Escape From Prouts Neck, 69.69 Miles

After getting out the vote, I got dropped off in the slums of Prouts Neck, left to fend for myself. Armed with some copies of pages from the Gazetteer atlas, I set out to untangle the knotted ball of roads that stood between me and home. The route looked squirly requiring travel in the wrong direction a couple times. Twenty miles of this ride were accumulated by heading far enough west to circumvent the Saco River without having to cross I95.
I thought to myself that this awkward layout of roads must have come about from early settlers having just an rough idea where they were headed when they set out to cut a road through the woods. Or maybe these small intersection towns were just never a priority to get directly to. In any case, it was a zig zag route with the goal of remaining west of I95.
I stopped at Spiller Farm Feeds and Needs store. I got apples from the farm, a home baked apple turnover, a banana and water. It was a cool little independent store surrounded by the Spiller farm.
Once again the sun set on me while I was still navigating Bell Marsh dirt. It seemed as if the Sun took an hour to slowly fall beneath the treeline. I squeezed every last ray out until the road was finally overtaken by darkness. Soon enough, the waning remnants of last night's full Hunter's moon silvered the asphalt and it is under this light that I finally pulled up my driveway exhausted. I counted 17 graveyards. The first half of this ride only produced the first five. See the mapped out route here...

I Bought A One Way Ticket to Epic, 75+ Miles

Oh Google Maps, where will you take me next?
Eli was working near Biddeford this morning. So I loaded the bike into the back of her pick up and hitched a ride to the Biddeford Park And Ride. It was c-c-cold at 9:15 this morning at the parking lot. I stuffed the directions and map I printed down my jersey to cut the wind, which was a life saver. It wouldn't be until over two hours later that I decided to do the same for my cold toes; wrapped them in directions for the roads behind me.
Lots of riding 3 miles to a dead end like when I decided to check out University of New England University and Hills Beach Road. Two miles down the beach road to the end of the Pavement. No way to continue without a boat. I u-turned and cut a left down supposedly "closed" road Old Pool Rd. The work crew let me pass. Then down Mile Stretch Rd. only 20 minutes later. Another down and back road on the other side of "The Pool".
Lots of stopping and looking at the map and directions fer sure. I had accidentally printed the backwards, from KP to Biddeford. So every time I had to figure out the next step, I'd have to stand on my head to read the directions in the right order.
This ride included three awesome dirt road sections, two of them unexpected! Apparently Cheney Woods is dirt for about a mile of climb and dissent. It really was awesome: dirt, rocks, pits and all. I ran into a mountain biker stopped and tinkering on his IPhone. He was decked in SAFETY ORANGE, which I thought was smart, given we were standing there on Cheney Road at the beginning of hunting season. The next dirt came along on Josiah Norton Rd. which I had been curious aboout while studying the maps. Turns out it goes to dirt about 1/2 mile in from either direction. Pretty well groomed, clay, with just a bit of washboard.
What a haul. It was Freakin sweet.
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