A big day ahead of us today. Looks like it will be our second biggest climbing day of the entire trip. Good thing we have 4 days of training under our belts! It took us about 3 miles to rid ourselves of industrial San Bernardino. Thankfully traffic was light and directions were easy. At least I thought they were easy; found out at dinner that two ladies took wrong turns early in the day. We started climbing right away, but a very gentle grade so a nice warmup. Then through some rural small roads but thankfully didn't have to contend with horses on the road as Patty did last night in the car when she was scouting the route. At about 8 miles we turned into Historic Route 66 for about 6 miles. Not much traffic as it parallels I-15 and that is where most of the vehicles are. It was quite a busy transportation corridor - I-15, Route 66 and two busy rail lines.
Rode about a mile on I-15 (no other options) which scared our Scottish lass Sheila half to death. The recounting of her day always leaves us in stitches! At about 18 miles we turned into Lone Pine Canyon and began a "long, steady climb 6-8%". Well, I think they need to revise the sheet a bit. I know it doesn't sound like much difference to a non-cyclist, but in the last few miles I was seeing a lot of 9, 10 & 11% on my GPS. Whew! What a grunt!!
At the top of that climb was the little town of Wrightwood. It is right on the PCT so lots of through-hikers. I stopped there for a few minutes and chatted with a few of them who were looking nice and fresh after a hotel night in town. Back on the bike to climb 4-ish miles. Crossed into Los Angeles County, passed a few downhill ski areas and large stone marker beside the ranger station.
Then we had a lovely long and winding descent. Very little traffic so it was quite fun. About 25 miles from our destination we started back into rolling terrain and the headwinds & crosswinds picked up. Quite a challenging ride into Palmdale until the last mile which was with the wind and downhill. Woohoo! Five riders completed the whole ride today and our SAG driver Cindi had a little gift for each of us. So nice......
Stats for the day:
108 km / 67 miles from San Bernardino CA to Palmdale CA
7006 feet up
5797 feet down
Weather: started out about 15C and went up into the low 20s as we climbed. Needed a sweater for the descent. Got up into the low 30s once we bottomed out. Fought strong headwinds & crosswinds for the last 25 miles. Hard to keep the bike under control at times. Started out cloudy, then moved to a high fog and finally to full sun.
Loved the pic with you and Route 66 sign! And later on, are those Joshua trees? We visited Joshua Tree National Park many moons ago... weird trees.
ReplyDeleteSounds like a tough day, but you got through it (as I was sure you would!)
You ladies are tough!
ReplyDeleteThat tall white flower almost looks like Bear Grass, plus the roads looked pretty rough.
ReplyDelete