Thursday, October 7, 2021

Circle Trail Centipede Encounters With Prickly Pear Cactus


Today my bike decided to take me north on the Circle Trail further than I have gone in a long long time.

About a mile north of Hamilton Park the Circle Trail comes to the Prickly Pear Cactus Orchard you see above. This orchard appears slightly south of where the Circle Trail crosses under Holliday Road, which you can also see in the photo above.

Going north on the Circle Trail eventually passes under a couple freeways, making for a lot of cement overhead. Soon thereafter the Circle Trail enters an undeveloped zone making it seem as if one has left the city and is out in the wild country.

Eventually the Circle Trail returns to civilization, around the point where the gazebo you see below shows up. As soon as I got off the bike to get out the phone I looked down on the ground and saw the biggest centipede I have ever seen. I did not know those critters got so big. It was big enough that I reacted the same way I do when a snake slithers too close. As in I shuddered. By the time I got the phone to turn on the camera the centipede had waddled out of sight.


You can not tell it via the photo, but the gazebo overlooks a bit of a gorge, with the Circle Trail crossing the gorge and then going down a slope for a quarter mile, give or take a foot or two. About a mile past the gazebo I decided I had gone far enough.

Turning around I quickly realized I had had the wind at my back as I pedaled north. This made for a more strenuous bout of pedaling heading back south, against the wind.

I think tomorrow my bike and me will take a break from pedaling...

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