Weather is a warmer 6ºC and I’m getting giddy with the forecast of high of 14ºC tomorrow and thinking it’s nearly time to swap out the winter kit with the summer (3 season, really) kit in a box in the basement. Clearly, all of my Southern California blood is completely flushed from my system after being away for more than a decade.
Donner was on the calendar, though Plan Builder apparently replaced it with a Ramp Test when, two weeks into SSLV2, I changed the build to Sustained Power Build (from General). (Support is aware.) In an act of rebellion (sort of, ok not really), I went for an outdoor ride. It was a late start, 6:40a, still dark, as the kids are on their February break so I don’t have to be in the kitchen at 6:30a making breakfast and lunch for school.
It was an easy spin with the only fauna sighting (by me, can’t speak to “of me” by fauna) was a pair of eyes in the forest reflecting my helmet-mounted light. Probably a deer based on the height and location, but there was a weird sound come from the same direction that I think was an unusual bird call, or was it…
Except for near the end, not a person was seen.
In a seemingly random spot at a junction of paved lanes (bidirectional but barely more than a car in width) that seem to be more of a bypass connecting grazing and farm plots. Nearby is a proper two-lane road, with minimal traffic. Regardless, there’s this book exchange sitting here. Many villages have a similar thing in town (ours has what is similar to a greatly oversized phone booth) where you drop off and/or pick up a book at your leisure.
With the ground less icy, logging ops have resumed. This is a managed forest and has been for, I’m pretty sure, is a few hundred years. The hillside in the background is a forest that was granted to the city of Zurich, whose boundary now is at least 10k away, but when it was granted was probably closer to 15k, for wood harvesting. It’s has a protected central core but still is logged on the periphery, mostly to sustain the forest. I suspect because of the intent to harvest the wood, the types of trees planted have incredibly shallow roots and are prone to falling in heavy winds.
As is usual, even though this was a “flatish” route, the power output looks like I was doing intervals. I’m anticipating a grander escape tomorrow of a 4+hr ride, which should be somewhat equivalent to the planned Clark workout of 90min, right?
). Then +6 to +8 and dry which would have been perfect for riding in. We had a few days of storms just to the west of us keeping it warm facilitating that. Now just in time for the weekend those storms have reached us. I had a short ride this morning and 
being from Los Angeles, I was (still am) fascinated by “old” buildings and infrastructure, which meant generally things from the 1920s through 1940s. When I lived in London, our not-so-old flat had “seen” autos for considerably less than half the time it has been standing and I’d regularly drink at pubs older than the US. That’s not to mention running along Hadrian’s Wall or along ancient Roman roads still with their paving stones in the “outback” of Tuscany (both for ultras). It’s all relative.
