Beautiful day, sunny and dry, so I decided to do a longer ride. Taking the Litespeed I set forth towards the Sonian Forest. Riding through Meerdael Forest and over the Smeysberg ridge, making my way towards Duisburg and entering the Sonian Forest at the Kapucijnenkelder. The trails were perfect and I made my way towards Jezus Eik. Here I did a loop some Swedish girl invented a lot of moons ago. Taking me towards the Rouge Cloitre were I paused for a snack, face basking in the sun. The ponds were willed with geese, duck and swans.

Some of those birds looked pretty exotic. When I finished eating my powerbar I moved on, taking the remainder of the hilly loop back towards Jezus Eik.

From here I made my way back towards the edge of the forest and Duisburg. Upon riding through Eizer I spotted a small track I decided to follow, very narrow and steep and leading me towards the plains above Huldenberg. Dropping down into the Ijse valley and then climbing back over the Smeysberg I arrived back in Sint Joris Weert. Only a couple of kilometers to go, my legs began to feel heavy and I had trouble keeping my heartrate at bay. But I opted for a little loop into Meerdael Forest, taking me towards the Kluis and the back along the Paddenpoel, following the Denteneer Path towards the Weertse Dreef. Crossing that I completed the last couple of K's taking me back home with a nice long ride that took me a little further from home, thereby extending my range of operations. Still a long way to go, but I feel that this week I have taking some small steps back towards being in the shape I had last year.

Ride Stats : 57K and 625/690 heightmeters (Polar/Garmin) in 3h9mins

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