All posts by Mike

Traffic jam on West Old LaHonda!

Ride reports (not Tu/Th)

It was going to be tight, getting in a ride today, with the 49er game starting at noon. We had to get out when we knew it was going to be really cold. What we didn’t know is how awful each of us would feel!!!

The plan was to head out to the coast and back Tunitas. We nearly bailed on even climbing Old LaHonda, in favor of a foothill loop to Los Altos! In fact, we almost turned back at the first corner on Old LaHonda, it was that bad. And it didn’t get better as we rode either. Oh, and it was even drizzling when we started, despite a forecast that said no issues with rain.

We got to the bottom of West Old LaHonda and turned back towards Skyline, and immediately Kevin was thankful, since we had a pretty good tailwind… which meant we would have been fighting a nasty headwind all the way out to the coast. At Skyline we headed north, then looped out Swett to Tunitas and back down Kings. A whopping 31 miles!!!

And got back in time for the game. Well gee whiz, we should have just ridden later; the 49ers played as badly as we rode. But at least they had an excuse, with their main quarterback quickly out of the game with an injury.

WOLH is still there

Tues/Thurs 7:45am ride

Kevin’s back from Disneyland so at least I had company for the whole ride this morning (on Tuesday, the “other” Kevin, es-pilot, rode up Kings a few minutes ahead of me, thinking I’d catch him.. like that was going to happen!). We actually left two minutes early, wanting as much time as possible to complete the ride, given how slowly I’ve been riding lately. Somehow I managed to get up a couple minutes faster than Tuesday, even though Thursday includes going through the park and, today, having to navigate a closed gate at the top.

Odd morning; more cars than usual, and fewer bikes, even though there wasn’t a cloud in the sky and the weather was very slightly warmer than it’s been lately.

West Old LaHonda is still there, and seemed like they’d even swept the road of debris on the upper part, before the first barrier. Until we’re 100% certain we won’t be blocked off, we’re still riding from the top-down, so a road blockage won’t cause a really long back-track via 84 back up to Skyline. Maybe Sunday we’ll head out in search of other damaged roads?