Hello...hello...ello...lo...oo......

Is anybody still here?

We've had kind of a crappy winter for riding, but I have managed to get out for a few impromtu spins around the 'hood and thought maybe a few pics might help cure your winter blues......

Here's a few pics from a ride I took just before Christmas...it was colder than it looks in the pics and I bundled up and rode South.



You know something's old when you see "MADE IN U.S.A." stamped on it!





I found a road that was still a little bit wet....it got worse over that ride with ruts and all..but I didn't dare stop for a pic!!



I believe it was a Sunday afternoon....but I was a little late for services.









It really was a beautiful day.....if you could shield yourself from the cold.





One of the "fun things" about cold weather riding is exploring and discovering the things that are practically in your own backyard.

The Monday after Christmas was a chilly day as well....but beautiful and sunny. I decided to chase down the TAG in the SC Tag-O-Rama game on ADV.

It was currently placed at the Belfast House, which sits West of I-26 between Columbia and Greenville.





I was the "winner" being the first to post the matching pic of my bike in front of the TAG.

I'm hi-tech now with a net-book and a cell phone that can be used as a modem.


That allowed me to place the next tag anywhere in the state I wanted to go.
I took more pics that could have been used that day...but in the end I decided on the church I had visited the week before.

Out in the Sumter National Forest I seen a sign for "Brick House Campground" then I seen what looked like the now vacant brick house and decided to check it out.







There was a shop and a trailer house behind this place and about this time the dogs started barking at me so I moved along....



While zig-zagging along on the hard packed sand roads of Sumter I came across this small but cool old trestle.



I couldn't resist stopping to check it out and taking a possible TAG shot.


I climbed up onto the tracks to get a birds eye view of the water crossing ahead....The recent rains have made the water murky and with erosion damage on the "dry road" who knows what lies beneath?


While I was taking that last shot I felt a weird rumble in my feet....and had just a couple of seconds to skeedaddle!!





Yeah...I "went for it"!


There was an another alternate to turning back.......


Just as I was going to get off my bike to make this a tag possibility....
I noticed a pack of about six dogs just lying in the grass watching me, so I just snapped this pick and "hit it"


On a day with temps in the 30s I stopped at this palmetto tree for an illusion of warmth.

Well with the longest cold streak in ten years and plenty of precip it was 2 more weeks before I made it back out onto the bike.

Jan 11th was forecast to top out in the mid 40s but it missed that by about 10*

Yet it was another TAG game that I was bundled up to go out and chase. This time it would be the NC tag that was sitting in downtown Statesville.



It would seem that the front yard of this govt. building has been dedicated to the war veterans and casualties of several conflicts.





What do you think is down in that cannon?!?






I managed to "win" this tag as well...so it was time to look for something of interest on the return.....



This has possibilities....





But it ended up here at the truck museum in Cherryville....


Congrats go to Wild Bill btw for being the one to grab it next!





Although it looks so nice and warm in these pics...one time-n-temp sign I seen read 23* and my porch thermometer was showing 34*



And that was still in the afternoon sun!!

One week later on MLK day or REL day....take your pick. It was a gorgeous sunny and warm mid 60s day!!

I didn't get out for a big ride though.....instead I had all 5 bikes in my stable out for little to medium rides and for some maint. work.

All bikes combined I only rode about 175 miles or so and didn't grab the camera until I embarked on my final "sunset ride" of the day.



It was still way too wet to go offroad....so I stuck to the streets.


This may appear in a future SC Tag-O-Rama....who knows.




A beautiful end to a beautiful day!!

Nice rides. Do you have routes you could post?

Thanks...but I'm not running a gps yet, so I don't even really know where I was some of the time!

On the TAG rides I went straight to them and then just turned down what ever road looked good on the way back. I was always conscious of which direction I was headed and would eventually pop out on a familiar road.
Of course the closer I am to the house the more familiar I am with what goes where.

.....but you can CLICK HERE for a google map that has placemarks and pics that I took in the Sumter NF.
(click on the icons to see a pic and description)

I'm trying to learn a little bit of post processing for my pics.......there's a lot to learn too.

I changed the levels and stacked a few layers on that 1st pic I posted in this thread as my 1st practice piece.

Original untouched.


Butchered by me in GIMPshop



OK...I had to do some work on my truck today but finished up in tome for a little spin around the 'hood again...70 miles or so.

Not many pics as I didn't see anything new....but here's the few I did take.





There's a For Sale sign on Apple Rd. in the Kings Mtn State Park for 47 acres.......it appears to be inside the park but I don't know what the deal is.

Any way there's a new driveway being put in next to that sign that's a couple hundred yards long.


I turned around where the pea-gravel ended and the ruts began...because this was a "street ride"



...and an "on the fly" shot of some cows and a shed wraps up today's pics!




I tried to adjust the levels on this old Coke sign too........

before


after


I've got an awful lot to learn about that kind of stuff!

Looks like you discovered the "saturation' button in photoshop.

Believe it or not.... No saturation button on that last coca cola pic....The reds just pooped like that as soon as I trimmed the levels.

It has some other tweaks too like unsharpmask and some randomly stacked layers that I couldn't duplicate in a million years

.......that top pic of the rusty truck has got some saturation button in it though.

Here's another pic from last year that has some saturation added, but mostly levels, curves, unsharp and I forget how I layered it...

Nice Photos.

Hope to get out riding next week, taking photos too!