Happy Summer Solstice!

By Dan Schoolfield, Atlanta Cycling | Exam​iner​.com

Summer SolsticeThe long awaited sum­mer sol­stice is finally here today, June 21st. With the sun ris­ing at 6:25am and set­ting at 9:00pm we get the ben­e­fit of nearly 15 hours of day­light. As a mat­ter of fact, every day this week will be within a sec­ond or two of the same. This means that Atlanta cyclists have plenty of time to get a nice hour + ride in every­day after work. If you have to work late, you should be able to get your ride in early, before work. This is not to say that night rid­ing is out of the ques­tion, how­ever, for the major­ity of rid­ers in Atlanta, there is def­i­nitely a pref­er­ence to day­light rid­ing on the longest day of the year.

To shed some light on the tra­di­tional Amer­i­can sum­mer sol­stice cel­e­bra­tion, there is no bet­ter place to look than to our good friends, the Pueblo in Ari­zona. The west­ern most mem­ber of this peo­ple is the Hopi Indi­ans. One of their biggest fes­ti­vals of the year takes place in Oraibi which is the old­est Hopi vil­lage on the third mesa.

To grow crops in their semi-arid land, the Hopi believe they must cul­ti­vate the favor of the spir­its who have power over nature and weather. The fes­ti­val in June accen­tu­ates how impor­tant the favor of these spir­its is for all plant life, espe­cially the sacred corn. The hopes of the peo­ple rely on the corn receiv­ing the spe­cial bless­ing of rain to sup­port its growth to maturity.

Each June, on the longest day of the year the katchi­nas will appear from their cloud homes to be among the peo­ple and renew the pow­ers of fer­til­ity and rain. Pre­cisely at sun­rise on the dance day, the katchi­nas appear and pro­ceed in sin­gle file to the plaza, bring­ing gifts of food to the peo­ple — sym­bols of what the com­ing har­vest will bring.

Even though his ori­gin is some­what uncer­tain, Kokopelli is con­sid­ered the most well-known of the Hopi spir­its. Accord­ing to their lore he rep­re­sents the spirit of fer­til­ity. His image can be found carved into rock through­out the four cor­ners region. Due to the fas­ci­na­tion that the Kokopelli has had on the moun­tain bik­ing enthu­si­asts of this region, many peo­ple have begun to iden­tify his image with cycling in gen­eral. In fact, there is even a 142 mile net­work of desert cycling trails that bears his name. The Kokopelli Trail con­nects the trails of Fruita and Moab, mak­ing it the regions most famous and exten­sive trail sys­tem. The net­work was cre­ated by con­nect­ing a vari­ety of dif­fer­ing trails that include sin­gle­track, sandy roads, dirt roads, occa­sional mud roads, and even some pavement.

While we do not have a desert trail adorned with ancient Kokopelli carv­ings in Atlanta, we do have 15 hours of day­light to ride in cel­e­bra­tion of the sum­mer sol­stice. We can cer­tainly ride the route most con­ve­nient to us while giv­ing thanks to what­ever spirit that moves us. Whether that be Kokopelli, or just our own spirit of adven­ture that reminds us to get out­side away from our com­puter, TV, and iPad and ride our bike for the pure joy that has inspired us to do since we were 5 years old. It will take us back to a sim­pler time when the pri­mary direc­tive from our par­ents was the usual “Just be home before it gets dark.” A time when spon­ta­neously chas­ing the sun’s golden ray could make life so easy to endure!

Happy Trails!

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