10.23.16 Waterfall Ride

The 3 amigos ride again!

Riders:
Greg Davis on his early 80's Palo Alto
Andy Antipas on his gorgeous late 70's Colnago
me on the late 70's Motobecane Le Champion I used in Cali Eroica 2016

Greg called this one for the Big Basin loop we usually do but this time we took Lodge Rd. to the back entrance of the state park. Lodge Rd. is a 1 lane broken pavement pot-holed brush and branch littered challenge. I thought I'd have the widest tires but the other 2 amigos were on 30+ mm rubber, I rode 28 mm. We pass the state park back entrance sign at the top of the climb and descend carefully into Big Basin. Eventually we come upon building materials and park employee housing and a "Road Closed" sign! We proceed anyway to find a large washout and follow the dirt and gravel around it. The road is now smooth and we descend gleefully and stop at Sempervirens Falls for a break and photo op. Riding on smelling campfires we turn right on Hwy 236 and into park headquarters - busy day! (sunday) More photos and we climb, and climb, and climb out of the redwoods and into the oaks, like BAM, as if there is a distinct border between the flora. Passing the China Grade turn off we decide to go for the full monty towards Hwy 9. I am finally starting to notice something - the road is incredibly smooth! Makes sense since almost the entire length of 236 has been resurfaced. It is like riding on a cloud... Short rest at Hwy 9 before we shift to our highest gears and fly down into San Lorenzo Valley, this is always my favorite part of the ride. The other 2 amigos became smaller and quickly disappeared as I labored to keep up.

What a great ride! Perfect temps, great friends, challenging climbs, smooth roads - hard to ask for a better day. Thanks Greg for calling the ride, it was a pleasure to meet and ride with Andy, let's do it again soon!

More photos here:

https://www.flickr.com/photos/ericm/sets/72157674249787382/

Until next time, "Have a Nice Ride"...

Linda Martinez ride - 6.25.16

On June 12th we received an email from Bob Freitas for a ride called by Linda Martinez:

"Linda Martinez would like to call a ride for June 25th.

10AM meet up at Crystal Springs Shopping Center which is off the
Polhemus exit on 280.

Plan is to do Sawyer Camp Trail and return to Rainbow Pizza for Lunch.
This will be a short and easy going ride."

Even though I'd lived in San Carlos for 25+ yrs. I'd never rode the Sawyer Camp trail so I was really looking forward to it. We met at Crystal Springs SS and even mid-morning it was obviously going to be a very warm day. We headed out, hung a left, rode uphill a bit and under Hwy 280 to find the trail entrance already crowded with walkers, hikers, families, skaters, dog walkers, tourists and sightseers. The peninsula open spaces are always crowded for a reason: they are beautiful! A sweet ride north was guided by Linda on her beautiful Gios Pro. I believe this was ~25 miles of gorgeous scenery on sweet lugged steel machines, it really reminded me of the paved bike trail through Samuel P. Taylor Park. At the northern-most point of the trail most went on the full ride called out by Linda but having installed my early 1950's Simplex RD jockey wheel cage upside down and having shifting performance issues I opted to retrace our route (through the woods) with a few others and made it back not too much further behind but still "Lanterne Rouge". We all met at Rainbow Pizza for lunch and had a great time. It was agreed that Linda should call many more rides and looking forward to getting together again - thanks Linda!

Here're a few more of Linda's pics: https://www.flickr.com/photos/ericm/albums/72157668723788854/with/28005700903/

'Til next time, "Have a Nice Ride"...