A Late September Bike Ride On The Bellevue Loop

Haworth Park Seen From Bellevue Loop Trailhead

Back On Our Tandem Again

Excuses, excuses! We neglected riding our bike this summer with excuses of "it's too hot", "we need to do this instead", and stuff like that.

Realizing that it was now officially fall, and September was almost over, we finally had the desire on a pleasant day in late September to pump up the tires on our Cannondale tandem, load it on the car's bike rack, and head for the Bellevue Loop.

Bellevue Loop Whew!

Too Much For Us?

A little more than a mile into our ride we were disappointed to discover that bike riding was much more work than we remembered, and we needed a break already!

Hmm? Are we now too old for riding a bike? It sort of felt like it, after all this is a fairly easy trail ride.

We discussed going back, but neither of us really wanted to do that, and after a few minutes we got back on our Cannondale and continued down the trail.

Bellevue Loop Lake Along The Trail

Bellevue Loop Lake Along The Trail?

We felt better after our little break, and pedaling went much easier. Guess we just needed that little break. We now felt much better about ourselves.

The trail had much more water alongside of it than we had ever seen. Some of it was rather pretty and looked like small lakes, though other parts had muddy streams and almost swamp like appearances. Many of the farmers' fields looked to be in much less than ideal conditions.

However, the flooding had eliminated some of the underbrush between the trail and the Missouri River, and we were able to see things that had been hidden from view before.

Bellevue Loop Farm

Not Everything Was Flooded

I'll add this picture taken a bit further down the trail to show that not everything was flooded. This farm looked nice.

So far we had the trail to ourselves, but in this area we began to see a few people out, mostly on bikes. It was nice to see a couple recumbants, including a tandem recumbant!

Bellevue Loop Trailhead Parking

Break Time At The Trail Head

Somewhat amazed at ourselves, we did make it to this trailhead parking, about five miles down the trail! It was time for a snack, and sitting around and enjoying the place. Strange that something so nice is so close to the sewage treatment plant.

This picture was taken under the same bridge pictured earlier.

Bellevue Loop Papio Creek and Bridge

Beyond The Sewage Treatment Plant

Knowing that by the time we got back to the car, we would have accomplished a ten mile bike ride, we did not venture further down the trail, but we did take this picture to remember how high the Papio Creek was on this day.

Bellevue Loop Wildlife

Bellevue Loop Wildlife

Our ride back was uneventful, and we did take one break. I like to stop here, mainly because this is where Vicky once saw five deer, and we usually are able to see hawks (they seem to like this area, too).

As usual, the hawks were here, but no deer this time.

We soon left, and rode the rest of the way to the car. This last portion of the ride went quite well, and we made better speed than we expected.

We were a bit stiff and sore after this ride, but not real bad. An acceptable amount of discomfort, if I were to describe it.

Length of this bike ride: 10.4 Miles

Weather on this bike ride: Sunny, in the low to mid 80s, light breeze from the south. Perfect bike riding weather!

Average speed of this bike ride: 8.9 mph

Top Speed of this bike ride: 14.4 mph

Total miles biked together in 2010: 50.3 Miles

Total miles we've ridden on our tandem: 187 Miles

Date of this ride: September 29, 2010

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