It was going to happen at some point this weekend. The land is flat and we brought our bikes. There are long stretches of road and we’re on the right side of the bay. I had this feeling of certainty: The sky is blue, the water is blue-green and I’m riding to Fort Morgan.
My mother used to play here when she was on vacations as a child. She took me there once or twice when I was a teenager. We’re only 30 miles away.
So we were looking at routes last night and The Yankee says, “Let’s ride to this Fort Morgan place.”
It seemed a bit long for her, but she suggested it, so we went.
We had a slight headwind as we headed west. We did a quick turn off the main road on the coast, up to a state park. We did six miles through woods on a bike path, sliding past lagoons and katydids and then two or three more miles of RVs decked out in Alabama and LSU regalia.
And then we joined the cars again, more woods, beaches, beach houses. Head winds. A beautiful, warm summer day. It would make sense that we’d get the tailwind on the way back. We even passed this street:
But the air was dead still on our return trip. This ride, The Yankee said, was a better idea last night when she was in the air conditioning. But it was a great ride. We stopped at a marina and topped off our drinks. I tried new cycling snacks of gels and crackers and things.
We just missed a coastal rainfall, the kind you can set your clock by each afternoon. We did not miss the post-rain humidity, though. Essentially this route took us across the entire width of Baldwin County. It was sunny and the heat index barely made the mid-90s. I love to ride like this. We had plenty of wonderful views:
Here are my seat stays and seat tube, after a flat, steady 60-mile ride:
The dirtier it gets, the better it looks. Just wish I’d been pedaling harder.
We had lunch, cleaned up and then went fishing with our hosts. We caught nothing.
That’s not true. We became very proficient at catching bait fish. Other fish would then eat the eyeballs of those fish. Eyeball-less bait is unattractive to what we were after, so we’d have to catch more bait. And this cycle repeated itself for hours. Fish eyeballs, it seems, are a delicacy in the Gulf this season.
As the sun went down we got cleaned up again and headed out for dinner at the famous Wintzell’s Oyster House.
Tomorrow, she tells me, we’re taking a much shorter ride.
