Today was a really old-school day of riding through some fairly serious hills. We followed the Mighty Delaware river up through the border of Pennsylvania and New Jersey, going back and forth across the river and between the states. I rode mostly with Ted and David and we kept a pretty solid pace up some 14% climbs and about 4400 feet of elevation change. Our rest stop was with an alum who brought up some delicious sub sandwiches. All in all it was just a very nice day of riding.

I remarked to one of the folks at dinner that I feel like I finally have all my gear “dialed in”; I’m not looking for new equipment anymore; I have the perfect bike computer, the perfect shifting system, the perfect bike. I do need a new rear tire but that’s about it.

We rode on a few closed streets today, closed because they got washed out, and it was really nice. I realized that was one thing I’d been missing, the ability to just ride along side-by-side and talk to the folks I am riding with; we really couldn’t do that in the Southeast because of the busy roads and small shoulders.