One of the greatest things I did upon retirement is buying bicycles for Thaddeus and I so that we can ride around the New Hope/Lambertville/Delaware River/Canal area and enjoy the beauty in a somewhat slower pace.

Beauty, History and Exercise – All at Once!

About 100 yards from where we live, there is a bicycle/walking path that leads us directly to the Delaware River Canal towpath.

Our first few rides, we just enjoyed the beauty of the area and the serenity of riding bicycles.  We enjoyed the exercise part of it as well…not too difficult, but helping keep us active and engaged.

Then Thaddeus started noticing parts of the canal…the locks, the spillways, the canal bridges (that transport canal water over existing streams going into the Delaware River).  We became “Friends of the Delaware Canal” and started to learn a lot about our man-made waterway.

We had no idea, for instance, that much of the area where we bicycle is not technically the canal, but a feeder to the canal.  And much of the “towpath” was really an old railroad bed.

Here’s a brief history of the canal in case you’re interested.

Here’s some additional basic wikipedia information on the Delaware/Raritan canal.

There are tons of maps for walking and bicycling and parks on the canal and river.

We truly do live in a wonderland of beauty and I’m thrilled to be able to get to explore it more and more.

Current Knitting

I’ve made quite a bit of progress on the shawlette using Madeline Tosh Merino Light.

Again, the photo doesn’t quite do the color justice.  The Loopy Ewe in Colorado has the best color representation for this yarn.