Sunday, November 15, 2020

2020: Jax Rails-to-Trails Bike Ride

 15 November 2020
Boat Maintenance Run: 2:15 to 4:00
Distance: 3.5 nm
Conditions: 80+ degrees, 100% humidity

Since we had a rental car and a desire for more bike exercise and sightseeing, we drove to the Jacksonville-Baldwin Rail Trail about 15 minutes from the marina. As we started on our way, we found we had an unexpected and uninvited hitchhiker on the hood of the car.






He managed to hang on until we sped up to 60 mph on Route 295. Then he flew off over the roof of the car never to be seen again.

Part of the Rails-to-Trails program, the amazing trail we visited today is a converted portion of the CSX Railway. 


Ready to start exploring the 
Jacksonville-Baldwin Rail Trail


After studying the map, we decided on exploring the first leg of the trail. Twelve miles round trip seemed like more than enough for one day.

     Leg 1: Imeson Rd to Halsema Rd 5.7 m
     Leg 2: Halsema Rd to Town of Baldwin 6.7 m
     Leg 3: Town of Baldwin to Brandy Branch Rd. 2.1 m




The trail was busy with people. We saw other bicyclists, joggers, walkers, scooters, and skate boarders.
 

Nicely paved, mostly flat



Nicely shaded


I played follow the leader all day.


The trail took us under bridges, over bridges, and past farmland. As we passed behind homes, I thought how great it would be to have this trail in my backyard.




Clark sped right by this turtle. I called him back
to take a photo. 








"Road" signs on the trail


"Bikeway Narrows" road sign

The trail had mile markers every mile. Knowing I had another 11 miles to go, I wondered how I would manage when my legs were already complaining at mile marker 1. I know from past experience that the first mile is usually the hardest as my body takes time to adjust to exercise. It did not help that the first two miles of the ride seemed to be a continuous, slight grade uphill. It still qualified as "mostly flat", but it was a tough start to the long-for-me, planned ride. 

When we finally arrived at the Halsema trailhead, we found a nice picnic / service area. It had picnic benches, water fountains, and even an air compressor and tools for a bike repair station. 


Water fountains for tall, short and dog. 


Unfortunately, due to corrosion,
it was not too appetizing.


Air pump and bike tire tools

Having biked the 5.7 miles to this point, I told Clark I needed to stop at the rest area before heading back. Besides nice restrooms, we found ourselves a friendly rooster and a side trip to a Civil War Memorial. As we pulled into the area, I heard two women talking about "them" being as friendly as a pet. I wondered who or what they were referring to until a rooster came over to make friends with me. 

One woman said, "He's looking for food. Got any treats?" At first I thought, no, and then I remembered that the snack I brought for myself was sunflower seeds, so I pulled out a handful and scattered them around. The rooster readily found each and every seed!







Ever observant, Clark noticed a pathway heading off at an angle from the rest area. He asked a man who had also stopped for a break what was up there, and we found out we could see a Civil War Memorial if we were willing to travel on potentially slippery wooden walkways to get there. He said it was about a mile down the path. Of course Clark wanted to take a look, so we diverted from the main trail to see what we would see. 

Lucky for me, the memorial was more like 500 feet down the path instead of 5000! That guy sure had a warped sense of distance (thankfully)! This accidental find turned out to be the most interesting part of the bike ride. 


Walkway to the Civil War Memorial

The path led us to a circular area with signs identifying the various flora in the area. Each had a unique,Civil War - related identifier with a blurb on the history of the flora. For example, we saw 
  • Booker T Washington Sycamore
  • Harriet Beecher Stowe White Ash
  • Battery Park Live Oak
  • Andersonville Southern Magnolia
  • Stonewall Jackson Prayer Oak
  • Seminary Ridge White Oak
  • Robert E. Lee Tulip Poplar
  • Gettysburg Address Honeylocust



Stonewall Jackson Prayer Oak


Gettysburg Address Honeylocust

Camp Milton served as a Civil War fortification and encampment. 



Description of Camp Milton


Captured during the war


A major military camp

Also, near this site, we saw The Harvey Farm. More details of this area can be seen at the referenced website. 


The Harvey Farm


Twice today my bike tire made unusual noises. The first time the noise was generated by a leaf stuck between the fender and the tire - no biggy. I fixed that problem by rolling the bike backwards a rotation.

The next time I heard noises coming from my front tire, "Pop", followed by "tinkle, tinkle, tinkle", I knew exactly what had happened. A spoke had broken! I called Clark to come back to help as I figured he would know what to do. Surprisingly, he just twisted the broken spoke around a neighboring one, so it would not get jammed up somewhere. We then added the repair to our "to do" list and continued on our way.

Having reached the end of our planned trip (and them some), we started back to the car. Only 5.7 miles to go! Oh yay! Clark was perpetually way ahead of me and happily peddling away. At each of the crossroads we would come to a stop sign, and I would yell, "Clark! Clark! Stoppppp!" Occasionally I needed to stop, stretch my legs and neck, get a drink, and take a deep breath to keep going. My "Energizer Bunny" husband does not ever seem to have a need to take a break.

At one such stop sign, I could hear a plane overhead, and I thought that sounds like a bi-plane. It was not that, but it was a small plane with the pilot doing stunts. We saw the pilot do loops and rotations as the plane passed overhead. Clark got a show, and I got a bit of a rest.

When we got back to the parking lot, I climbed off my bike and dragged myself over to the car. We only had a small snack with us on the trail, so as soon as we got back to the boat, I made lunch. I wanted to take a nap, but part two of today was just starting. We needed to take the boat out for a maintenance run today and a pump out of the holding tank. Since we were already at the fuel dock for the pump out, we decided to fill up the boat with fuel. As I stood watching the dials indicating fuel levels and reports fill amounts to Clark, I felt like I could fall asleep on my feet. 

It took an hour at the fuel dock because of all the things we did there. Afterwards, we went for our quick maintenance trip down the Ortega River to the fixed bridge and back. The sights were the same today as on our last jaunt downstream; however, today we had sun instead of cloudy, overcast skies. 

For as much as I wanted to take a nap, I did not. After tying up in our slip, I immediately started working on preparing for our car trip home to New Jersey. All thoughts of sleep quickly disappeared as I threw myself into planning mode. After that, I worked on the Blog to be caught up on that before we head north. 

I guess the predicted 100% humidity finally became too much and the skies finally opened up and let all that water fall. We had quite a deluge going on for a while. Later, the heavy cloud cover prevented our satellite TV from finding the satellite, so the Hallmark Channel was not an option tonight.


Sun hiding at the marina


More clouds moving in


Getting ready for a downpour


No colorful sunset tonight.









2020: Jax Park Tour Day 2

14 November 2020
No boat travel.

This morning we picked up a rental car, which gave us an opportunity to explore parks a little further afield than yesterday. Clark mapped out a route that took us to three different parks where we whipped out our bicycles for a quick tour of the area. 

Our first stop was Tillie K. Fowler Regional Park where we found an historic marker commemorating the areas contribution to World War I. Our exploration here took us on boardwalks built over swamp land and ended at a lookout tower unfortunately boarded up due to its unsafe condition. 


We followed the Blue Trail to the
lookout tower.


World War I Historical Marker
explaining part of Jacksonville's contribution 
to the war effort.


Slippery, Wooden Walkway over Wetlands 


Bit swampy out there


Lookout Tower  - closed off to 
public access, sigh!


End of the trail, time to turn back!

In the very, very short time we took pictures at the lookout tower, someone had come along the trail and moved logs into the path. It confused me a bit since they were not there no more than 10 minutes ago (if that). For someone with a trail bike, they probably made great "jumps". For us on collapsible road bikes, they made the trail impassable. Too bad for the jumper because Clark and I moved them back off the trail. 

After arriving back at the rental car, we set off in search of Riverside Park. Here we found a pool of water with lovely fountains and lots of birds - some more attractive in appearance than others.


Fountains at Riverside Park in
Jacksonville, FL


Two guys with a loaf of bread clearly
ignoring the sign on the fence saying
"Please do not feed the birds."


Now I know where there expression "ugly duck" 
comes from (and this was one of the better 
looking ones).


An island in the pool for all the 
appreciative water fowl and Ibis.


Rainbow fountain


Clark had one more park on his list, so we headed there next - Memorial Park.






World War I Memorial



A pair of eagles were added to the memorial in 1926.


This park with nicely paved walkways contained lots of folks that were taking advantage of the nice day. Given the size of the park staying physically distant was not an issue.


Clark and Ev at Memorial Park in Jacksonville, FL


Very quickly we had seen all that Memorial Park had to offer. Before leaving the area we had a bit of a look around since the park was on the St. Johns River.


Jacksonville, FL


Private Property / Parking along the St Johns River






When we parked our car by the park, we saw an antique vehicle parking nearby. Before we left, I had Clark grab a couple of pictures for the blog.


Custom Convertible Comet circa 1963



After a fun day at the parks, we returned to the marina. Walking down our dock back to our boat, we felt eyes on us as we walked by one of the boats a few slips away from ours.


Boat Cat!


After dinner, I spent the whole night transferring pictures from cameras and phones to my laptop and working on the Blog.