Snow in the morning, riding in the afternoon

I woke at o'dark thirty this morning to prepare for a network change in Los Angeles, CA. All the work was done remotely except for the testing which was done by gate agents working for UAL at LAX airport.

Afterwards, I looked outside and saw about an inch of snow, tops, covering the ground and pavement in the neighborhood. But I did not lose hope of being able to ride today, because the forecast was for the skies to be sunny and temperatures to be in the low to mid 40s.

That's what I like about this area of Colorado, known to be part of the high desert plains I believe. The air is pretty dry most of the time, we're a mile closer to the sun than at sea level and we do luck out in getting about 300 days of sun a year.

Add all these factors up and the snow was pretty much history by 10am. All that remained at that point was wet slushy ice, and the roads were steaming up in miniature steam clouds as the pavement dried.

I drove my cage in to work at that point since the roads were still wet and the temperatures were at or below freezing, I should have ridden but oh well.

By the time I left work around 1330hrs, the roads were bone dry and I was almost, almost kicking myself for not riding. Still, Liesl, my 1987 560SL Mercedes had been sorely neglected over the last year so she deserved to get a little exercise.

Once I got home after running a couple of errands, I washed Liesl and put her away. On went my riding gear and out I went with Brigitta for a rather brisk ride towards the east, into the plains.

Temperatures were in the mid 30s to low 40s at this point, add in the wind chill when moving and I was finding myself wishing I'd put on an extra layer. Oh well! I had a pretty good ride nonetheless. Brigitta went into reserve fuel as I was heading east on Quincy Road so I stopped to turn around at the entrance to the Aurora Water Reservoir.

It was here I saw a good picture background for Brigitta, using the massive electric power line towers as the backdrop with a hint of the road heading off into the east:

Looking East to the Plains

Afterwards, keeping in mind I had limited fuel left, I rode further east by a few hundred feet and posed Brigitta in front of a satellite dish and support building I'd often seen while riding past on Quincy Road:

"I'm listening" the dish seems to say to me

I turned for home, stopping at the local gas station to fill her up. She took 4.6 gallons of the good stuff so I figure I had perhaps less than 1/2 gallon left when she had me go to full reserve.

Once I got home, my wife gently hinted....OK, strongly suggested that it was time to put the tupperware back on Maria since her services were done. I'd been delaying it due to work and just trying to see if other things needed to be done before I put it all back together. Taking the tupperware off is not hard, putting it back on can be a PITA sometimes. Doing it in high 30s temperatures outside the garage made it that much more special.

If you squint a little bit, you can see how the RT and GS models are similar. The RT is heavier though and the GS has stronger suspension and higher clearances.

A good day all in all, we had us a little snow that did not stick around. While not exactly warm, the rest of the day was good enough weather for riding! Another day in the 40s tomorrow, it'll be Maria who I take to work, she's much better for cold weather riding.