After two weeks of feeling awful, achy and creaky, and not really into riding my bike, the weather mellowed out and gave my body and mind a break. I woke up yesterday morning and felt an absence of arthritis pain. I walked across the living room and didn’t bump into anything. And I decided that it was a sign that I ought to go for a ride.
Coffee Outside PDX was meeting at Willamette Park, quite a distance from where I live. However, I could ride the two miles to the !AX satiation, take MAX to OHSU at South Waterfront, and ride the rest of the way to the park, on the winding MUP that runs alongside the river. So I made a thermos of coffee, dressed and hopped on my bike.
The morning was cloudy but warm for November. It hadn’t gotten below 50F the night before, and by the time I got to the MAX station it was in the mid 50s. The train ride was mostly uneventful, except for a half dozen homeless folks with all their worldly goods in tow — sleeping bags, shopping bags, a couple of dogs — that sometimes blocked the aisles of the train car. I stuck to one end, hung my bike on the hook and stood with my bike. (If you don’t stand right next to your bike, chances are someone might try to make off with it at the next stop. That’s an ugly side effect of the spike in Portland’s homeless population over the last seven years. Don’t ask for my opinion on where and how city government has gotten it wrong so many times.)
The train arrived at OHSU — the medical center where I go at least once a week for physical and speech therapy — and I threaded my way through the network of one-way streets to the beginning of the Multi-Use Path of the Willamette Greenway. The water was calm, and I enjoyed the sights and sounds of waterfowl on the docks and the riverbank below. This MUP is a combination of public and private property, with the private sections allowing public access by way of an agreed upon easement. The private parts of the path have lots of bumps and holes in the ashphalt, marked with wide stripes of yellow paint. The paint was obscured by all the fallen leaves, making it hard to see some of them until I was right on top of them. I took my time and rang my bell to warn folks on foot of my approach. The air was balmy, and I ended up not needing my vest about halfway to the park.
I pulled into the covered picnic area at the park and found lots of Coffee Outside regulars. It was lovely to hang out with them and catch up on the two weeks I’d missed, while sipping coffee and snacking on whatever treats had been brought to share. A young couple at one of the picnic tables had brought a miniature, tabletop camp stove, basically a tiny version of the drum from a washing machine on little feet. They fed newspaper and then small pieces of wood into the top, and soon there was an impressively warm fire that we could gather around.
They’d also made up a bunch of spoke cards to give away. Some featured the frog suits that have recently made the news, being worn by protestors at the ICE facility. Others commemorated the recent anniversary of Oregon’s famous exploding whale. I found these especially funny, since the couple who’d made them hadn’t been born yet when it happened. I giggled at the sweet absurdity and helped myself to a couple of whale spoke cards. I’ll probably gift one to a friend, and stick the other on my Peugeot.
I was starting to feel my energy fall off a bit, and I still had to get home. So after a lovely ninety minutes of bike-fueled socializing I said my goodbyes and headed home. The sun was beginning to peek out a little bit between the clouds as I retraced my route, and I was thrilled to spot a great blue heron atop a pole at one of the little boat piers, near a flock of cormorants showing off their wings. I heard a bird cry I couldn’t identify, but which sounded high and piercing like a raptor.
Once on the MAX train, I saw that every bike hook was in use, but I managed to find a spot where I could park my bike in a wheelchair space and sit next to it in one of the fold-down seats. I didn’t have to move the whole way back to NE Portland, which was good because the fatigue was really beginning to set in. Two miles back to the house, and a much-needed afternoon nap marked the end of the journey.
Total ridden, about 8 miles.
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