Ride of Silence, 5/20/09

Next Wednesday is the Ride of Silence. Show up at the ride in your town or start your own. Bring lights and maybe a black arm band. Obey lights and signs, ride next to someone and generally bring positive attention to cycling.

Photo from http://www.rideofsilence.org/

Recreational Cyclocrossing

I recently did some recreational cyclocrossing.  What's that?  It's a term coined by our very own -d to describe a road/dirt ride with potential dismounts and a bit of adventure.  For a while now, I've wanted to ride Alpine Road in Portola Valley, CA.  It used to be paved road which was eventually closed off to traffic and maintenance was ceased.  It was used in the past as a good way for road cyclists to get up into the hills while avoiding traffic.  There are some pics on Ray Hosler's website of famous local cyclists like Jobst Brandt and Tom Ritchey riding it in the 80's. Also, it was part of a hill climb time trail series back in 1996.  However, there's not a ton of current information.  Time for reconnaisance.

The road starts out as a graded gravel road.  Nice riding.  Steep in places.  We had a two weeks of rainless weather so I thought it would be pretty good, but there was still peanut butter style mud in the shadows.

Eventually after some switchbacks, you get to this sign.  You can go beyond it and around a small gate.

But don't bother.  The vegetation is so thick and overgrown, you have to take the side trail which is steep, root strewn single track.  Great mountain biking, impossible road biking (be prepared to walk it so bring your mountain bike shoes), challenging on a cross bike, but do-able.

Apparently, it was once attempted in a pickup truck, and here it lies.

After the single track, the road opens up again, gets a little more sunny, and picturesque.

You pop out on Page Mill road, where a right turn takes you west towards the Pacific ocean, and a left turn takes you back down to Palo Alto and the Santa Clara Valley.

If you're on a mountain bike, don't bother to take the road.  Take Montebello Trail instead which should dump you out at Stevens Creek Reservoir.

 

If you take the road down, there's a water spigot outside Foothills park where you can top off.  Because of this, I only carried one bottle on the ride.

In conclusion - if you've got something just a little knobbier than a road bike, you should do this ride.  It's low on traffic, high on nature and scenery and a damn fine way to spend a weekend day. 

Adventure Cyclocrossing

While riding my road bike down a local rural road, I found a mystery tunnel. It didn't have much of a path going to it, and went under a pretty major freeway, so I decided to come back with the cyclocross bike to follow it. I also checked it out with Google maps and Wikimapia and thought it might lead into a dirt path in a neighborhood on the other side, creating a neat road/dirt bike loop. Well, on my return visit, I found this:


Equestrian use only. Booo. This was found in an area so rich that people either drive their luxury cars, ride their horses or excercise in their home gyms, so I'm not going to hold out much hope that the path will ever be open to cyclists. Also, I dare not trespass, lest some very well connected resident call the authorities and have me sent to Guantanamo. In the mean time, it really whetted my appetite for some adventure cyclocrossing. The kind that goes from my doorstep, to a rural road, to a dirt road, to a trail and back to a road in a scenic loop.

Kennedy Trail Turkey Ride

My legs are still tired from this year's Kennedy Trail Turkey Ride. I didn't know about it until this week, but apparently every year, people ride their bikes up the very steep Kennedy Trail in Los Gatos, CA and bring Thanksgiving treats to eat and drink at the top. I have ridden and hiked this fire road several times in the past, but never with the kind of crowds that turned out today. The climb is probably a solid 2000 vertical feet. It starts bright and early, so if you do it, you might also make it over the river and through the woods to Grandmother's house for an evening supper. Things to bring, besides food and drink, include an extra layer for the ride down and a bell for your handlebars to signal hikers and bikers on your descent.

All sorts of fun, wacky bikes show up at the starting point in downtown Los Gatos. This Retrotec model was recently acquired by its owner (although it looks rather vintage) and the stiffness of the rear 'triangle' is adjustable by tensioning the cables/rods that go from the seat tube to the rear dropouts.

More weird wild bikes include this leopard print tandem with moto style upside down forks. A tandem would be fun for this ride since you enjoy the added power of two riders on 1.5 bikes and the downhill is not very technical.

The leopard tandem also had a festive gecko idler gear just sort of floating in the timing chain between the pilot and stoker.

This "Yokota Project USA" tandem was built at the dawn of mountain bike suspension. The "Shock Blades" fork offered about 18mm of travel (unless it was locked down in some way) and the bike made use of elastomer shock stems for both riders. Put a rack on this thing and you have a mean turkey toting machine.

It wasn't all contraptions and tandems. A few riders showed up on cross bikes, lots of people pushed excessively suspended downhill bikes up the trail, and one guy rode his very fancy LOOK carbon fiber race machine.

Happy Thanksgiving to everyone from nippleworks.

Bike Sundays - enjoy it

Every Sunday (with the exceptions noted on the sign), the local authorities close off Cañada Road near the Filoli estate in Woodside California to traffic. They call it Bicycle Sunday. I call it fantastic. Not only do they post steel poles in the ground at both ends, but they also put out a water cooler with cups and put a water bowl on the ground for dogs. Last weekend, they also had a mountain rescue guy hanging out halfway down the road, just watching people go by with his radio. Everybody's out there: people with Primal Wear jerseys, kids with training wheels, joggers and people on custom tri bikes. The road has good paving, and perfect big ring rollers. If you go, say thanks to the Sheriffs and Rangers. They're out there sitting in their stinky pickups on Sunday when they'd probably rather be watching the game, so that we can stretch our legs.


Another point of interest - stop at the Pulgas Water Temple. It is kind of imposing looking, and when you get near it, you hear some serious stuff happening. Kind of like a Hercules-cleaning-the-stables sound. If you look down the hole in the center you can see all the water we're stealing from the Sierra's flowing under ground. The trail to the temple is a gravel path, easily traveled by road bike and there's a toilet and water fountain for pit stops.