On a Roll

Today I rollerbladed^TM for about the 3rd time in 5 years. I went from the office in Mountain View to the Palo Alto Baylands and back for a round trip of about 7 miles. The wind was brisk but not ridiculous. At first, the path had a few patches: The tar was spread over cracks in the asphalt as if icing were drizzled over a cake to hide its imperfections. This coupled with the headwind made the initial going a little slow. After the first couple miles, I got used to the wind and the path smoothed out a bit.

As I got to the baylands, the trail got a bit more uneven. It's kind of an odd feeling coasting along with one foot several inches higher than the other. I made it out to this frontage road to the freeway, and the trail continued (all the way to Ikea, I think), but I figured I should get back to the office.

On the way back, I took a slightly different route and found a nice smooth part of the trail. Not super smooth like I remember this one part of the quad at U of I (or the linoleum in the dorm basements there), but smooth enough. I made the final turn to return to the office and had a couple miles where the wind was directly at my back. This was the payoff for the earlier workout-- skating effortlessly, zipping along, and actually looking like I know what I'm doing.