Walking on the bike trail

[deacon]

I have been back walking on the bike path for a three or four days. Nothing much happened until today. It was hot out there. I started late and it was miserable. I was walking the last hundred yards of my three miles when I saw her. A woman laying on her stomach fully dressed with what looked like a couple bags in her hands. From my angle it looked as though she had been walking and fell forward. She appeared to have tried to use the bags to catch herself. I didn't have the best angle.

Since I don't carry a cell phone I couldn't really help her. But I did call out to her since she wasn't moving. "Hey lady are you okay?" No answer...

I walked a few paces toward her and asked again. "Ma'am are you alright?" no answer.

I walked a few more feet then realized the thing beside her head wasn't a bag it was half a pillow. She was sleeping in the middle of a field of grass. Laying on a pillow in the hot sun sound asleep.

I was glad that the pillow tipped me off. I probably would gotten a pervert arrest for tying to take her pulse. God everything happens to me.

 

[deacon]

Do you know how large duck dung is. Well I just found out this morning. It seems that the bike/walking trail today became an emergency landing field for ducks. There were about a dozen walking around checking out the are for things to poop out in an hour or so.

On another note an old man who had asked about the Rhino bike wanted to take a closer look, so he did that while I walked. He was gone when I got back so I have no idea what his verdict was.

Passed a couple of young black men walking their dogs or rather their dogs walking them. Usually dogs on the trail are very well trained and very good citizens. These two had a ways to go to be ready to walk the bike/walking trail. I am pretty sure it was their first time.

Also passed an old white man with a younger black woman who was trying very hard to be there but not be with him. Obviously a caregiver of some type. That trail is a microcosm of the world. I would pass the same people all day long in the real world and never notice them, but on the trail each one seems to have a story to tell me.

 

[robin]

Riding the bike trail--yesterday i drove north of Oliver B.C. passed the park on my left, the canal is on my right,the park is a highly groomed type with an area for skateboarders,a large swath of grass,picknic tables and a shelter where vagrant French Canadians hang out if there is no work fruit or vegetable picking.Today is Sunday so here they are playing hacky sacky and smoking(they all seem to smoke).
The canal on my right was dug in the 50s to bypass the many oxbows that the river made over the eons,this was to prevent flooding. Next on my left is a big tomato farm and I can see East Indians toiling in the sun to get off their crop.They comb the field every couple of days depending on how the crops ripen.
Next on my right side is a giant construction project going on to take out some of the channel canal and reestablish an area of the oxbows for wildlife etc.
To be continued tomorrow if there is interest, brought to you by Happy Time engines...............

 

[restapukin]

yeah, duck dung, (not to be confused with the great soul bass player from stax "duck dunn")

as i was saying yeah duck dung is the reason i don't keep ducks... they are just too damn friendly kept as layers... you wake up to find your back step covered in the dung most every morning

but duck eggs make the best crepes (large thin pancakes) in the world.....

 

[deacon]

I made it back to the trail today. The ducks had moved on and someone had cleaned up. There were people mowing the grass all over the place, I suppose some city employee got that job.

As i walked behind an elementary school on what was the first day of school I guess, I got to hear the principal explaining about the dress code. Then a ten minute lecture on if you look good you feel good. I looked down at my dirty blaze orange tee shirt and my dirty cut off jeans. I wear them in the shop and I had planned to go back to work there.

After I took a look at myself I thought, no wonder I feel like crap all the time. I'm going shopping right after this walk. Of course by the end of the walk a dozen other plans lined up ahead of buying new clothes. I decided that I didn't really feel bad enough to stop working on my bike.

 

[deacon]

I weighted myself today and found that I was up two pounds... Oh my god someone take my ice cream away again. My wife keeps buying it for the kids for Sunday dinner. Then I am FORCED to finish it off so they can have a new flavor for the Next Sunday. So I guess it's back to the bike trail for me.

That is after I drink a lot of coffee to use as a lubricant to slide my head out of my butt. It's hard to ride a bike, if I skip this step.

 

[deacon]

It's time to dust this thread off since the weather has changed,

I decided that it was time to walk the bike trail again. So I put on my sheepskin lined bomber jacket and off I went for the park. The bike was great fun up and down the hills but not so much fun on the pot holes left from winter. Even the short ten blocks was torture on the bike I know. I know it was on my seat if not the bike seat.

So the park was fairly empty this morning. It's a little chilly for most walkers at 8am on a saturday morning in March. However you might remember the older gentleman with the chubby white dog. He takes the dog into the enclosed tennis court, then turns her loose. Almost every morning when I walked he had the dog out there throwing sticks for her. She would waddle over to them.

Well this year the dog looks like she has lost some weight. She doesn't quite waddle but she isn't puppy romping either. I'm sure she is old as well as fat. But she does look much better. Maybe the vet had her or a diet and exercise program. You can just see the love between them. I'm sure she was overfed from love and is now out there in the cold waddling after sticks from love as well. Somehow I get the feeling they only have each other. That makes me both sad and happy for them. God I'm writing like a teenage girl.

I walked on down the trail. When I got to the point where it crossed over college road, I ran into the spring marathon. It is one of the qualifier races for the Boston marathon so there are several runners. I hit the tail end of the marathon on my walk out. When I hit the one mile mark on the trail, I turn to walk back these days. I will expand that but for now 2 miles is comfortable. But the story is on the return trip I crossed paths with the fun run people. That is a second race just for local runners, who are not so serious but still not too bad.

I could tell the difference quite easily. The first bunch looking like they all had tape worms. They were also very intense. The second group seemed to be in better shape than me, but not like the serious runners. They also weren't dressed quite as well over all. Now some looked like real runners but some also looked like they were trying to be sportswear models. All in all a mixed can of nuts.

After I passed them I plodded back to my ebike and hummed off home. They ran, I walked, they are still at it, I am having coffee and soon will have breakfast. All in all a fair trade off I think. they get to say they ran the High Point Marathon, I get to say i had frosted flakes and coffee while they were running the marathon.

 

[Michigan Mike]

Deacon,
Would enjoy seeing some pics of your bike trail(s) and test routes ... just to test the accuracy of my imagination! lol

 

[deacon]

I will see what I can do. I would like to take the real camera out there anyway so maybe, I'll pack it up carefully and carry it along. I don't know it's awfully rough riding on the bike, I think, I'll see if I can con my wife into driving me over. I can try to find something to make a poster from while I'm out there.

 

[Michigan Mike]

Sounds good Deacon. About protecting a camera ... I'm terrible for dropping them. It might take me a few years but I always get around to it. So I bought a small, cheap, zippered, camera-size canvas bag at a yard sale and lined it with bubble wrap. Works good.
Looking forward to your pictures.

 

[deacon]

 

[deacon]

 

[deacon]

 

[deacon]

If a mod knows how to do this more efficiently please feel free.

 

[deacon]

I thought a map might be helpful as well..

 

[robin]

Sort of what i envisioned as your trail--Olivers trails are more past farms-Pentictons are city then no houses or fields just lake and woods and not paved.

 

[robin]

Here you will see portions of our trail-mostly winter pics and some trail clearing.The two guys on scooters are regular users LOL !

 

[deacon]

I have run my ebikes on the trail now and then, but I kind of hate to do it. I expect someone to complain even though it isn't technically a motor vehicle.

I timed my morning walk and I walk at 3 miles per hour. Up and down hill that's a pretty good average for a 65 year old, I think. I have another map of the full trail and it goes many miles. Someday I might pack a couple of meals and try the whole thing, nah not a chance.

They had the boston marathon prelim here yesterday and it ran by the college. It actually cut across the walk path, so today when I spotted a college student runner moving along the same coarse as the marathon, I just had to ask if she was the last of the marathon runners. She pretty much looked at me like she would her grandfather with Alzheimer's and said seriously. "NO Sir." I didn't even try to explain I just kept walking.

 

[Michigan Mike]

Cool pics Deacon. Dandy trail too.

 

[deacon]

its much better than walking at the mall.