Yes, yes, it is that nice out...

And it looks like it's staying with us until March.

First bike ride in months.  First time in years that I have had regular physical activity every day.  And first lesson - biking muscles and walking muscles are actually fairly different even though they both involve legs.  And while the towpath seems level, unused biking muscles can detect the slope as you climb northwest.  Also, I should have changed into my padded biking shorts instead of plain short pants after Mass.  'Cause OW my butt!  How can my butt be so big but be so unprotected at the same time?

But a beautiful ride.  I want to come back on foot and explore the remains of a road that, according to my guide book, goes past various ruins, including a canal community, on the other side of the canal.  I've got some serious neck problems that may require me to trade for a recumbant cycle, but its worth the suffering on a day like today.  10 miles, then I went off to explore stuff on foot as well.  This area is the north end of where the canal barges locked in/out of Big Slackwater above Dam 4.  The cliffs here were too much to allow for a 60 ft wide, 10 ft deep canal to be built so they built the dam and created a 14 mile resevoir in the river.