A day out and some more

On Friday the weather was dry (unlike most of the week) and I was well, so I loaded up my bike and took off for the day.

I first rode to my favourite park, my first ride there in more than four months. I find the first thing to go out of my life when I'm busy is exercise and alas I've done little exercise since January. So it was great to be out, and in lovely temperatures too (mid teens).

I was disappointed to find that the majority of the cherry blossoms weren't out, a few early bloomers were, and they were wonderful, but only constituted about five trees.

I love the blue sky! Reminds me of Australia. Look at these buds just about to burst out of their winter confinement.

What caption is needed? This is a type of cherry blossom, though not the most famous version.

I think these are almost my favourites. Their colour is so vibrant compared
to the famous cherry blossom, and they bloom a bit earlier.

I've got no idea what this is, but there was just a single bush.

This looks a bit like a relative of the Australian wattle.

I didn't so so great at getting the right angle on these either, but they
were quietly blooming in the semi-shade.

After the park, I kept going, stopping for lunch in a little community park and then on to a coffee shop. There I pulled out my computer and worked on a couple of articles that were promising to be a couple of the harder ones on my current to-do list, and the sorts of jobs that are easy to procrastinate on. My strategy was to sit there till I'd decently tackled them. I left there feeling pretty satisfied with the work I'd been able to get done.

Then I reversed my journey, though it was getting late and some dark clouds had come over, so I didn't go back to the park. I still had grocery shopping at two different stores to do, so I stopped at one on the way home. Then rode home, unloaded the bike and went to the second store. I was happy to have pretty comfortably ridden nearly 20km.

I had the added challenge of extracting my bike from this jam in the free bike park (pay for parking and you get a better
experience!).

It was great to get out. It enabled crossed off several things that give me joy:

• a ride on a day with some blue sky
• the park
• photography
• a coffee shop
• crossing things off my to do list

Yesterday was spent at an athletics meet, another great day out (warmer weather than last week). 

Today was church, then I rode the long way home, searching for more blooms to capture (but not with my big camera). 

I love the apparent wild abandon of this early bloomer. Not a cherry blossom.

After lunch we spent a pleasurable hour chatting with our eldest. Then some rest, reading. 

And now it's preparation for four days away in Hokkaido at our mission's national conference. I'll see what time I get for mobile blogging while we're away. Maybe once or twice?