Tag: Morning Star Grocery

Grocery run

~ Patrick O'Grady ~ 16 Comments
Top of the morning to ye. …

Yesterday the Geezers made their annual run to the Morning Star Grocery, a 42-mile round trip from El Rancho Pendejo that chalks up about 2,400 feet of vertical gain.

Medals and promotions all around!

Ordinarily we do this ride in the fall, when Tonatiuh steps away from the stove to burn one, to wit, something other than us.

Not so this year. Someone (not Your Humble Narrator) thought it would be a swell idea to make the trip when the forecast was basically “hotter than the hubs of Hell.”

Nevertheless, we persisted. And one of us more than the others.

Yesterday I chose the New Albion Privateer for the Assault on Morning Star Grocery. But for today’s recovery ride in the Elena Gallegos Open Space I chose the gentler gearing of the Soma Double Cross.

Our peloton included three octogenarians and a couple gents sporting aftermarket parts installed after unscheduled getoffs. One of the 80-somethings may have been jealous of the cyborgs and hunting a retrofit of his own, because he crashed coming into Tijeras; alas, not hard enough to require the full Steve Austin makeover.

Bloodied but unbowed, our man soldiered on and made it to the grocery without further incident, accompanied by our senior officer, an 84-year-old motorhead who immediately began grilling a stranger about the technical specs of his BMW motorcycle.

I made it into the lead group, but was not first to the grocery. We were a trio, ticking along nicely at 155 beats per minute, and I knew that I’d have to find another 10 bpm somewhere starting about six miles out to win the roses. This I felt was a dog that would not hunt.

When the terrain shifted from straight climb to rollers one of the cyborgs got the jump on me and that was that. I found another 14 bpm, briefly, but not in time to close the gap. No bouquet, no podium girl, no anthem.

Well, it wasn’t my first rodeo. Sometimes you’re the cowboy, other times you’re the clown. Good times either way.

Like Bilbo Baggins I made it there and back again. Also like Bilbo, I ate and drank prodigiously afterward, and treated myself to a short nap. It was my fourth trip to the Morning Star and back, so I suppose you could say I’m making a hobbit of it.

Change of pace

~ Patrick O'Grady ~ Leave a comment
One of the rare flat spots on Tuesday’s ride through the Manzanitas.

A friend and neighbor who’s lived here longer than me and grown bored with The Duck! City menu of cycling possibilities proposed we try something a wee bit off the beaten path this week.

And so we motored up NM-337 a ways, parked at the Otero Canyon Trailhead, hopped aboard our trusty cyclocross bikes, and took a 21-mile tour of the rolling back alleys to the east and south, beginning with Juan Tomas Road and ending with Oak Flat Road.

One of the smoother descents.

Phil had warned me that we were headed for some steep, gnarly bits that could only be described as “roads” because they were passable by horse or halftrack. But they weren’t any worse than some of the knee- and tire-popping Paris-Roubaix-style bighorn-sheep circuits I used to wrangle in CusterTucky County, so I got along just fine on the old Steelman Eurocross with its new 34x32T low end and 33mm Donnelly MXPs.

To be sure, long stretches were steep as medical bills, with ruts that may recently have channeled hot lava, enough bad lines for a Sylvester Stallone film festival emceed by Carrot Top, and more baby-heads than the basement of the John Wayne Gacy Memorial Montessori School in Hell, if your idea of a baby is a 45-year-old Scandinavian blacksmith who dabbles in professional wrestling, rugby, and steroids.

But we saw plenty of wildflowers, and the motorists were mostly parked, hunting piñon.

Oak Flat dumped us back onto NM-337, just below the Morning Star Grocery, and we had a fine, high-speed plummet to our parking spot. As roller-coaster rides go it was worth the price of admission and then some.

Grocery run

~ Patrick O'Grady ~ 11 Comments
Here comes the sun, doo doo doo doo, etc.

When I haven’t been watching crazed seditionists screeching about immigrants living high on the dog or feeding less startling dishes of my own to visiting in-laws there’s been plenty of time for the ol’ bikey ridey around The Duck! City this past week.

The turnaround point.

On Wednesday my geezer brethren and I pedaled south and east through Tijeras and up to the Morning Star Grocery, just past Oak Flat on NM 337.

This annual outing is one of those “your mileage may vary” deals. A couple of us start from home; for me, the ride from El Rancho Pendejo and back is 42 miles with about 2,300 feet of vertical gain. Others drive to the meetup spot, a corporate grocery at Tramway and Central.

Our youngest (59) and oldest (82) riders were a little concerned about completing the entire ride this year. The first was undertrained due to travel and other distractions, while the second confided he felt a little less snappy on the hills lately.

But both soldiered on and finished with honor. Huzzah to one and all.

Miss Mia does her Bill the Cat impression.

With the Morning Star ride and a few lesser outings in the rear view I’ll top 150 miles for this week, which is a lot for me. Also, a good excuse to eat everything in the house. Veggie quesadillas, bolognese over egg noodles, pizza, you name it.

Not the cat, though. Not even with homemade pico de gallo.

The bright side

~ Patrick O'Grady ~ 31 Comments

The Morning Star Grocery, our turnaround point.

“Feeling good about government is like looking on the bright side of any catastrophe. When you quit looking on the bright side, the catastrophe is still there.”
— P.J. O’Rourke, “Parliament of Whores”

It’s true; the catastrophe remains. The bright side — yesterday, anyway — could be found along NM 337 south of Tijeras.

My fellow velo-geezers and I decided to skip our usual Wednesday spin through the Sandia Foothills in favor of an extended climb to the southeast, from the corner of Homeless and Hungry at the eastern edge of  The Duck! City to the Morning Star Grocery, just past the Carolino Canyon Open Space.

From El Rancho Pendejo we’re talking 42 miles round-trip with about 2,400 feet of vertical gain. I rode down to meet my compañeros at H&H, which Google Maps calls “Tramway and Central.” From there, it’s nothing but rolling hills, wide shoulders, and a single stoplight where Old Route 66 meets NM 337.

This is a two-bottle ride in cool weather, which it was; I started out wearing arm and knee warmers. In summer you can resupply as necessary at Los Vecinos Community Center or the Sandia District ranger station; toilets are available at both spots, too. For anyone feeling the urge at the turnaround there’s a porta-john outside the Morning Star.

The ascent from the stoplight to the grocery, nine miles or thereabouts, reminds me of the climb from Manitou Springs to Cascade, which the Mad Dogs did now and then in the Before-Time, when we still had the mighty legs of mastiffs instead of the quivering pins of Chihuahuas.

But while U.S. 24 has the shoulders of a young Calista Flockhart, NM 337’s shoulders are padded and smooth as a zoot suit, especially since both shoulders and highway recently got a fresh coat of asphalt. We got this intel preride from one of our number who reconned the route last Sunday, solo. Most manly.

One of these days I have to stop and snap some pix of this ride. But in a group I tend to get caught up in aimless chitchat interrupted by minor acts of aggression because hey, we may be old but we’re still cyclists. There will be attacks and counters.

Meanwhile, anyone out there feeling the ravages of time and contemplating an e-bike should know that our senior road warrior, who is 82, covered the whole route without electrical assistance and took his pulls in the paceline on the way back, too.

How’s that for a bright side, younguns?