Climbed Bates Street

5/9/11 #232
32.5 miles*

Rode 32.5 miles * according to my bike computer, which I need to calibrate against a GPS. I suspect it might be reading 10% high.

Rode from the Penitentiary to Pamela's Pancakes in Millvale, had strawberry pancakes, rode to Station Square, south to the American Water cutoff, Hot Metal Bridge and then I made a leap into adventure and departed Second Avenue and rode up Bates Street, which I've been staring at for a long time and today I rode up there. It was a nice climb, which was over with before I expected it to be.

On the way back down Bates I decided to shoot a gap between a car stopped in traffic and the curb, forgetting that the handlebars on the road bike are about two inches wider than the bars on my LHT, and I rapped the passenger-mirror with my left hand. I stopped and spoke with the driver and apologized, he was quite civil about in - no damage, it had flexed on its spring hinge and returned to position.

From Bates Street I rode north on the Jail Trail to Grant Street, then I reversed to the Hot Metal Bridge. It looks like the connector to the new trail behind the AEO corporate campus is complete to a point past the building, leaving the new trail behind the HofBrauHaus still to be completed. Rode the Southside Trail, Station Square, Ft. Pitt and Ft. Duquesne bridges, back to the Western Penitentiary.

It was a great day for a ride. Saw two recumbents. Big sighting of the day: I saw a rider going opposite direction coming out of Southside Riverfront Park, and his bicycle was towing a trailer carrying his kayak. Very very cool. This photo below isn't from today, but it looks similar to what I saw: