Thursday, Jan. 17, 2019 – Another Nice Long Ride on Flash

My plan for today's ride was to try to find a more efficient way to do a loop to and through Riverbed Park, by finding the first crossover road or canal that would take me on the most direct route. By looking at Google Earth, it looked like there was a canal that might do it, but it's hard to say from the satellite pictures for sure. We headed straight east to the canal in our neighborhood, then took that due south until we hit Indiantown Road where we crossed the four lane highway. Fortunately, it's just before the road narrows to two lanes, so there's not usually too much traffic here. We crossed with no problems, then continued south along the road, which had an asphalt bike path as well as a grassy ditch that was wide enough to get us clear of the road with no problem. A few tenths of a mile down that road led us to the first canal, and we heading straight east from that point, mostly along the back yards of houses along the way. There was one yard with a blue tarp covering some things, and Flash got very antsy about passing it, so I had to back him up until we were past it, the only way I've been able to get him past things that freak him out. Fortunately he's very cooperative on his backing, even for the good 30 yards or so we had to go, then I turned him to face the front again just after we passed it, and he was fine. Funny the things that bother him! When we reached the end of the canal at Jupiter Farms Road, there was major construction at the intersection, including a huge shovel and bulldozer, and a large noisy generator. The bulldozer driver waved at me and got out of the way, and the shovel driver saw me and responded to my request to pass through the very narrow part of the road which they were mostly blocking. He put his shovel down and turned off the machine long enough to let us pass, and Flash moved through with just a bit of urging from me. We crossed the road and entered Riverbend, where Flash decided it was time to hop up to his fairly fast cordo gait, which he kept up the entire time we were in the park (about 4.5 miles) until about the last half mile, when he finally dropped back down to a walk, exiting through the tunnel under Indiantown Road.  We took a slight detour on what I guessed later was actually a hiking trail, but then rejoined the equestrian trail and headed back into Cypress Creek Trail again, which took us home in the usual way. A good ride, over three hours, and nearly 16.5 miles, in beautiful weather, which we've had a lot of lately!  Got home and did a little housework, then resumed our binge-watching of Downton Abbey for the evening.

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