Sunday, June 3, 2007

Historical Post: 9907 XC bike tour, Vol 4


Tom (left, with Gill)
Currently a Soup Attendant at a local High School
NOTE: Vol 3 & 4 are reversed chronologically on this post, but you get the drift.
Sunday
Jerry Erb’s “Quote of the Day” – You know, I really should have trained for this…

This was a good day in paradise – 8500 vertical feet of climbing, increasingly dropping temperatures, incredible vistas, and even more nude waitresses.

Gill, Chris, and I start out at daybreak again. We get ~ 50 miles and then the climbing begins – 3500 ft in ~ 20 miles. Pretty rugged, steep uphills followed by short steep downhills. We ride well as a team today, switching off in the mountains frequently, as often as 2-3 miles. I actually have to ride through a mountain tunnel, a rather scary stretch of road – basically pitch black and narrow. The autos are very kind to me however. We close our morning session with me riding an awesome downhill - ~ 8 miles at 50-55mph. I should be able to nail 60 this trip, and could have a viable shot at 70 if road conditions are right. As you may have guessed, “Il Campione”is a master of the downhill….

We trade off and gill takes the helmsman slot. 2 hours, a rapidly overheating engine, our first forest fire, and at least one Indian reservation later, we finally get back on the right road. And they say blondes don’t have a clue – what do they know…

We grab another buffet dinner at JB’s again (our new favorite buffet restaurant), and then pickup the riders ~1700. They are very whipped, having climbed the remaining 4500 vertical feet or so. We plow on through a few more hours, then call it a day. Very heartening to all of us was that as we would stop the “big rig” on the roadside to wait for the cyclist to come by, many people would pull over and make sure that we were ok. Maybe there is some hope for humanity. Or maybe they were just checking out Gill’s butt. Nah, it’s probably the humanity thing.

Cliff meanwhile is getting pulled over by the cops for going 57 in a 55. Only Cliff. The cop checks them all out, and tells them (and I swear again that this is true), that he’s looking for some of those “goddamned dreadlock people ‘cause they got lice in their hair and he wants to give them a good whuppin’. Ah, good to be in the heart of liberalism. Tom of course (being clean shaven) doffs his hat, and launches into “We’re just looking for a nice retreat so that I can recover from my last round of chemo cough, cough, hack, hack. The cop backs off and wishes them well –no ticket for cliff, but he did give Tom a $20 donation towards his medical expenses…

We camp the night in a national forest at 9500+ vertical feet, sounds of wild animals everywhere – Jerry snoring, Cliffs farting, Chris’s slapping noises (whatever those were…)

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