As I drove to Galveston for today’s bike ride I wondered if I should ride from the east end of the island to Isla del Sol or ride east from there. If I rode from the east the prevailing wind would be a headwind with a tailwind on the way back. My inclination is to ride into the headwind at the start of a ride and finish with a tailwind but today I opted for the Isla del sol start location. I had wanted to take this ride in May but ran out of time.

The weather was good with the temperature at 81 when I rolled out on my Cervelo Caledonia at 10:51 AM from the parking lot at the beach access point. It didn’t take long for a warning to pop up on my bolt computer that the battery for the rear derailleur was low. Why didn’t that come up after yesterday’s ride when I could’ve charged it before today? Then the cadence and power meter sensors showed n/a. I thought this was the same problem I have had before and used the same steps to try and fix them. Those didn’t work so the ride did not record cadence or power. When I got home I tested the batteries and they both were dead and I replaced them. Why doesn’t the bolt computer report low battery for those like it does for the Rival AXS eTap derailleurs? Again I could’ve replaced them before leaving for the ride.

Recently I was looking at the Galveston map in Google Maps and noticed Stewart Road paralleling FM 3005 and wondered if this would be better than riding on FM 3005 from Jamaica Beach to the Seawall. That section of FM 3005 does not have a shoulder and lots of traffic. To check it out I drove to Jamaica Beach on Stewart Road. There is several miles of bike lane in both directions from east of 81st Street to the west. When the bike lane ends the road doesn’t have a shoulder but the traffic is low and the speed limit is lower than FM 3005. The few cars and trucks that passed me gave plenty of room. Stewart Road ends at FM 3005 east of the Galveston State Park. The shoulder from Jamaica Beach to Stewart Road is about 3 feet wide in both directions. From Jamaica Beach to Isla del sol the shoulder is 10 to 12 feet wide and smooth asphalt.

I turned from Stewart Road onto 81st street to get to the Seawall because it was the first street with a traffic light so I could cross over Seawall Blvd. to the sidewalk. this worked in both directions. I turned around on the Seawall around the Grand Galvez hotel. I was back at the Isla del Sol parking lot at 2:49 PM. After putting the Cervelo in the Jeep and changing clothes I drove to Joe’s Crab Shack for a late lunch or early dinner.

Weather: Start 81 degrees, humidity 77%, dew point 73, fair, wind W 9 mph; Finish 87 degrees, humidity 61%, dew point 72, partly cloudy, wind variable 3 mph. The wind was light compared to my previous visits to Galveston. Driving back home I got caught in a severe thunderstorm with some hail about halfway to Houston. Traffic was very slow and the normal hour and a half drive was almost 3 hours.

Today’s ride was similar to my ride on June 8, 2022. I did not ride on Stewart Road last year. Today’s 45.92 miles built up my average miles per day to 29.75 surpassing the required 27 miles per day to reach my 800 mile goal for June. Now to increase the cushion.

I scored a plethora of Strava medals on this ride. Here are four of them: PR on San-Luis Single Lane (7:22), PR on Seawall Blvd East (61st to 45th) (5:46), PR on Jamaica Beach sprint (18:02), and PR on Seawall Blvd East (Central City to 29th) (13:46).