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DAY 15
San Francisco to Santa Cruz
 

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ROUTE: Santa Cruz DISTANCE: 82 Miles WINDS: South 5-10 early, later in the afternoon out of the west 5-10
WEATHER: Hazy, cool...low 70s TERRAIN: Hilly most of the day TOTAL CLIMBING: 4925 Feet

DAILY REPORT: 

Well, another "rest" day is in the books.  I think the riders had a good day off touring the sights of the city and trying to relax for the last 9 day punch to Costa Mesa.  Barb and I spent the morning resting and touring the waterfront.  There sure are a lot of people around here...and some weird ones too.  We spent the afternoon meeting our two new riders and getting them all set to ride...I'm not sure what everyone else did, but I hardly saw anyone the entire day so they must have been to the 4 corners.  But now it's back to work...we have a ride to do.

Even though we were in the big city, the route out of town was pretty easy...if you just count navigation and suitable roads.  Most of our route was on a published bike route out of town and after Pacifica, we were only highway 1 with the ocean to our right...pretty easy if you ask me.  Plus, the scenery leaving town was awesome.  The Golden Gate Bridge (GGB) was partially obscured as we left along Lincoln Drive.  I couldn't resist taking tons of photos of the bridge anyway...I probably have more photos of the GGB than anything else we see on the trip aside from the Grand Teton Mountains.  It doesn't seem to matter how it is being displayed, it's always impressive...and different.  Aside from all that, the pedaling was pretty challenging as we were up and down over bluffs overlooking the bay and ocean all the way out of town.  As I said, after leaving town, we found ourselves on hwy 1 for the remainder of the day until we got into Santa Cruz.  Hwy 1 was a very suitable road with a nice shoulder except for one short section climbing out of Pacifica.  That climb is a bit narrow and the traffic was pretty heavy today...more than I ever remember in the past.  But everyone negotiated that area with aplomb and welcomed the wide shoulder the remainder of the day. 

After peaking out on top of the cliffs overlooking the ocean just past Pacifica, the riders were treated with breath taking scenes all the way to Santa Cruz.  I'll probably just show riding shots in the photo section below...there were just too many great shots throughout the day to pass up.  In addition to the beautiful scenery and nice roads, the afternoon brought a slight tailwind to help the riders finish easily in spite of all the ups and downs.

Santa Cruz looks like something out of Baywatch.  As we entered town, we rode along a rustic coast line in the outskirts of the city...premium housing along the coast I'm sure.  As we neared the downtown, the shoreline turned to sandy beaches lined with volleyball courts and an amusement park.  Not sure the park added to the beauty of the beach scene, but someone in their infinite wisdom decided they needed them.  All along the way, we saw surfers of varying degrees of ability trying to catch that perfect wave to take them down the shoreline while tourists (and some of us) marveled from the cliff's edge.  Boy that water looked cold from where I was standing.

All in all it was another perfect riding day...great weather, great scenery, and everyone got in safely.  What more could a ride leader wish for?  We miss the riders who left in San Francisco...we lost 10.  We're down to 16 for the remainder of the ride.  Best wishes to you all and hope you'll come and ride with us again sometime. 

Tomorrow we head toward Carmel Valley and on our way we ride through the Monterey Peninsula.  We're expecting our warmest temperature of the season and the next couple of days might be a little toasty.  I hope we don't have fog tomorrow, it would be a shame to miss those views around Pebble Beach.  Tune in tomorrow for some photos of 17 mile drive...if we can see it.  M

HAPPENINGS ON THE ROAD

The early departure was pretty much "Riders in the mist" as we climbed away from town.

 YOU HEARD IT HERE FIRST

"Riiiiiing."
"Hello."
"Hello, is this Mike?"
"Yes...is that you David?  Anything wrong?"
"No, I just wanted to make a call on my mobile phone...IT'S WORKING!!!"

"I'm having a 3 dwarf morning."
"What's that?"
"I'm Dopey, Sleepy, and Grumpy."
"Hard day yesterday, huh?"

"I spent the whole day yesterday just moseying."
"Took it pretty easy did ya?"
"Well, one time I increased to an amble."

"Barb, I hope you've noticed that I've now learned to coordinate my Gatorade color with my outfit. "
"You have?"
"Yeah, when I spill it all over me, it doesn't show."

When we popped out at Pacifica, the view was stunning.

But as we made our way down the coast, the views again became a little grey...clear however...still pretty awesome.

What if you are out of town?  Can you still P in there?

Hey Jim, pick your ride!

While everyone else was enjoying the views, Greg and Bill were busy trying to play an etude on a bad tube.  I didn't take their effort seriously as I heard Bill exclaim, "Greg!  If you put this to your ear, you can hear the ocean!"

We got our first taste of agriculture today also...tomorrow will even be more into crops.

Just a bit hazy, but still good views of the coast none-the-less.

And some areas were just better than others.

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