Some biking pictures

I keep forgetting to take my camera with me when I go biking on Saturdays. I grabbed a bunch of photos from my friend Tim's Flickr collection - he's the one who usually organizes the rides and heads up the group of mountain bikers.

These first shots are from a long ride my wife and I went on a few weeks back. The ride was beautiful. After an incredibly tiring ascent that seemed to go on forever, we rode on a boring and rocky plateau for several miles until starting our descent back down towards where we began the ride.

Here's some of the group taking a breather after the climb (my wife and I are in the middle of the frame - why is almost everyone wearing white shirts and black shorts?)...

and here's the beginning of the long descent back down into the valley to the left...

Once at the bottom, there was a treacherous crossing over a muddy creek on some old boards...

...and finally, here's Olivier, a very nice French guy, with a bunch of village kids in the background looking on.

Who knows what the locals think about all these crazy white people who breeze through their little corner of the world on a Saturday morning, riding their fancy bikes and wearing shorts.

On a ride back in January, we rode through a dump...

...and then through a minefield.

While seeing the "DANGER MINES" sign threw me for a bit of a loop, I wasn't too worried. There were lots of families and houses in the area and I think that all the kids and dogs running around would have set off any landmines years ago. Don't worry, Mom, I stayed on the trail anyway.

On last week's ride, we crossed the Niger in a hired boat, along with all of our bikes. Cost for seven people plus their seven bikes: $2.

These Saturday rides have been a great way to get out and see the city and some of the surrounding area, and I've gotten to know a few of the other riders as well.

Over the past month, I've been relatively busy with all kinds of different things. I ended up getting called in almost once a week to sub at the American school, at least until I caught the strain of strep throat that had been going around. That put me out of commission for a few days. Last week I taught middle school math plus middle and high school science for the entire week. It was fun, although I didn't have to grade any papers or give out any tests which made things a lot easier.

Since mid-January, I've also been following the one hundred pushups program. As you might guess, the goal is to get to the point where you can do a set of one hundred pushups. I used to have a regular routine of pushups and pullups when I lived in the states, but I'd fallen off the wagon after moving to Africa. While at home, I picked up a set of these Perfect Pushup thingies from my brother, who was tossing them out. I don't know if there's anything all that sensational about them. At the very least, it's a gimmick to get me inspired in the mornings. So far so good - I'm just over halfway done with the program and I hope to hit the one hundred mark before the hot season really kicks in, around mid-March. Let me tell you, it's already plenty warm at 6:15am when I get out of bed and start my day.