Been meaning to get out for a ride with the folks from OMG! Gravel and Adventure Club for a few months now but for one reason or another things just didn't work out. I know it's kind of a lame excuse but Wednesday (every other Wednesday to be exact) is the day I get the rabbits trimmed so that has contributed to not making the ride before. Any who, decided that there wasn't anything going on this Wednesday so I'd finally get on down and see what riding in Omaha is all about.
Threw the bike on and the gear in the car in the morning and took it all to work as I had no idea what the timing would be like from work to the meetup spot by the Bob Kerry bridge. Turns out I severely over estimated the amount of time it would take to get there at 4:45 and ended up with almost an hour to spare before the 6 o'clock meetup. Spun around the immediate area for a few but quickly ran out of things to see and do...
...so I decided to spin over the Heartland of America Park and see the sights over that way as well, as always it didn't disappoint.
After spending a few minutes in the park it was time to head back to the Bob and meetup with the rest of the group. Having never ridden with these guys before, they were probably wondering what the camera was all about but they seemed to go along with my paparazzi ways.
Not being too familiar with the Omaha Metro yet, especially the off the beaten path part, I had no clue where we were really but found some cool gravel within Omaha... then Conrad got his first flat of the night. Conrad is also a Lincoln transplant, I remember reading this guys blog back when everyone and their brother had one and he hung out with the Monkey Wrench guys. Hadn't ever ridden with him before though, good guy and strong rider.
It wasn't too much longer before more air needed to be added to the tire, which was OK with me as we had found some serious hills and the rest was much appreciated. Chasing skinny tires on the Pugs up and down hills can be a bit tiring.
After the third flat in the dark, battling Zika filled mosquitoes we decided that maybe we would just retrace our steps back toward town rather than proceed on the rest of the route.
This lead me to another first, the Surf Side Club for some fried catfish and beer, both went down pretty smooth after climbing all those hills. All in all it was a great first real ride in Omaha with the OMG Gravel folks, if timing works out I'm going to try to make these on a more regular basis. Good times and good group. Plus I discovered I need to learn Omaha by bike much better than I currently know it.
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