All posts by Mike

Skyline is open for business!

Tues/Thurs 7:45am ride

Finally, the last one-lane traffic-controlled section of Skyline is gone!
If you had asked me last night if I was going to be riding this morning, I would have given odds of maybe 75%. If you had asked me about 3am, when I woke up to do that thing guys my age have to get up and do in the middle of the night, odds might have been 25%. I would have given even lower odds of completing the whole ride. But the alarm goes off at 6:50am, as usual, and I get up, as usual, and get ready to ride. The extreme muscle pain that came anytime I did something like sit down or try to get up, well, once you’re up you just keep moving and hope you figure out some way to put on your leg warmers and socks without having to bend over. I’ve had lower back pain like this maybe just 3 other times in my life, and it passes in a couple days, and once I got on the bike, I started feeling better. Just tough getting to that point.

And of course it would have been so so so much nicer had it been warmer! 42 on Skyline isn’t all that cold, but it was pointed out to me by Kevin (pilot; the kid is still with his sister in Disneyland) that I ride a lot stronger when it’s warmer. Today I stayed with Kevin & Karen up to the half-way point on Kings, where I lost contact and arrived at the top a couple minutes later. No great views from West Old LaHonda today; the coast was not clear. I was glad I hadn’t had a chance to clean my bike up after Sunday’s wet-ish ride because this morning, again, the roads were wet. Thankfully not wet on the 84 descent into Woodside though, allowing us to stay close to a car that felt they just had to pass us at crazy speed just before beginning the descent. Somehow it’s fun reminding them they didn’t save any time by passing us.

Glad I didn’t change plans based on weather early in the ride!

Ride reports (not Tu/Th)

The not-so-pretty view from West Old LaHonda
Another solo Sunday ride, this time because Kevin’s goofing off in Disneyland with his sister. The plan was the usual; Old LaHonda, Pescadero, Tunitas. I thought about doing something else, but there aren’t too many foothill variants you can do that end up on Skyline without including Redwood Gulch, and I really didn’t feel like doing Redwood Gulch again, at least not anytime soon. Already been there, done that, maybe three times this year.

But it got colder and, towards the top, wetter as I climbed Old LaHonda, and the “view” from the other side didn’t extend too far. But I came across others who weren’t being deterred, and if they were tough enough, I was. Thankfully, by the time I got to the top of Haskins, the skies in the direction of the coast were beginning to clear up. Life is good.

Happy to report the Mastadon is still standing tall, steadied by ropes on each side. Without Kevin along, I was able to stop and smell the roses (take photos) whenever I wanted, one of the nicer things about riding solo. Not so nice, of course, is not having someone to ride behind during the inevitable headwinds riding Stage Road north!

The Pescadero bakery/market is beginning to lose some credibility; not a single cookie in the display case today! Olallieberry Strudle wasn’t a bad stand-in though. I was able to locate a friendly wheel leaving Pescadero; poor guy got to hear my heavy breathing on the Stage Road climbs, probably the reason he headed home via 84 instead of Tunitas.

In the end, it wasn’t a fast ride, it wasn’t a pretty ride, but it was a good ride.