April Fool's Has Come And Passed ...

Put on your "I'm With Stupid" T-shirt and follow me!

And I'm the biggest fool at last.

After a really good training ride yesterday, I felt confident as I headed out today.  I took my Giant FCR3 up the Eisenbahn State Trail into Fond du Lac County, then headed east with the vague notion that I would check out the mountain bike trails at New Fane.  I wasn’t on a mountain bike, but I had my state trail pass with me ...

But a funny thing happened on the way to New Fane: I couldn’t climb worth a damn.  (That’s funny strange, not funny ha-ha.)  Going slower than expected meant I was running out of daylight and the trails would have to wait for another time.  I took Mill Road south, even though that would mean another slow grinder of a hill once I got to East Moraine Drive.  But shortly after I turned onto Mill Road I saw County Line Drive.  It was unpaved, and I love unpaved roads.  I probably hadn’t noticed it before because I had always passed it on my road bike and it wouldn’t have been so appealing.  Today it looked inviting—something new to me and, perhaps, a chance to head east to Kettle Moraine Drive without slogging up another hill.

Well, that was the theory, anyway.  The reality is that just 1,000 feet east of Mill Road, County Line ends at a cable stretched across the road.  But on the other side of the cable is a snowmobile/equestrian trail.  I have good cyclocross tires on the FCR3 and I figured I could make it through.  And I did, but I can’t say I’d recommend it.  A mile on grass, mud and snow was frustratingly slow, and when I was done I still had to climb East Moraine Drive.  What was supposed to be a shortcut actually cost me time and precious daylight.  I had just enough to get back to Lighthouse Lane and the safety of the Eisenbahn before my lack of a headlight became a real liability.  Still, dumb.