Coniferus Interruptus

The last two times I've ridden out east of town, I've had my path blocked by a fallen pine tree.



On the Arabia Mountain trail, the really nice 1700 foot boardwalk was bisected by a pair of pine trees that came down during a storm. It only took three days to repair the damage, but one of those days was the day I chose to ride this trail. I was able to dismount, lift my bike across the gap in the boardwalk, climb back up onto the boardwalk and continue, but I took my odometer off so I wouldn't count that against my average speed ;-).

Today, we rode our new favorite route to Stone Mountain. While entering the park, several members of our group heard a loud pop and sizzle sound. After noticing the power lines were dancing, we realized a transformer had blown. The park police were summoned and arrived within moments.

We continued our usual clockwise traversal of the outer loop, passed the Evergreen Conference Center and came across more park police. They had found the cause of the blown transformer. Another pine tree. It had fallen across the road, took down the power line, and blocked my path once again. I was taking my odometer off to enter this portion of the obstacle course, but the officer didn't let us on that stretch of road until Georgia Power could make it safe.

Two rides in less than two weeks interrupted by fallen pine trees. What other strange coincidences should we expect?

Well, Michael was able to burst both his tubes on the same hard spot. At least this was more efficient than bursting them in two different locations and making us stop twice.