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It’s been about 8 weeks since I’ve been out for a bike ride. Today was the last in a stretch of beautiful days, and considering it might be the last really nice bike riding day for a while, I couldn’t pass it up.

Mountain biking as the sun sets is an amazing experience. If you back off the throttle just a touch, you’ll get to watch the woods transform. As you set out, the late-afternoon sun cuts through the empty trees and catches the dust in the air. The squirrels are still out foraging. Any time you stop, it seems like your surroundings are still in motion. But as the sun sets, the breeze calms down and the shafts of light disappear. You can feel the air chill down around you, and watch your breath begin to appear as you ride between ribbons of warmth and pockets of cooler air sliding down the veins and contours of the landscape. You ride hard – you still carve through each turn and you still push yourself up every ascent – but there are certain rides where you just can’t help but take a little extra notice of the surroundings sliding past.