The longest day

Thought about doing this ride in more then one opportunity for different reasons.. You know one of those that has a lot of different things that attract amateur cyclist like me and maybe you to embark on what we like to think as  an epic adventure... With a friend as a companion..
Beware this post will have a lot of pictures of New Jersey.

When you head North in NJ you find country roads like this one..

So I had the alarm set for 5 am to have an early start since June is one hot month in NJ... Around 4:50 AM I got up because I couldn't stay in bed any longer.. My body and my brain were ready to tackle what would end up been a great and looong day on the saddle..

Got up, had breakfast I think you noticed by now that I don't function well without food... Filled my bottles grabbed some +Clif Bar & Company pumped some air on the tires (120 lbs) as I am a big guy not to have any surprises with snake bites and stuff like that... Went to the bathroom.. Kissed the wife and the kids.. And head out the door to wait for Vasil... 6:14 am showed the +Garmin when we hit the start ride bottom...

We were not far from the house when we started to hit the first couple of ups and downs of out long trip.

As you head North of Somerville you enter the Watchun Mountains that are not really steep but offers you a nice challenge with plenty of category 4 climbs according to +Strava

We had a run into some of the local fauna, I had to take a picture of this creature... And then get it out of the route before traffic got heavier..

As we continuing going up and down in our constant way to the farther and highest point of NJ we saw a lot of up and down routes...

I am very thankful for the shade since it started to get hot by now.. But as you pedal the wind feels great in your face..

We came across a bison ranch and I coudln't resist to stop and take a pic of this creatures...

And finally after some 5 hours or something like that we reached the highest point of New Jersey.. Called guest what? High Point, NJ can't remember how high it is and at that point all I could think of was that it looked like a mini Ventoux....

The view from the top of it was amazing..!

And one to remember the place for ever..

After that was time to stop somewhere and reload for the way back... I mean it was lunch time and the bars were not making the trick anymore...

Lunch time..!!!!

And we also used this time to rest a little and refill the bottles... Water wasn't lasting that long anymore.. It was like 30 + Celsius that is like over 90 F...!!!

Ah there it is..! Took us 5:20 minutes to reach the rest point.. As you can see there wasn't much flat involved in it either..

We still had some riding to do to get back home so we finished our drinks, filled our bottles and hit the route again... After all this was only half way... No we didn't finish the pizza... And I couldn't put it in my jersey pocket.. Too messy... (only 2 slices were left)

After putting a nice and brave face into the head wind and the hit and some more hills we run out of water again and had to stop to buy some... It felt soooo wrong to buy water here...

That was one of our last stops before we got home... I can't tell you how happy I was when I saw familiar routes again.. Then I felt like a second wind came into me and I could push the pedals again..

The way there took a lot out of me and on our way back poor Vasil had to do most of the work.. I was spent..!

We finally got home and as I mentioned it it was hot..! Good thing the kids had the little pool up and I could jump in to cool down...

But felt much better after a little refreshment...

So what was all this at the end of the day? Let me see....

That my friends reads:

242 km.... 3393 meters of elevation gain.... and all of this in 9:23 minutes..

If you want to see more details about this ride here is the link to what I called THE LONGEST DAY

Thanks for reading

Thanks for sharing

Stay tuned more stories are coming..!!

Pablo