{"id":1297,"date":"2011-08-15T22:23:48","date_gmt":"2011-08-16T02:23:48","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.seakingdom.net\/blog\/?p=1297"},"modified":"2011-08-15T22:23:48","modified_gmt":"2011-08-16T02:23:48","slug":"ware-i-went","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.seakingdom.net\/blog\/2011\/08\/15\/ware-i-went\/","title":{"rendered":"Ware, I went"},"content":{"rendered":"

After my failed attempt<\/a> to ride to Shelburne Falls, I planned another training ride the following weekend.\u00a0 This time, I went for a bit more modest distance, because I went biking the evening before, and was a bit tired from that.<\/p>\n

The evening ride was on Saturday, July 9, and involved riding from Hadley north to Sunderland, MA and back.\u00a0 It was a quick 22 miles.<\/p>\n

The following morning, I set out for points east and south.\u00a0 I first rode east through Amherst and Belchertown to the town of Ware (“Where?”\u00a0 “That’s right.”).\u00a0 On the way, I passed near the southern part of the Quabbin Reservoir<\/a> reservation, and rode right by a marshy area along state route 9.\u00a0 Saw a heron there (at a distance):<\/p>\n

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The road gets a little hilly as one gets closer to downtown Ware, and so I was feeling a little bit worn already when I got there.\u00a0 Here’s what the main street looks like:<\/p>\n

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In the distance is the spire of the Town Hall:<\/p>\n

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Here’s the whole building:<\/p>\n

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I’m always fascinated by how many town and city halls in New England seem to look like churches.\u00a0 Coincidence?<\/p>\n

I left Ware heading south on route 32 toward Palmer, MA.\u00a0 This was a slightly hilly, and not always very interesting-looking ride, but I did find one nice view:<\/p>\n

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I could tell that the ride the evening before was still having an effect on me, as even minor hills were slowing me down a fair deal.<\/p>\n

Before too long, though, I got to Palmer, passed south of the Mass Pike, and started heading back west on US 20.\u00a0 As I rode out of Palmer’s downtown, I passed this abandoned fast food place:<\/p>\n

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There were no signs indicating what it was, though the patterns on the awnings might give some clue.\u00a0 The only text seemed to be a “Welcome” sign over the side door, and this:<\/p>\n

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At that moment, I wasn’t hungry yet, having had a sizable breakfast.\u00a0 But it was nice to be asked, I suppose.<\/p>\n

I passed briefly through the town of Monson after that, and then into Wilbraham.\u00a0 In the latter, the road started run along the Chicopee River:<\/p>\n

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That’s the view west (downriver), and here’s back east:<\/p>\n

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Soon after this, I turned onto a side road that took me across the river into Ludlow.\u00a0 There’s a dam just before that bridge:<\/p>\n

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I didn’t take any more pictures after that, as I didn’t see anything I really wanted to photograph.\u00a0 I rode through Ludlow, with a short break to eat some fruit I’d brought along, skirting the Pike on a parallel surface road.<\/p>\n

This road took me into the city of Chicopee, where I ran into route 33, a heavily developed road.\u00a0 I headed north on 33 toward home, and though it isn’t a particularly pretty ride, it was direct and pretty flat.\u00a0 My legs were not liking inclines much at that point.\u00a0 I stopped at a convenience store to get some kind of drink with electrolytes, and fortunately I wasn’t feeling picky, because they had hardly anything on their shelves or in the coolers.\u00a0 I wasn’t sure if the place was closing, or getting ready to remodel, or what (and I neglected to ask).<\/p>\n

Somewhat refreshed, I continued up into South Hadley, where I rode on route 116 for a while, and then picked up route 47, which took me back to Hadley.\u00a0 47 has a few short but steep hills, and it took me a good bit more time to climb them than I was used to (this is the route I use when I ride my bike to work).\u00a0 I did make it home, though, having spent about 6 hours total on the ride.\u00a0 Miles ridden: 58.\u00a0 Still an improvement over my previous rides of the year, and a total of 80 miles for the weekend.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

After my failed attempt to ride to Shelburne Falls, I planned another training ride the following weekend.\u00a0 This time, I went for a bit more modest distance, because I went biking the evening before, and was a bit tired from that. The evening ride was on Saturday, July 9, and involved riding from Hadley north … Read more<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[19],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.seakingdom.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1297"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.seakingdom.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.seakingdom.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.seakingdom.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.seakingdom.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1297"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.seakingdom.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1297\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1311,"href":"https:\/\/www.seakingdom.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1297\/revisions\/1311"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.seakingdom.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1297"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.seakingdom.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1297"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.seakingdom.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1297"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}