#coffeeneuring, the final ride: Bradbury's Coffee

It was the last day of the coffeeneuring challenge, and I wanted to get one final ride in. On a recommendation from my friend Kevin, I picked Bradbury's Coffee near the State Capitol as my destination. The plan was to have coffee there and then loop around Lake Mendota. Tired legs from the previous day and the bitterly cold wind made me reconsider—and then I also heard back from someone who was selling a tandem on Craigslist. So I hung out at Mother Fools for a while and then checked out the tandem. Sadly, it was sold to someone else in the end.

Pretty ice on the Lakeshore Path

The excellent "featured espresso." Expensive, but worth it.

Bradbury's is a small place, and it was busy on a Sunday

Extreme manspreading: The guy took up three seats and refused to give up any of them

#coffeneuring, Bike Bingo, and a side of cyclocross

Coffeeneuring season is over, and I have a few ride reports to catch up on. This one is from late October. Madison Bike Bingo was still going on and so I combined getting a stamp from Manna Cafe with seeing a cyclocross race, and checking out a new-to-me coffee shop, What's Brew'N, in Sun Prairie. I also added a few roads to my collection.

Manna Cafe was very busy on a Sunday morning and it took me a while to get my Bike Bingo stamp

At the race in Sun Prairie. There was a fierce cold wind, which prevented me from staying there very long

The giraffe is always watching

The kids enjoyed throwing balls at riders in the sand pit

What's Brew'N is your typical suburban coffee shop

Inspirational posters and knick-knacks for sale...

...and rather mediocre coffee.

#coffeneuring 2017: Cranksgiving

Yesterday I had the opportunity to combine a coffeeneuring ride with Cranksgiving. Cranksgiving is a combination of a food drive and an alley cat bike race. You get a manifesto with a number of supermarkets and items that you have to buy at each of them. The event started in 1999 in New York City, and as I learned from Jon Kendziera of Jonny Cycle, a veteran of the Madison bike scene, Madison had a couple Cranksgivings in the early 2000s. After a long hiatus, the event made it back to Madison.

Thanks to one of the sponsors, Cafe Domestique, there was good coffee at the start/finish at Revolution Cycles, allowing me to check off another coffeeneuring ride on the final weekend.

The alley cat was great fun, despite strong winds. My knowledge of the street and path network in Madison paid off and I finished second (in spite of a mishap where I lost my manifest and had to backtrace my route to find it again...). Sorry, not too many pictures, as I was too busy racing :)

A last minute tire change was in order... The Panaracer Paselas have been a real disappointment 

Start/finish at Revolution Cycles

Tasty Intelligentsia coffee, courtesy of Cafe Domestique

Le Mans-style start, with people placing their bikes on a green space and running there from the start location

Awards ceremony (Photo credit: Billy Calkins)

#coffeneuring 2017 #coffeeoutside at Donald County Park

Another gray coffeeneuring trip, this time to Donald County Park near Mount Horeb. With temperatures not much above freezing, #coffeeoutside was a somewhat cold affair. 

Townhall Road is one of my favorite roads around Madison, and it does indeed have a town hall

Military Ridge Trail at Neptune

Donald Rock

Ice Age Trail just outside of Madison

One of my favorite sounds

To combine the pleasurable with the useful, I checked out some new bike infrastructure on the west side and shot video footage for Madison Bikes.

#coffeeneuring 2017: #coffeeoutside at Lake Kegonsa State Park

It was a dark and stormy night. Okay, it wasn't quite dark yet, and the wind was strong but didn't quite qualify as "stormy." After a slow Sunday I overcame the urge to just spend the rest of the day on the couch and went on another coffeeneuring excursion. My destination was Lake Kegonsa State Park, via Lower Yahara River Trail.

Wingra Park, with lots of geese

We haven't had much sun lately

New bike repair station in McFarland

Cute "Fish Tales" Little Free Library at a boat landing

Much of Lake Kegonsa is surrounded by private property. Public access is rare, and even the state park has little frontage on the water.

Lake Kegonsa State Park

On the menu: Just Coffee Humdinger, ground with a Zassenhaus Santiago and brewed with my Bialetti