Agave

2806.3; 100.8 miles!

Sometimes in crossword puzzles, they have the clue "century plant" and the answer is "agave." Very near to halfway through my ride today, I saw an agave plant.

Well, I got started, and I just kept goin'! Lunch at the Dry Creek Store is becoming a popular destination for me. Started north on Dry Creek Road, but ran out of shoulder and came back to Lambert Bridge Road and cut over to West Dry Creek, SO much nicer. At Yoakim Bridge Rd., no choice but to take it over to (East) Dry Creek, but the shoulder wasn't bad from there, and traffic fairly light.

Then, Dutcher Creek Road, a pretty substantial climb in mid-afternoon heat, and then a long cruise downhill to find myself in Cloverdale with over 45 miles on the meter!

Ice Cream! Couldn't find the drive-in/walk-up ice cream stand I had imagined I'd seen before in C'dale, and had to settle for a vanilla bar with chocolate coating from the freezer at a Mexican deli. Ate about half of it.

Decided the known evil was better than the un, so back over Dutcher Creek Road I went. I followed the same route back to the Dry Creek Store, by which time I was ready to eat the second half of my sandwich and refill my hydration pack. Then back through Healdsburg, Eastside (I hit 75 miles at the Riverfront Regional Park--another new favorite stop), Laguna, bike path, the usual, but I saw that I was gonna be about three miles short of 100, so I took a half-mile detour into Santa Rosa and then rode south out of Sebastopol til I had 99 and headed for home. All told, about 11 hours, including two lunch stops, ice cream, various rest stops.

Again didn't really hit the wall until about 60 or more. Oddly, no leg pain. Quite a lot of butt pain, and a bit of shoulder soreness, and I'm sure my leg muscles will be sore tomorrow (and the next day....), but I have my 120 for the week (137, actually), and less than 200 miles now to go to 3000!

Now that I've done a century, what next? Well, there's always 110! Seriously, I think I'd rather settle in to a good routine, and I don't really see a need to do more than 60 miles at a time, except for special occasions.

Burnside Burn

2705.5; 21.0 miles

I started out with a much longer ride in mind, and noticed about three miles out that my odometer wasn't working. On closer inspection, it appeared the cable-tie holding the sensor on the fork had been sheared off by my loading of my bike with another on the car rack yesterday. Miles the odometer doesn't see? They don't exist. So about 6 "ghost miles" back to the bike shop (West County Revolution), where they kindly affixed TWO cable-ties. By then I was rethinking my ride, not sure where I wanted to go, but no longer in the mood for 50+. I gravitated toward the mighty, fearsome Burnside Road ("English Hill" on this map, if it shows terrain as selected):


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I'd never before climbed this hill without at least two stops. It gains about 1000 feet in about 4 miles, all told. Today, I found I couldn't get into the lowest front gear without a derailleur adjustment that requires a phillips screwdriver, which my not-so-handy bike tool doesn't have!), so climbed it in 2-1 at best, and WITHOUT STOPPING, in about 40 minutes. Whoo-hoo! (It's a spectacular view up there, one of the best in the county!)

The other side could easily lead to 40mph+, except it's so badly potted and, in some places, slick, so I was seldom much over 30 mph, and riding the brakes for most of it. All in all, a slow start on my week, but I'm still easily in the running for a 3000-mile year.

I drove it later and filmed the climb: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QiN8zFlZq6g