Exploring The Silver Comet Trail

I was so excited to discover the Silver Comet last night that I decided to go ride a portion of it today. Work had graciously given me some time off after a recent project and the weather today and tomorrow is supposed to be great so everything fell into place. The trail is about 15 miles from my house so around 10am I loaded up the bike and set off.



First stop IHOP for some fuel. Then over to Publix for water and granola.



When I unloaded the bike, I found out what that popping noise was that I heard when loading it. Its hard to see in the pic because its out of focus but I somehow managed to bend the thing that holds the front brake line. Still works fine.



There are fair number of bridges and tunnels early on. Here's one of the first I crossed.



And one of the tunnels.



I stopped at Silver Comet Depot to see their selection of Specialized and Bianchi bikes and to pick up a second bike lock since I'd left mine at home. They're friendly and have a small but good selection.



I'm really pleased with the MTX bag. It holds more than you would think even without the panniers pulled out.



There's still a lot of ice on and along the trail. Most of the surface ice has been crushed by so many feet and wheels that its not a problem. I did fish-tail it once which was fun.



While riding on the trail you feel like you're somewhere remote but the whole time there are streets large and small all around, at least on this initial portion of the trail. Mostly you just see trees and the backs of nice neighborbood houses but there are some less than ideal sites along the way too... like this junkyard.



My plan was to ride 15 miles in and 15 miles back for a total of 30 miles. This would be about the distance required for each day along The Otago Rail Trail. It's something I'm trying to convince Jen to do for 2 (3, or 4) days on the south island of New Zealand. Unfortunately the trail is closed at 14.69 miles from the start.



They do offer a detour by road but I didn't follow it. At this point I turned around to head back.



At the 14.69 mile marker there's an old caboose that is now used by the police who patrol the trail.



By the time I rode back to the trail head and up the trail head connector I was hungry. A Rueben Cubano from La Fonda hit the spot.