Oct. 5

Today I got to bike again! This was unexpected because it had rained overnight and was still sprinkling during our drive. We stopped at Wildcat Hills Recreational Area, near Gering, Nebraska. It was a wonderful place. Here's a view from the top. It was still cloudy.

The ride was really fun. Gail would call it an easy ride, but there were plenty of challenges for me. There were deep ruts in several places so I had to ride with precision which is kind of scary. There were lots of steep ups and downs. I did pretty good pushing through the uphills. I usually said "thank you Monkey Bar Gym" when I succeeded. Now I will appreciate their killer workouts more when I return home. And thank you Dr. Fuhrman whose diet cleared out my arteries so I could catch my breath. There were enough rocks and branches to give me some technical challenges, but there were also some easy flat parts. So it was a nice mixture. I think I only had to stop against my will about 4 times. That's proof it's an easy ride because I'm not that good yet. I stopped several times to snap photos though. Here's a few:

When I got to this crossing, I chickened out and turned around. I had been out longer than I promised anyway, so had to get back. I am still easily psyched out due to several things that make me nervous--being alone, and those darn clip-in pedals still scare me. At the beginning of this crossing, you can't reach the railing. But it would be doable if I weren't pysched out.

Then we went to Scott's Bluff. There was a little paved bike path that I rode. It turned out to be more fun than I expected because it was relatively narrow and curvy so sort of like a racetrack when you were going downhill. Here I am departing:

Some scenery shots:

some farmland at the end of the path

The path was only about 1.5 miles one-way. Then I returned. It's hard to not have fun on a bike, even on a paved path.