Hampton Falls Loop

Another storm has dropped 6 or more inches of rain on us. I haven't been doing as much riding due to the weather and spring chores. So here's a map of a ride.

Here's a map of the Hampton Falls Route 88 to Route 84 loop. It starts and ends at the Newfields Town Hall.


View Hampton Falls Loop in a larger map

Custom 12-32t cassette

The cassette holds the cogs or gears on the rear wheel. I had always ridden with wide range cassettes, whose spacing between the gears resulted in bigger jumps in the effort required for pedaling. Then I got my Aero, which came with a narrower range of gears for road bikes. The advantage of the road cassettes is you have gears more closely spaced. So, if you want to pedal just a little bit harder or easier, you can shift gears and not get a big change. The disadvantage is that you don't have the lower gears for hills. I got use to the road cassette, but found I wouldn't mind having a lower gear for hills, so I wouldn't have to shift the front onto the granny chainring. But I didn't want to give up the close spacing of the gears that I use most often.

Somewhere on a forum, Bacchetta's I believe, a person described how to create a custom cassette by changing the 12-27t cassette to a 12-32t.

You take the cassette off the bike and remove the 14 tooth cog. Buy a 32t cog and use the spacer that was between the 14t cog on the back of the cassette. Then add the 32t cog on the back. There are a number of videos on the web that show how to remove the cassette from the wheel. I bought the 32t Shimano Hyperglide sprocket from Harris Cyclery. The picture shows the 14t and 32t cogs and the spacer.

The gearing changes from 12,13,14,15,17,19,21,24,27 to 12,13,15,17,19,21,24,27,32. There's a big jump to the last cog, but I only use it when climbing a steep hill.

 I've been riding with this cassette for awhile and like it. I still have the closely spaced gears, but now have an easier gear when I hit a steeper hill. I rarely use the granny chainring on the front now.

Warm March Day

I'll take it. We never know what March is going to be like, but this one has been a warm one. The temps reached into the 70's today and many bikes and motorcycles took advantage of the day. I rode the Route 84 to Route 88 loop through Hampton Falls.

I was treated to seeing the horses from Little Brook Farm heading down the road.

A Hampton Falls church that was established in 1712 and further down the road is Applecrest Farm which gets very busy in the fall.

The last picture was taken along Drinkwater Road in Exeter.

ROAD CLOSED

That was a very common sign today. I had a hard time deciding which river to ride by, but ended up following a portion of the Lamprey River. A great day for a ride. My first ride this year without a jacket and gloves. The river is still running very high, but appears to be subsiding. Packers Falls in Durham was amazing.

This is the river above Packers Falls.

And just below Packers Falls, Bennet Road was closed.

I road up the river to Wadleigh Falls where it looks like the campground lost a picnic table to the river.

On the way home I stopped a Piscassic Ice Pond and took a picture. You can see that the water has gone down to almost normal.

Rain

We got approximately 8 inches of rain in two days and woke up yesterday with no power …. again. Plus the water in the basement was almost at the top of the hole for the sump pump. This is the third time the water has risen to that level in the 20 plus years that we have lived here. We got busy moving things in the basement, when, luckily, the power came back on before the water reached the level of the floor. Many rivers in the area are 5 feet above flood levels and are expected to remain at these levels for most of the week. The weather is suppose to turn for the better with temps reaching close to 60 degrees. I’m hoping to do a “river ride” this week. The normal level of Piscassic Ice Pond is beyond the first line of trees in the picture.

And Brian decided to try some skim boarding on the temporary stream in the backyard.

A Short Ride

I took a short ride on March 12th. I had to drop the van off for inspection, so I put the bike in the back and rode it home. A few pictures are below. It looks like a couple of cool rainy and windy days are headed our way for this weekend. Time to paint some rooms in the house.


An old but well kept cemetery on Bald Hill Road. I found more pictures of this cemetery here 

Went by a field waiting for spring planting.

Mulch Mountains

Another sign that spring is coming. The mountains of mulch are full size now. I guess they truck the mulch in during the winter to get ready for spring distribution. A couple of cyclist were riding by as I took the picture. I think they were wondering why I was taking a picture of an industrial park. Just one of those strange people on a recumbent I guess. The picture was taken on March 10, 2010

Brentwood Loop

This is a nice loop that starts and ends in “downtown” Newfields. You can park at the Town Hall across from the country store. There is also parking at the marker, which is at the power lines on Watson road in Exeter. Parking here will give you a shorter ride. There are not many hills and no big climbs. The roads are rural and not heavily traveled, but there are no shoulders most of the way. Route 27 does have shoulders and is the most heavily traveled road. You can see the map here.

Feels Like Spring

March 7,2010

It felt like spring today with temps in the 50’s, which is very nice for this time of year. Many cyclists were out to enjoy the day. Anyone who has lived here for awhile knows that March usually teases us with a few nice days. Winter can surely show itself again still. There were many reminders of the February 26th wind storm as I was riding. I saw a few men repairing the cables on a Saturday afternoon and a number of White Pine trees uprooted.

But there are also signs that spring cannot be too far away. The ice on Piscassic Ice Pond in Newfields is melting, Waldleigh Falls in Newmarket is running high and all over there are buckets hanging from the sugar maples.

Friday March 5

I thought I'd try this blogging stuff with a blog about my rides around the New Hampshire Seacoast area. I ride a Bacchetta Titanium Aero that I bought in 2003. I have over 17,000 miles on it, mostly in the NH seacoast area.

I finally got out for a ride today after losing power for 5 days due to a storm that dumped inches of rain on us then decided to blow the trees over with 90mph winds. Today was a beautiful day with temps above 40 degrees, so I just had to get out and try to start getting back in shape again. This picture was taken on Rt 111 in Brentwood. I did pass areas where a number of large white pine trees had blown over. Their root systems were pulled out of the ground and stood 10 feet high.