Natalia la Exploradora

I rode my bike on this cool trail last night as the sun was setting. I even put on my helmet, though I felt like a goober, because I thought it may get wild. Indeed, it did.

I took off down Teson, cut through White Birch Estates which backs up to Truman Park, and took the paved trail to the end where it diverges into three dirt paths overlooking the Missouri river bottom. I reached the top of the hill where the pavement ends and dirt begins and slammed on my breaks! Maybe 15 feet from me was this huge doe hanging out on the trail. After staring at each other for 20 seconds, she decided I was harmless and started sniffing around. I was like "Excuse me, but I was going to take that dirt trail..." and began rolling towards her. She jetted off the path. I cautiously began rolling down the narrowed path. I'd seen the damage deer can do to cars--imagine if she freaked out an knocked me off my bike?!

I continued on, gaining speed, took this bumpy trail through spiderwebs, brambles, over fallen logs, through mud, twisting and turning... there were various trails coming and going so I just took them at random without a clue where I was or where I was going. That sense of adventure and pursuit of the unknown is one of my favorite things in life. Call me Dora la Exploradora.

All of a sudden I came upon an open clearing, full of super tall prairie grass (no idea where I was) and there was the doe was bounding next to me again! It almost felt like a dream sequence. I stopped and talked to her a few seconds when she stopped to nose at something. I pushed on into the dark canopy... after exploring a few more winding trails at random, I got spit out at the back of Riverwood Estates subdivision. I reluctantly left my jungle trail and began my suburban ride-- including a 1/2 mile huge hill-- whew! I rode the couple miles back through another park and sat on the playground to reply to a text as dusk approached. Suddenly my parents and our neighbors appear on their evening walk. I wave and say "hey! Hey guys!" they give me a nervous wave and muster an uninterested "hi". As they walk away I realize they haven't recognized me! I yell, "I'm your daughter!!!!" but they don't hear me. So that was weird.

I used gmaps to try to estimate how far it was, but none of the jungle-like winding dirt trails are on there. I'm thinking maybe 6 miles. Yay!

Saturday I looking forward to biking 7 miles to the community center, swimming 1 hour, then biking 7 miles home to (hopefully be able to force myself to) run my regular 2 mile route-- but the pool was closed for cleaning so I did NONE of the above. Sigh! The triathlon is less than a month away! I need to up my running another mile consistently and get used to that.

Gah, I hate running.

But an adventurous ride through the jungles of Hazelwood, Missouri, now that's another story....