6 Miles on the Tanglefoot Trail

Okay...okay......Carrie is keeping me honest here.......actually it was three miles one way....3 miles back.....but hey that's progress!! As a new baby boomer biker.....I'm proud of my progress)))) All week long my biking as been circling the building at Trendy Tree. Not much to look at, but the safest place to do a little short burst of riding. It takes time to get really comfortable riding again and I'll be even more comfortable when I find a bigger seat! And I'm still looking for a basket, bag or something to clip to the handlebars to carry stuff. I could have used a Diet Coke a time or two this morning))) We didn't start out too early this morning....left around 9:00....Carrie, Maggie and me again. I'm trying to talk the hubby into getting a bike and he's coming around to it I think. We got on the Tanglefoot Trail close to the shop in industrial park......right across the parking lot from Sydnei's Kitchen. This is one of our favorite lunch places when we feel we deserve more than a ham sandwich for lunch. Sydnei's serves breakfast on Saturdays. That's something to keep in mind on our next outing. We headed north toward New Albany and rode three miles. This stretch of the trail just really isn't very pretty yet. There are a couple of wooden bridges that are nice and we did see some soybean fields with there orangey brown and yellow leaves, beans just about ready for harvesting and some pretty pastureland. There were lots of shady places and the breeze was nice. The best thing about this ride was just being out in the fresh air with good company. I did my best to point out "nature" things to Maggie.....see that red bird.....listen....it's a babbling brook.....there goes a lizard! Maggie finally said very dryly...."oh yeah NeNe" ......rolled her eyes and sped past me. But I know...one of these days she'll look back and probably tell her little children about the day she rode bikes on the trail with NeNe. It will probably be a tale about that first ride when I nearly collapsed before getting back to shop....but hey.....we can't choose the memories that our grandchildren will have of us. Seems like the birds sing louder when you're out just enjoying the world around you, even if it's not the prettiest stretch of the trail. And the babbling brook....as we rode a little closer.....well....it was water running out of a culvert into a ditch....lol.....well....it SOUNDED like a babbling brook))) Now, let me be clear, this isn't my photo. We did not see this deer on the trail this morning.....but someone did some time ago. I show you the picture because we did see plenty of Kudzu. If you're not familiar with the green plant, Kudzu, it was planted in the south during the depression by the Soil Conversation Service to prevent erosion of land. It has taken over.....it grows over trees...fences.....light poles......anything that stays still longer than a few seconds.....don't take too many rest breaks... There was a bridge over a creek that was pretty....so there are some nice views on this short stretch even if I have made it sound drab. And you do have to watch out for falling nuts! Not the kind that might fall off a bike headed toward you.....the kind falling off Hickory trees and oak trees that have limbs overhanging the trail. Hickory nuts and acorns to be exact.....course if you're with local folk.....that would be "hicker" nuts and "akerns." We have huge oak trees around our place and I mean really.....acorns coming down from the tops of those trees can really zing you! We met several other people also exploring the trail.....moms with kids......middle age ladies with dads (assumming here), elderly couples walking, the loners were mostly men and we met two gentlemen that were very nice. One was a middle aged guy and he was with an elderly man who looked like his father probably, they were walking the trail and had started at New Albany. I asked if they were walking to Pontotoc and they said no.....they were headed to Algoma.....quite a ways down the trail! The middle aged guy said he had driven 9 hours from South Carolina just to walk the Tanglefoot Trail and the elderly gentleman said he lived in Corinth. Made me feel a little embarrassed that we hadn't gone the full length of the trail yet....even by golf cart! They were planning to make it to Algoma, eat at the country store there and head back I guess in time to make it back to New Albany by sundown. The trail closes 30 minutes after sundown. After we hit a three mile marker, we headed back. Pedaling had really been pretty easy going north.....while you enjoy that time, you just know it's a bad sign.......going back is bound to be harder. And it was, we had to stop for a couple of rest breaks for me and I did walk for about half a mile as we got closer to our exit point. I called this....my cooling down period...lol Overall, I made the trip much better than last week and look forward to going further the next time. I think we could make it all the way to Ecru on the next ride.....and maybe just call for pickup service from there instead of riding back.....doesn't that make sense! See more of the trail......and hey.....maybe it will be easy pedaling all the way to Ecru)))