Today’s ride: I did @ranlee’s Tour of Taipei, clockwise, with an additional 25km or so added on to get there from Danshui. Despite foolishly turning Strava off for a brief stretch, the 90km recorded still wound up being my longest ride recorded with Strava (bike computer said 96km) - probably my longest ride ever, although not as tough as those circles I’ve been doing via north coast / Jinshan / Balaka.
Huh. So that’s where Academica Sinica is. I’ve wondered about that for a long time.
I seem to be more homesick for Vancouver than I realized (I normally visit every summer). To my surprise, I saw a crow while descending … er … whatever that hill is. Only hill on the route. First time I’ve seen a crow in the Taipei area, although I’ve seen them higher up in the central mountains. I thought to myself “No way, that’s not a crow!”, and then it caw-caw-cawed, and I suddenly deeply, deeply missed the friggin’ noisy and annoying and swarming crows of the Vancouver area.
I’m now at 421km for the month, which is another personal best with Strava. Not sure if I’d have done more than that in pre-Strava days. The bikes weren’t as good, the regular rides weren’t as long, but I was younger and sometimes riding more frequently than I am now.
Legs were fine, bum was not fine. Ouch.
You’d think by now I’d have a better read on Taipei weather. So often I’ve turned around due to threatening clouds, to get home and see skies that remained rainless. Today I thought, nope, all fine! Even in the last stretch coming home to Danshui, there were some fluffy clouds that made me think “Oh, those might be a problem in a couple of hours.” And then 20 minutes after I got home, darkness descended, and heavy rain came soon after. Good timing on my part, but where was that storm hiding?!
Doesn’t work for me, unfortunately. I’ll pass out for an hour or more (sometimes much more!), be even foggier upon waking up, and then have trouble getting to sleep that night. I know, I know, it’s supposed to be better to set an alarm and get up after 30 minutes or so, and I’ve often set that alarm, but I have never, ever succeeded in getting up with it.