Old New New Year’s Tradition

Last Jan­u­ary 1st I remarked that we had started (after all of 2 in a row) a new tra­di­tion of tak­ing a hike in the Sumter National For­rest on New Year’s Day. This year our hik­ing com­pan­ions were non-committal and a plead­ing phone call from an old friend made us revive an old tra­di­tion with some folks who con­tin­ued on in our recent absence. We joined the Aiken Bicy­cle Club on a ride to Aiken State Park.

In the inter­ven­ing 5 years or so since we last did this with the ABC a cou­ple of things were dif­fer­ent. 1) Donna and I were rid­ing a tan­dem instead of sep­a­rate bikes and 2) the Aiken State Park was now called Aiken State Nat­ural Area. (I won­der what the dif­fer­ence is?)

The Nat­ural Area is a 22 mile one way trip and see­ing as that is about 2 miles fur­ther than we have rid­den in a long time and there was a catered lunch wait­ing there for us, we opted, along with about 1/2 of the cyclists, for a ride back to Aiken in a car with the bikes on a trailer.

Because it was such a beau­ti­ful day for Jan­u­ary, we had plenty of day­light left when we got back and tomor­row promises rain, so we climbed into the Miata and went for a 50 mile or so drive.