Lisa is perfectly prompt as usual, and I'm ready and waiting in the driveway for our trip to "summer camp". The drive up goes smoothly, on the highway we see Patti Hartinian (who must think she's waving at Sue since we're in Sue's car), get ourselves to Columbia with only a little confusion after Sonora, now where is that campground? How can it be so hard to find, we wonder, as we drive around, and also see a car with a yellow tandem on top, also driving around... finally we ask directions from a very friendly Columbia resident, and pull in, see Phil Weiss ("Wrench Boy"!!) working at his bike stand and decide to serenade him with a round of 'Smoke on the Water' on our kazoos... I still have mine from the year before, but Lisa had misplaced hers and we made a fortuitous stop in Sonora where she picked up 3. Phil recognizes our musical talent immediately, and we quickly catch up with him and hijack him into town for a beer and hook up with Miguel, Richard, and several others on the tour.
Lisa and I are staying at the City Hotel again this year, as the campground is a small and crowded one. This year we also decide to join Pam, Jackie and Deborah Lefferts for a gourmet dinner at our hotel, and then attend the tour dinner afterwards so we can win friends and influence people by giving away our food there. We meet Troy Stenstrom, Mylo's son, and Steve Sloan, who's wife Sue works with Lisa and me at IBM, as well as Teri, who Lisa tries to convince to join our kazoo band... After dinner, we relax in the parlor with glasses of sherry, and meet Liza and Jeri, who will be riding the yellow tandem we saw driving around earlier. Early to our beds, as we have a lot to do the next day... and we can't wait!!
I have Phil take a quick look at my brakes, which decided to stop making their infernal noise, so all is well and we start rolling with the great downhill to a very scenic bridge where we stop for our first photo opportunity ("we've never taken photos here before") and then up the hill and over to Murphys. This is where Lisa, Miguel and Troy begin the quest for city/county limit signs to sprint for. As usual, I'm content to watch the fun from behind, and get a kick out of how Lisa declares the ones she gets as counting for "double points". I have some trouble convincing Miguel that it's OK that not everybody wants to race for the signs...
At Murphys, we split from Phil, who claims that he has to watch out for bike trouble on the regular route, but has given Donny his option for the day, to continue on Sheep Ranch Road past where we turned off last year, and through the scenic towns of Railroad Flat and West Point. We try to instill a counting-off policy to keep track of everybody, but this proves to be more difficult than we thought and it doesn't last past today, the confusion was pretty entertaining, tho, like when Judy decided she didn't want to be "6" any more, and Miguel somehow thought he was both "12" and "13"... We stop to swim at the same stream we were at last year, the water is COLD and most of us don't stay in long, except for Donny, who even found a rope swing to play Tarzan on, and Kim, who couldn't resist the rope swing either...
When we came back up, I noticed that there was a rock embedded in my tire, but on further inspection it turned out to be a gash with part of my inner tube sticking out. Troy quickly produced a 'tuffy' tire boot and he and Ken Schwab made quick work of installing it for me. (Thanks, guys!!!) We find out quickly that climbs back out from a river crossing tend to be VERY steep, but none of us yet realize just how many times we are crossing rivers today... After a quick regroup in the shade at a fire station, and the friendliest firemen anywhere, who offer us their driveway and point out their water spigot for us, our next stop is in the town of Railroad Flat for lunch. Mylo and Kim head for the cafe, while the rest of us check out the fare in the market next door... not gourmet, but they seem friendly enough, have shade, a rest room and water for the bottles, which is pretty much a 4-star lunch stop for cyclists.
As we sit there, a pickup truck comes with several "mountain people", sort of foreign to us Silicon Valley types (no kidding, missing teeth, overalls, etc.) We also meet up with 2 cyclists who are headed the opposite direction, going from California to Colorado over 22 days. They tell us that there is an incredibly steep section coming, at least 15 percent grade, but Donny tells us that Phil told him there isn't anything that steep (I'll let you guess who was right !!!) Yep, it was right after a river crossing... After this, some of the group went for another swim, while others of us continued on to relax in the shade of the town of West Point, a pretty big town for the area, and where Ken's friend lived so he split from us there, as he said he hadn't had the gearing for the really steep stuff and the day was getting pretty late with all of our stops.
Then on to Jackson, on scenic Clinton Road that Phil had also recommended over going down busy Hwy 88. Of course, there were a few rolling hills involved and we were pretty sure 88 would have been all downhill, but hey, what were we here for anyways? We must have been travelling around the town of Volcano, because we saw at least 2 signs that it was 3 miles away, and the signs were several miles apart... But Volcano's not until Day 2!! Jackson brought the usual delicious dinner preceded by the usual long line at St Sava Mission, then a quick walk into downtown Jackson and an early turn-in for most of us. The first day is the hardest day, I remind myself, we did lots of climbing. Still... I know the next day will be hot as well, and I bed down in my tent with water and cytomax bottles handy... it's a hot night, but somehow I don't have much trouble sleeping... :-)
We finally roll out, the last out of camp as usual... A quick tour through town, we stop to say hello to Phil's children (identical twin 7-year old boys and a 6-year old girl), then our first sightseeing stop at the Kennedy tailing wheels, really cool remnants of the old mining days. Pam takes off from our group with a couple of other riders at this point, and we don't see them the rest of the day... we make a stop in Sutter Creek at Phil's house, use the restroom, Phil changes out his pedals, then we finally get ourselves rolling onto Sutter-Volcano road, an excellent, beautiful gradual climb along a creek up to the town of Volcano, which has a lot of character. We stop for a rest there, then head up past the tulip and daffoldil farms, up a pretty steep climb, and then an amazing terrific downhill into Fiddletown. Some of the group rides in a fast paceline, but I am so happy to stretch out on my aero bars and enjoy the scenery and gliding...
Fiddletown is pretty much shut down, the market is closed and unfortunately so are the restrooms (eek!) ... so Phil and I take off for the next town where we'll have lunch, the rest of the group behind... in between here we have a minor run-in with some cars, sort of a busy and narrow road, but nothing too intimidating. We wave to Pam, who has stopped to eat at a diner and some join her there, the rest of us grab lunch at a market and bike with it over the the fairgrounds, where they are busy setting up for an upcoming fair. After much relaxation, we drag ourselves up off the comfortable grass and shade, and head out. Our next stop is at the house with the big shady porch and the nice Weimeraner dogs... whom we talk into letting us come into the backyard and fill our water bottles... just like last year, I wonder if the people who live there have any idea? :-)
Sometime after lunch we hit a river crossing which looks like a good place to swim. It turns out to be a GREAT place to swim, an easy ledge to get in the water, hidden from the road above, and part of the river has a very strong current which is really fun to try and swim against, now I understand that those backyard current pools really would work! The side of the river is more sheltered, so we could rest over there and hang onto the rocks, but just about everyone has to try swimming upstream at some point... it takes a serious effort to make any progress at all upstream. Such fun! I've always loved swimming with my friends, and on such a hot day it's just perfect.
It's HOT out... but we roll on and get to camp in Folsom in time to catch a shower in the air-conditioned community center, icee's at the 7-11 and hang in the shade until dinner time. After dinner, Phil goes to work cleaning up my bike while I get a massage (ok, so today I'm not roughing it too bad... ) Then we get to talking in a group, Lisa turns in at 9:57 pm, shortly before we get asked to be quiet, so several of us decide to go for a walk... well... it turns out there's a very fun bar in walking distance, somehow 8 or 9 of us end up there with pitchers of beer and lots of credits on the jukebox... I haven't had this much fun in a LONG time... and never like this on the bike tour. Are we finally figuring out how to do it right? It's pretty late when we come staggering back into camp... fortunately, tomorrow is a pretty easy ride day...
Our gang has decided to do it differently this year, we are going for breakfast in Folsom instead of waiting until we get all the way to Old Sacramento, in fact, most of us are going to skip the stop in Old Sac because there's a rail fair going on there and it will be crowded. The problem is that Phil is a major railroad nut and really wants to go, and we don't like to split up the band.... well, it turns out that Steve Sloan is also big on it, so we hook up the two of them. Also, Patti Hartinian, who lives in Folsom now, and Lucie Rufiange are joining us for breakfast and for riding to Old Sac. I was looking forward to meeting Lucie, as I'd heard so much about her for the last couple of years. And Patti and I had met at the Tahoe Roundabout 2 years earlier.
After a hectic breakfast, we got rolling on the bike path, beautiful, right on the river, excellent socalizing first with Patti, and then with Lucie, with whom I hit it off tremendously, what a treat it was to have such a nice chat!! We stopped when it was time to split outside Old Sac, had a good kazoo concerto for awhile and then said goodbye to Phil, Steve and Troy , who headed to the railroad museum, and to Patti and Lucie, who headed back to Folsom, while the rest of us rode on, continuing on the bike trail almost all the way to Davis. In Davis, we rode around awhile, and then Lisa guided us to an air-conditioned Thai restaurant... yum! After lunch we picked up another bike path and also a local rider who was commuting back to Davis, very talkative, an aspiring triathlete as well. We got to the tour water stop (our first of the tour, since we'd been rolling our own routes so far), and got the bad news of 2 injury crashes among the cyclists. One in Davis, a hit and run resulting in a broken ankle, and the other on the bike path, Phil and Helen from SD, who had been on both of the previous tours and who we were trying to get to ride with our group, had tangled with a cyclist on the bike path, and Helen had broken her pelvis... Big Bummer... John Zidak was, understandably, quite upset.
We rolled out of the stop, past graffiti bridge (which didn't look so bright this year, was it us??), and then started playing with pacelining on the flat road to winters. At one point, we rolled past the most beautiful field of sunflowers, just acre after acre of them... Then the pacelining got a little too quick for me, egged on by the commuter kid, I think, so I just hung back and rode, trying not to feel left behind, knowing that I didn't want to work that hard, and also knowing some were behind me and some ahead, pulled into the campground and decided to roll out my sleeping bag and take a much-needed NAP!! :-))) Got organized in time for dinner across the street, one of the best of the tour with those huge beef ribs, chicken, lots of salad and veggies... yum!! After dinner a quick run up to the store, it was still incredibly hot out, sat around the mechanic's stand for awhile. I talked to the guy who was from WI, riding with his mother on a tandem, it turns out he had been on a tour with Bubba, who was on this tour last year, and also knew "Pasadena Sue" from two years prior...so cool, our tour is getting talked up among the bike tour crowd! If I just keep doing this one, I'll meet all these great people as they come through! At some point I was up during the night, it was still really warm out and the moon had set so the stars were really amazing. I pulled my sleeping bag back out of my tent and laid there stargazing for a long while, seeing at least one shooting star and just being very relaxed...
Donny has found a 'Donny option' to ride along Lake Berryessa, so we veer off the main route, and it's just perfect... beautiful road, great lake views, and then Phil stops the group and declares "this may be a good swimming spot' -- and it turns out to be PERFECT! Perfect temperature, easy path down, good place to get in, and super clean water surrounded by steep walls (looks like a fjord, some comment). We have a great time swimming and playing in the water, maintaining the 8-foot rule between the men and the women :-) , finally drag ourselves out and head along. The rest of the road is also perfect, not much traffic, then a not-too-bad climb out to Pope Valley.
We skip Hubcap City this time and start heading up Ink Grade. We start our traditional singing, and then suddenly Kim eggs Phil onto a faster climb and they SPLIT THE BAND!!! Awww... the rest of us climb in silence, having lost one of our leads... :-) But we reunite at the top, and sing a rousing chorus of "Crocodile Rock" (which, coincidently, is playing as I write this! :-) ) Then it's down into the town of Angwin for sham-whiches (they don't believe in meat there) and various lunch items across the street in the shade. Leaving Angwin, somehow Donny gets us immediately onto an extremely steep grade, sort of a grind on full stomachs, but mercifully short, and there are GREAT views on the other side. Then it's the screaming downhill into Wine country, more great views and then a paceline up the 10 miles or so on Silverado Trail into Calistoga.
Calistoga brings our usual laundromat picnic on gourmet items from the markets, back to camp with our now-clean clothes and then back into town for dinner at a good, inexpensive casual italian restaurant. After dinner, we wander into a bar for a couple of dark beers, on tap for open mike night. Late night, several of us get caught up in a "spin the bottle for truth or dare game", which just ends up being 'ask questions and answer them if you feel like it" :-)
After a very relaxing lunch of goodies from another store that we enjoy on the lawn at Dry Creek Vineyards, we take off and soon come to the turn onto Sweetwater Springs Road. It starts out pretty innocuous, with a nice little uphill which leads to a good view. But somehow we know this isn't all... then we get to a dirt road section, then there is lots of grading and watering equipment, then suddenly a STEAMROLLER COMING RIGHT AT US!!!! The horn is beeping, I can't tell whether he can even stop, as he is coming downhill, so I get out of the way to look up and see the rest of the riders I'm with just continue on past him like he isn't there. Great, now I'm alone, the road is really muddy, my recently cleaned bike is the dirtiest and muddiest it has ever been, and now the road starts going straight UP... no kidding, the steepest road I have ever seen, I can barely make the pedals go around standing up in my lowest gear, Donny is next to me but I don't say a word to him, afraid I'll just lose it if I try... I'm weaving back and forth to try and take some of the hill out, each turn shows more steep uphill... no kidding, this hurts. The 1000 feet must all be in about 1/2 mile... I stop to rest at one point, just can't make the pedals go around, and Donny stops next to me and tells me to take my time. (Thank goodness he did NOT offer me the bungee cord, as hard as it was I would have been really insulted!! ;-) ) Finally we reach everyone at the top, I ask about cleaning the mud off the brakes, but am told it will come off as we go. Lots of comments about the hill, but most people liked it (this is a sick group sometimes!).
We start descending, I start near the back and as I get to one of the early turns, I see LeRoy in the road, he's telling me very calmly "slow down, stop, Kim is down around this corner", so I stop on the VERY sharp turn and get off my bike. Teri, Troy and Lisa are already there, (Phil and Miguel are ahead) and Kim is sitting on the ground, calm as can be, feeling her right collarbone and saying "it's broken, I can feel it". Whoa... she's talking about trying to still get down on her bike, but there's no way this will work, it's really steep... then a car comes around, and Lisa stops them and asks if they'll help. No hesitation, the young couple says 'yes', Troy gets Kim's bike loaded in the hatchback and Kim gets in the backseat. Troy follows the car closely all the way down to make sure they let her out, and when they get to the bottom, send Phil and Miguel off for the SAG (SHAG) Wagon. We get Kim into her new "Armstrong Redwoods" t-shirt and Ray takes her off to the hospital. What a bummer... the rest of us ride without much talking into Duncan Mills. As Miguel takes the city limit sign, he gives the point to Kim....
As we come into camp, the story is spreading quickly, and the other riders come to us for the story, and all are amazed at the muddy condition of our bikes... None of us feels much like talking, there is a wine and cheese party going on, we set up camp and get showered and head over to dinner. While we're eating, Steve Sloan comes in, just getting in from his ride. After that killer climb on Sweetwater, Steve continued on to Armstrong Redwoods Park and then up this ridiculously steep climb to BullFrog Pond (I opted out of that climb last year). What a stud rider to do both of those climbs, and what a wimp I was to complain about the one I did!! At the end of dinner, Ray drives in with Kim in the passenger seat, and she is in amazingly good spirits! We all marvel over her x-ray (Dr. Ben turns around and whispers "she's tough" after looking at it). Yep, it's broken... Kim decides to sleep in the van, and decides to stick it out for the rest of the tour.
After breakfast (which was around luncthime) we made the climb up to where we can see the coast, and then back downhill into Tomales, to the bakery and the general store. Here we decide not to do the inland route with the cheese factory, we instead ride the rollers to the coast and then mosey along to Olema. At some point, some of the riders started riding hard, but once again I was enjoying the coastal route too much for that, talking and riding with Donny and Debbie. When we got to Point Reyes Station, only about 2 miles from camp, Lisa and I decided to go into town and get something to eat, Donny wanted to go swimming instead. We walked into a bakery, which had a couple of vegan selections, so Lisa was very pleased, as was I because I had seen something that looked good to me but wanted to make sure she found something, too.
As we sat outside enjoying the baked goods and an elementary school newletter that I'd picked up inside, our friends Jon and Misti, who were on their way to a camping trip, walked by... what a nice surprise! Re-energized, we rode into camp, got our tents up in the wind (had to use the tent stakes for the first time) then showered and got dressed for our nice dinner. We didn't get there early enough to score a table for everyone we'd been riding with, then there was much discussion about whether we should move inside or what... we stayed outside and just did a lot of visiting... After dinner, we stopped at the liquor store for beers, then sat by the campfire for our last night of beer and conversation....
Deborah and Jimmy meet us here (they're late), and we all take off on the climb up to the base of Mt Tam, singing our way up that, as we just have to :-). It's so clear, the views are great, and once again, the dipsea running race is going on. After a quick stop at the top, we wind our way down to the bottom of the hill, and somehow have lost track of Deborah. The group starts splitting up a little, but somehow we get ourselves to the bike path and to the Golden Gate bridge!!! We ride over without stopping. Lisa clues me into going first so I pick up the San Francisco City and County sign... nobody is counting any more at this point, but let's face it, this is a really significant one, it must be quadruple points. :-) Then we pull into the log cabin area where lunch is being served, bags picked up, bikes taken apart, and lots of goodbyes are said... and Deborah is here. *phew*...
Several of us are riding to SJ, so we get our lunches down quickly and then take off through the city, and, it turns out, through the "street luge" course of the X-games! A huge crowd near the cliff house, but we manage to stay together through it and then, riding again, make our way down the great hwy, skyline blvd, etc... Some of the group starts splitting up, but Donny gives everyone a stern lecture, and the regroups are much more frequent after that. Lisa and I have planned to ride to Sue and Alan's place in Cupertino, where Lisa's car is, and when everyone splits off we talk Donny into joining us and we drive him home to his place. Then we all head over to Pam's to pick up our bags, and then, finally, HOME..
What an excellent tour.... at some point during the middle of it, I realized that I had been a little apprehensive about whether it could really keep being fun to come back to the same tour for the 3rd year, and I know now that it just keeps getting better and better. The 'family' that we have found in each other is really something to cherish. Lisa, Phil, Donny, Miguel, Kim, Leroy, Pam, Troy, Mylo, Teri, and Judy - Thanks, I LOVED riding and hanging out with you all!!! See you next year....