THE MILD WEATHER continued today: a high in the mid-60s and faultless blue skies.  Until we hit the wind tunnel in "downtown" Rockville, we hardly even noticed that there was a wind.

On arrival back home, the neighbor greeted us, then joined us for the first "front porch wine drinking" event of this year.  We enjoy sitting on our front porch on pleasant afternoons and evenings, generally taking the opportunity to have a glass (or more) of wine.  The neighbors all understand that they need no specific or explicit invitation to join us: all are welcome when we are out.

It's one of the best things about living in the spot where we do: ALL of the neighbors on the court are especially good to one another, and to us.  It's truly a blessing, and made a great cap to the ride.

Today's ride took us (me on the fully-loaded Bike Friday, my wife accompanying me on her e-bike) through 15 miles of very familiar territory.  We picked our way through town to pick up the Rock Creek multi-use trail and went north to Lake Needwood, then turned around and followed the trail back downstream as far as Viers Mill Road.  

The advantages of riding in Rock Creek Park include no worries about cars (there's a hiker/biker trail that follows the line of Rock Creek) and plenty of shelter from the wind thanks to the trees in the park.  In the summertime, the canopy of leaves overhead make the park a cool refuge from hot, humid mid-Atlantic heat and humidity.  

The park was less busy on this pleasant Friday afternoon than it would have been on a weekend day; the ability to take advantage of that is part of the joy of being retired.

And, I discovered a recently-made and hitherto unknown-to-me connector link trail, that bypasses a very busy and not very appealing intersection.  (* Except for the fact that there's a Dairy Queen right there at the corner there's nothing at all appealing about that location.)  Following the connector link, we were eventually deposited right in front of the government office building where I worked for 15 years.

From that point, the remainder of the ride was a rehash of what was once my bicycle commuting route.