Receding Waters

It's been a rainy weekend, but yesterday I was lucky enough to sneak in a ride between storms.  I had planned on a short ride to run errands, and maybe head over to Fort Snelling and back.  I ended up riding for 3+ hours.  I explored some trails in Fort Snelling State Park that I'll likely include in my Bike Path Metric ride, and then headed over to Mendota to check on the condition of the MN Valley Trail.  The river had receded enough that I could access the trail, and surprisingly it was rideable from Mendota to at least Interstate 494.

The river was still covering a section at the beginning of the trail, but that was easily ridden around via a sand bar that had formed between the river and the trail.  

Once on the trail there were a fair number of puddles and quite a bit of sand, but it was easily rideable on the fat tires of the PMP.  The relatively smooth Hookworm tires would spin out if I pedaled too hard in the slick areas, but it wasn't much of an issue on the flat trail.  I'm beginning to wonder if a low profile knobby tire might be a better option for the summer, or if I should just stick with the Hookworms.  I might try an Endomorph, or even an Innova Spider, up front along with a 2.35-2.5 low profile knobby in back... the added height of the large volume front tire would be a nice side effect.

On my way home, I stopped to take some photos of the flowering trees along the Minnehaha Creek Trail.  It's always a neat section of trail this time of year...

Earlier in the week I installed a different stem on the PMP... one with less rise and more reach.  Not sure which stem I like more, so I'll probably keep experimenting.  The bike seemed to handle a bit better with the longer stem, but I'm not sure if the lower handlebars are worth it.  I am having a lot of fun riding and tinkering with this bike, but I'm looking forward to getting out for a long ride, or a singletrack ride, on one of the Fargos.