Three Rides in Three Days

Well we rode Friday, Saturday and Sunday. Not what you are thinking.

On Friday we had a “Dave Ramsey” date night. Rode the Townies to the mall. Used gifts cards from Christmas to see a terrible movie. Rode to Outback Steakhouse and used a gift card for dinner. Rode back home in the dark with just a small headlamp. Ev was right we should have put the lights on. Great date night!

Saturday we rode over to Block Bikes for the Saturday ride. Good turnout with some new riders. We rode toward the aqueduct and split into the fast and not so fast group. Like last time we rode with the fast group but took a little shorter route. Rich still waxed all of us. We split off before they got back to the shop and registered 25 miles.

We slept in Sunday and by the time we might have thought about riding it was hot. We instead went to Pasadena to see Taylor and deliver Ev’s home-made yogurt. Back home and after dinner we did a neighborhood Townie ride.

We really plan to ride tomorrow morning. Bright and early, on the road before 5:30AM. We’ll see…

This summer's proposed route

We slept in a little today but we finally got on the bike around 10AM. We (actually I, since I have total control) did not have a plan. We ended up on Elizabeth Lake Road and stopped for breakfast in Leona Valley. Pancakes, eggs and bacon at Scramblez. We split one order. We then turned west and continued riding to Munz Ranch Road then rode along the aqueduct. It was a beautiful day in the high 50's and no wind. The snow-covered hills were in the distance. We saw a roadrunner, a couple of hawks, and lots of duck couples. We waved and said hi to many of the fisherman on the aqueduct. We were both pretty tired at the end and the odometer register 39.1 miles as we pulled up to the house. We really need to ride more during the week!

Riding along the aqueduct

Just a few poppies.

Later in the afternoon we got out the book, maps and the two dueling laptops to finalize our summer's trip. We think we have a plan. Hopefully California does not close all the State Parks that have Hiker/Biker sites. We have hosted many bike travelers through warmshowers.org but we have never stayed with anyone ourselves. Ev searched the site and we may stay with one in the San Diego Area. There is also one in Ensenada Mexico. We have a couple extra days at the end and this intrigues us. Ev emailed him to see if it is doable and safe. Our other option is to hit a few of the San Diego Co. breweries for a beer-tasting weekend. 

Even though I told Google Maps to find the bike route, when printed it still shows car driving time. Here is the map!

Kern County Ride

While we love riding in our desert, especially in the spring, you can go up to 90th Street West & Ave L only so many times and not get bored. We scanned the neighboring bike club web sites and found a ride with the Kern Wheelman, a club out of Bakersfield. This club has many rides on the weekends and we joined the Slow Spokes group riding from Caliente to Twin Oaks and back. We were, of course, the only tandem. We left at 8AM and rode with Joe and Raul at the head of the pack... well, we actually left the pack. It is a steady but moderate 15 mile climb to Twin Oaks. We dodged cattle and had a slight head wind but the ride was great.

We stopped at TOGS (Twin Oaks General Store) for breakfast. The four of us ordered while we waited for the others as we were warned about the prompt service. Pancakes and eggs. 

The ride down was sweet and fast. We dodged many more cows and averaged in the mid 20's most of the way down, hitting 30 mph a couple of times. The last 5 miles we faced a fierce headwind as the valley floor had heated up and the wind was racing back up into the canyon. We got caught by a train right at the end back in Caliente. We loaded our bike and said our good byes. Thanks to Richard, the ride leader, for letting us tag along. 

Rob, Joe and Raul.

Here it comes!

We then went to the Tehachapi Loop, an item on Evelyn's bucket list and another place that we have driven by hundreds of times but never stopped. This engineering marvel has a train go under itself around a big loop. We waited for about a 1/2 hour before a train came. It is pretty amazing.

The Loop!

On it's way.

Marina Del Rey to Watts Towers

 We rode with the LA County Bike Coalition and other LA bike clubs on a Funday (fun and Sunday...get it?) ride. We left the AV at 6AM and drove to Marina Del Rey. There were 3 routes and we thought we wanted to ride the 37 mile, non hilly route. We talked to the ride coordinator and he said he "hoped" to do the first 11 miles in under two hours. Well that's just a little too slow for us so we joined the longer, hilly and faster group (about 50 riders). We left at 8:30, first riding on a the Ballona Creek bike path. We were soon in Baldwin Hills. There is a reason it's called Baldwin Hills.  Short but intense hills. We made it up the first three but we walked the last part of the last hill as did about half the group. We then rode through South Central on our way to Watts. One bike club was predominately African American and the leader gave running commentary about riding in the the "hood". While is was all good-natured, we have lived in So Cal most of our lives and have never been to the Watts Towers. Kind of a sad commentary on us and how LA is still segregated. Our group split up on the way back and we rode with about 10 others. The pace was pretty fast for us but we kept up. Got to rest at the many lights, but we were riding at 17-19 mph most of the time. We headed toward downtown and then turned up MLK Blvd and made our way back to the beach. Total miles: 42. It was a beautiful day and even hot as we ended our ride. Hey it's February in LA!

25 miles on the new wheel

It was a little cold but we rode this weekend to test the new rim. Worked great! Very smooth and quiet. I was worried that I would not get the disc brake adjusted correctly, but all was well.

We also met with Doug (and Jan), our riding buddy this weekend. He's in for the next trip! Starting with us in SF, he will  ride down to LA and then he and Jan are off to another vacation. He was previewing the elevation profile through Big Sur. Some big climbs again await us. Guess that's why we are going to spin classes and yoga again. Have to get into shape!

New Rear Wheel

A Christmas present to ourselves...a new rear wheel! This will be the third rear rim for our bike. First one bent when we must have run over something. I noticed cracks at the spokes the last time I changed a tire on the second one. This time we got a Phil Wood, 48 spoke, tandem hub with a Chukker Velocity rim from Peter White Cycles. It's soooo pretty and hopefully bullet proof.  Have to start riding more for we are planning this summer's trip. San Francisco to San Diego which will be the last leg of our Pacific Coast tour. We have already done the Santa Barbra to Oceanside part. That was our first tour and we did it by credit card (no camping and eating out every meal). Not possible since we don't have credit cards anymore and we like the camping with other cyclists too much. SF to SB would be just too short and we did not ride to the Mexican boarder last time. This time we will. 

Warm Showers Guests

 We have now hosted our fourth set of  Warm Shower's guests and it's just early spring. With the new Sierra Cascades ACA route, I think we will be seeing more and more bike travelers riding through the AV.

Geoffrey & Olivia