Tuesday, June 29, 2021

Midnight Poem


Happy 25th Anniversary to my favorite cycling companion, Victoria Day! Here's to many more rides together.


Bicycles move

With the flow

Of the earth


Like a cloud

So quiet 

In the October sky

Like licking ice cream

From a cone

Like knowing you

Will always

Be there

             --Nikki Giovanni, "Bicycles"

Sunday, June 27, 2021

Viking Ribstones



I’m a big believer in having a destination on a gravel ride. It doesn’t have to be anything special--a country store, an onion-domed Orthodox church, a shaded picnic spot, a viewpoint. A plaque even. I’ll gladly ride to a random plaque and back.


On a recent foray, setting out from Kinsella, in east central Alberta, we settled on the Viking Ribstones, an historical site I’d read about online. Ribstones are big old rocks with shapes or lines (specifically lines that look kind of like an animal’s rib cage) carved into them a long time ago by Indigenous people. It’s thought that the carvings were a kind of offering to the spirit of Old Man Buffalo. Apparently nine different ribstone sites have been found in Alberta, but the one near Viking is one of the better preserved specimens.