not caused a problem. Looking closer I found probably half a dozen tiny but sharp little dagger of sand that had penetrated the tire. I pulled these out but it didn’t seem like any of them were long enough to go all the way through to the tube – especially when I had a layer of Mr. Tuffy between the tire and tube.

a tiny puncture

Next I took the tube out of the tire, inflated it and gave a visual inspection – still nothing seen. I put a little more air in the tube and very carefully inspected it, listening for any hissing. That worked, I did not have to resort to putting the tube under water and looking for bubbles. the whole was very tiny (maybe 1 mm long) and virtually impossible to note without the tire being stretched.

I patched up the hole but decided to put in a brand new tube just to be safe. I didn’t want a repeat puncture so I tried to  analyze what caused this one. It”s possible, but I think unlikely, that one of those shards of sand embedded in the tire caused the puncture. My best guess (unlikely as it seems) is that a piece of sand worked its way in through the opening at the valve stem (Schraeder valve). In any case I was cleaning out the inside of the tire and the protection strip. I didn’t notice any sand, just rubber crumbs. In any case, the new tube was mounted, tire inflated and all seemed fine.

I lubed up the chain again and headed out onto the trails and road. Today’s ride was the same 20K loop (between Dawson and Rundle Parks) that I’ve done for my last couple of outings – but today was faster. It was sunny and 14 degrees Celsius so I was able to ride in shorts for the first time. It also helped that the paths and road were very dry. With my tires at rated pressure I felt like I was flying.

There were a few places where snowmelt run-off was flowing across the path (particularly just north of Dawson Bridge. For the most part though the paths were completely dry. The bike path through Dawson Park was also surprisingly clear of sand. I do think it must have been swept recently. the main road on this route, Ada Boulevard was also very dry. It however was still very sandy. The sand basically took out the south most lane of this road but with minimal traffic this was not an issue. Even Rundle Park, which had large sections of flooded paths 2 weeks ago, was now perfectly dry.

Bridge in Rundle Park on 2011 April 24

Thawed Pond in Rundle Park

This ride was also my first opportunity to test a new point and shoot camera that I have bought, specifically to have something small that I can take with me cycling. In a future blog I’ll write more about what I was looking for, what I got and what I think about it.

As you can see from the photos, the Edmonton landscape on this last Sunday in April, has not yet started to green-up. Nonetheless we are moving in the right direction and the cycling season is young.

Today (Sunday April 10) I got out on my bike for the third time this year. I rode the same route as I had  a week earlier – but what a difference. While last week’s ride was slow, careful and deliberate, today I felt like I was really riding. I’d forgotten how well my mountain  bike move with the City Slicker tires. I was cruising along at 25 Kmph along some stretches and it felt good!

Dirty and Rusty Chain

Before I could hit the road I had to clean up my bike a bit. Last weekend’s ride had left it very sandy and this was especially  an issue on the drive train. I  knocked off as much dirt and sand as I could then applied some White Lightning lubrication to the  chain.

The route I took was along the bike paths and connecting roads from Dawson Park in central Edmonton to Rundle Park in the east end of the city.

The first difference notices was that the paths in general were much drier and almost completely free of snow and ice. Last week I found the most dangerous part of the trail being a very muddy section beside a construction site in Dawson Park. Today this section was a bit dirty but dry – no issue. Through Dawson Park and up the trail beside the Highlands Golf Course, the  path had a few wet spots – either puddles or sections where the run-off flowed across the path. There was also still a lot of sand on the path.

Once I got up to to Ada Boulevard I traveled  on the relatively quiet residential street. Again there was a lot of sand on the road but for the most part the the surface was dry and fast. The biggest thing to watch out for was the pedestrian traffic: runners, dog walkers and strollers. Overall, the few kilometers along the street were a pleasure. This is where I got up a good pace, a good rhythm and felt wonderful.

Reaching the turn-off down into Rundle Park the only obstacle encountered was water completely across the path about half way down. This was the first  (and probably the smallest) of a number of small  patches of water across the path in Rundle Park. It was just a matter of going slow. I wouldn’t want to have been cruising down the hill at a significant speed and hitting this patch of water. One of the neat parts of slowing down was seeing the pond amongst the trees beside the path – great reflections!

The trail down onto the flats of Rundle Park  was completely clear of snow. It was amazing how much snow had melted in just a week. I was most curious to see if the large patch of water across north of the ACT Centre had drained or dried up.

Rundle Park, 2011 April 10

Rundle Park 2011 April 3

Alas, although a lot of snow was gone, the path was still a low spot filled with water. At least this week it seemed like a reasonable alternative to go off-pavement and ride along the grass beside the path – but I didn’t. since it had worked fine last week  I just coasted slowly straight down the path.

There would be quite a bit of standing water on the Rundle park loop, both on the west side and  then again in numerous places along the river side path. So I just had to go very slow through these stretches and since there was no ice under the water this strategy worked. This  part of the ride was also slow because of a few stops to take photos of  some attractive scenery, such as reflections and snow like this:

The ride back to Dawson along the same route was very similar – fast back along Ada Boulevard. The only issue, downside to today’s ride came in the last kilometer or two. I notice that I wasn’t moving as smoothly as I had been earlier. I thought I detected something wrong with my rear wheel – perhaps the hub. I eventually noticed that my rear tire was very low. It didn’t go completely flat, I was able to ride home on it but my speed dropped to about half. A quick inspection did not reveal the problem – no obvious puncture or other cause. I will have to do a closer inspection of the tire later this week, once it is dry.

Overall, a good 20K ride. It was about 8 degrees and sunny this afternoon. I was tempted to ride in shorts but stuck with my long tights. I was glad I did  because my legs would been pretty cool after getting wet from the spray of riding through puddles. I rode with regular half-finger cycling gloves and  without a hat under my helmet and felt very comfortable. I’m looking forward to my next ride!

Goldbar Footbridge from the Path into Rundle Park

Today, Sunday April 3rd I continued my early season exploration of cycling conditions. Yesterday I had gone west from downtown along the north side bicycle paths. Today I made the journey east  – basically from Dawson Park to Rundle Park.

The first section of today’s ride was along the path through Dawson Park on the north bank of the North Saskatchewan River. The path had been plowed through the winter and is relatively exposed to the spring sun so there was not “much” snow and ice. These was however lots of snow on the sides of the trail and sometimes those sides spilled over onto the path. There was also plenty of run-off water in places and lots of sand over the pavement.

For the most part the route was quite passable but there was one stretch of maybe 50 meters, beside the construction site that is worthy of note and caution.  The path just east of and beside the constructions site is very muddy – mud,  water, loose snow and ice. It was difficult to tell quite  what I was riding over – but by taking it slow and easy over this, I got through.

the path north of the west end of Highlands Golf Course

Coming out of the east end of Dawson Park, the path winds up past the west end  of the Highlands Golf course to reach Ada Boulevard. This section of the trail is sheltered by tree so it wasn’t surprising to discover the path partially  covered by snow. Cycle and pedestrian traffic was relatively light this Sunday afternoon so I encountered no issue with one lane being blocked.

Once I reached Ada Boulevard. I cycled along the street for a few kilometers. The road was pretty typical of streets at this time of year – mostly clear of snow in the middle but with about a meter or two of snow beside the south curb of the road. The roads had wet patches and plenty of sand

Snow and ice take up a lane on a street near Rundle Park

The descent into the west end of Rundle Park had worried me but was fine. There was one small section of water across the trail at the bend, but since the trail was clear and ahd been which was resurfaced last year the descent was safe.

Now Rundle Park was interesting. I did the loop clockwise around the park. Just as I entered the loop I encountered one little hazard. There was a small gap in the snowed-across trail. I took this gap and then realized that there was ice beneath the water – a bit of a slip but it was such a small section I was through it before I knew it.

Mind the Gap

Around the  bends of the little lakes I ran into a different kind of hazard – wild life!

Canada Geese at Rundle Park

There were a number of geese in this area but really they were not an issue at all. I continued on north past the ACT Centre where the path runs flat and straight between the sports fields. It sounds pretty safe but going around a bend this is what I saw:

A Lake on the Path

The path was completely flooded for maybe 20 or 30 metres, then there was a brief dry section and another big lake. I briefly considered my options for getting by this obstacle. I could have tried to cycle through the snow beside the “lake” or walked through the snow. In the end I decided to just ride, slowly  right through the water. It appeared that there was just water over the path, no ice and the depth was probably no more than 10 cm. It was a good decision.

Along the east side of Rundle Park I encountered a few more flooded sections but again, riding slowly through the centre of the path, worked.

Flooded Path Along East Side of Rundle Park

Once around the Rundle loop I retraced my path back along Ada Boulevard and through Dawson Park. The sand continued to build up in my drive train, which always make me feel cringe a bit, but again like yesterday the feeling of being out on two wheels in the sun left me feeling good. I cycled about 20K today with the temperature of only about 3C (still about 5 degrees below average).

My conclusions after these couple of early April rides. The riding is in the adventure category. It is not a time  for fast cyclng on skinny tires, not a time for multi-hour recreational rides. Hopefully those days will come within a few weeks as the trails and roads dry off and are sweeped of the grit. For now I recommend riding cautiously and sticking to quiet streets and bike paths that are fully exposed to the sun. By all means though, do ride and enjoy the adventuere!