Berkshire Cycling: Great Barrington - Sheffield Loop 2

18 miles   Paved Roads

Towns: Great Barrington, Egremont, Sheffield

Parking: Great Barrington

 

Pond usually covered with geese

Another nice after-work ride for me, not too long and generally flat. When I ride near home after work it is always hilly … not always what I want to see after a long day and commute. So I often ride here, then drive home. This ride goes west from Great Barrington to the pretty, very traditional white-building, town of South Egremont, then south past the Appalachian Trail before turning back west in Sheffield.

View of hills to east

One of these days I’ll ride to the top of Mount Washington, past Bash-Bish falls, but my defeat on Washington Mountain Road chastened me enough to wait another few weeks before trying  this south county hill. 

Sheep farm

The two Washingtons are confusing, even to area residents.  One is a hilltown, simply named Washington, with “Washington Mountain Road” leading to it from the northwest. It is large in area, small in population, with most of its landmass  unpopulated in October Mountain State Forest. The other town is Mount Washington, located on the Connecticut/New York border, featuring (surprise) Mount Washington.  Even the Commonwealth can get confused: once about fifteen years ago the state deposited monies due to Mount Washington into the bank account of Washington. Both are small towns, and no one realized the error for months. 

   

 

On today’s ride I pass the Appalachian Trail Conservancy’s Kellogg Center, located on Rt. 41. This mid-18^th century farmhouse was a gift to the Trail Conservancy, is the regional office for Massachusetts and Connecticut, and offers workshops and retreats for staff and hikers. 

Continuing south, on the other side of the road the herd of sheep reminded me of my trip to the Languedoc in southern France. Though the Cévennes are much more rugged, and high, than the Berkshires, some people say that they aren't really mountains, just as I say the Berkshires are hills. The Cévennes are sheep country and provide milk for Roquefort cheese. There is a growing cheese industry here, but I haven’t learned of any local sheep-milk cheese.

The ride across Berkshire School Road is fast and flat, followed by a short stint on Rt. 7, a jog over to Boardman and the ride back to central Great Barrington.

Roads: From Great Barrington travel west on Rt. 23 to South Egremont, turn south on Rt. 41, then left onto Berkshire School Road. Follow it back to Rt. 7, turn north and follow Rt. 7 for a short distance to Maple Street. Right on Maple then left on Boardman. Left when Boardman ends onto Brookview which takes you quickly back to 7. North to Great Barrington center.

Berkshire Rides List

Berkshire Cycling: Washington – Becket Loop 2

12 miles                Moderate               Paved roads

Towns: Washington, Becket
Parking: Washington Town Park, Rt. 8

My riding recently has all been training, not worth reporting here, but valuable for me. From the bottom of the hill I live on, all roads go uphill: gradually to the south and north, more steeply to the east and west. This is good hill training territory, but they are hills, not mountains (whatever they may be named.)

Mid-spring chartreuse

By the way, the more I use Map My Ride (which I think is a great tool) the less I understand its climbing grades. A grade is a grade, and the percent should remain the same, because the road doesn’t change. But their numbers change, apparently varying with the distance of the ride. It must be taking some kind of average, and I take it with a grain of salt. Someone could explain this to me.

Blooming shadbush

However much as I enjoy spring, with its growth, colors, and early green vegetables, there are simultaneously many things I dislike about it: spring here is very short, this year made up mostly of snow, glimpses of sun, extended periods of rain and fog. Also, there is far too much to do, the snow melt exposes every project not finished last autumn, not to mention all the erosion and downed branches from the winter. There are chores. And there is the garden, with its endless spring busy-ness.

On the other hand, one of the joys in riding (forget those chores, get on the bike!) is watching the forest floor and trees come back to colorful life. The shades of chartreuse in the woods start so pale that they can barely be seen, coloring up until sometime in June.

Trillium dot the forest floor

Now wildflowers paint the forest floor here with their blues, reds and whites; the stronger yellows and pinks will come later in these high woodlands.

Violets

Historic one-room schoolhouse

This ride is a nice short one that links easily with others, Ridden this direction it offers a good, gradual climb to the top of the ridge, which is generally flat and goes past the historic Washington School House and St. Andrew’s Chapel on the Bucksteep Property. The ride down Frost Road is fast and steep. 

In today's ride I got in about 800 feet of climbing and made a start back to hill-fitness. And I badly need to get back there if I am going to get back into the mountains, which I plan to do.

Roads: South on Route 8 Route 8 to the intersection of County Road in Becket. Right on County, then immediately straight onto McInerney (which becomes Washington Mountain Road, aka Pittsfield Road.) Follow it to Frost Road, turn right onto Frost, which is a nice fast downhill back to Rt. 8. Right on Rt. 8.  

Berkshire Rides List

Berkshire Cycling: Algerie Road

11 miles   Paved

Town: Becket & Otis, MA

Parking: Corner of Bonnie Rigg Hill and Algerie Rd            

After a very tedious 3 weeks trying to shake a wretched respiratory bug, I can no longer bear being such a slug. The medical world tells me that I should be “taking it easy and not pushing myself…” well this ride is certainly easy and I didn’t push. I rode. It’s this year's first outdoor ride, off the stationary set-up this year: a month later than last year and six weeks later than the year before. Not good.

The Berkshires Hills are, well, hilly but Algerie Road in Otis offers some of  the flattest cycling found outside the river valleys: not only is it no more than a 4% grade, it is not more than a 2% grade, good for training drills requiring flat terrain, or just for a pleasant, pretty ride. Expect little traffic except the occasional semi-trailers hauling stone to and from the granite quarry.  Chester Granite Quarry is worth a stop and look-around if you enjoy stone, to admire the beautiful granite that they quarry, shape and polish.  
 

The ice remained on some local lakes, ponds and swamps, but it was gone here in Otis. As soon as the ice leaves, the spring peepers arrive. They are little nocturnal frogs, not more than 1-1/4 inches long, with a pointy nose, a tannish color, and large feet designed to grip and climb trees and bushes. They’re cute in a kind of reptilian way. Their whistling calls create a big racket, quite the din, in early spring woods and wetlands. We sometimes hear them from half a mile away, their calls becoming loudest at night. They are a welcome sign of spring in New England.

Coltsfoot is another early spring arrival, the first flower I usually see. Its bright yellow shape appears on a naked, leafless stem (the big leaves arrive later) looking something like a dandelion. The plant is extremely invasive and is especially mobile in disturbed soil, where it is often found on the edge of roadsides in large colonies. Colonists brought it from Europe, for it served them as a herbal medicinal which they used to treat lung ailments. Medieval storefront signs, at least in Paris, were carved or drawn symbols, not written words. For pharmacies the emblem was of coltsfoot leaves. By the way, beavers grazed the twigs in the photo next to the coltsfoot.

The redpolls have left to return to their northern summer homes and our summer birds are beginning to return here, with mergansers, mallards and wood ducks back on the pond nearest my house. Today I saw several year-round residents also: most notably the pileated woodpecker that flew across Algerie Road and the kingfisher hard at work in the brook. Here's a hooded merganser.

Roads: One way ride. Algerie Rd. to Rt. 23 and return.

Berkshire Rides List