April 14, 2009
Day 1: Headwinds, Hills and Hamburger
Day 1 - Headwinds, Hills and Hamburger
Not a bad day on the bike. I could have done without the winds but I'll get to that later. My route started with a section of the Western Express ACA route. I ride that road all the time but rarely take pictures there. Today I took the time and I hope you like them. It really is a beautiful stretch of road and I feel lucky to be able to ride it whenever I want.
After that the route turns west on to route 128, and that is part of the route of the Tour of California. I was wondering how I was going to do on 'Cardiac' hill with a loaded down Trucker. Cardiac is a categorized climb on the Tour of Cal but it was not as bad as I thought. It was one of the stretches with calm winds and I was grateful for that
After that I continued on to Napa Valley. If you don't know the area it's pretty hilly. In fact one racing cyclist kept passing me in both directions doing hill repeats. But traffic was very light and the cars today were great, giving me plenty of elbow room when I passed. The weather was weird the whole way but got noticeably cooler around that time and I was happy to finally drop into Napa Valley Until I turned north and got a face full of cold wind! :-P
Luckily, I had already decided where I was going to head for lunch (even though by then it was almost 4:00pm). I looked up a restaurant online that serves all natural hamburgers in St. Helena and nothing was going to deter me from my cheeseburger, fries and a coke! Every time I felt like a gust was going to blow my brains out of my ears I thought about the cheeseburger and kept pushing on. I got to Taylors not a moment too soon and sat down to my prize (see pic).
By then the wind was becoming more than annoying and I was tempted to call it a day in St. Helena, but in the end I pushed on. I only had 10 more miles after all and I am learning to live with wind, except that, about 3 miles out of town it actually started raining! Not raining hard, more like 'sprinkling.' But that on top of the cold and wind just seemed unfair. Still, some parts of the sky were blue and some were grey, and I could see my little rain 'thing' would pass in a few minutes. I thought about ducking into a winery but found a little tree overhang and that seem to do the trick. Ten minutes later it was sunny!
So, I made it to Calistoga and got a much needed hot shower, a great pasta dinner, some macadamia clusters at the towns candy shop and now I'm sitting here on my Aspire One and drinking tea.
I LOVE this little laptop! More on that another time.
Now, as for the wind It was not as bad as I was expecting until I got to Napa. Because of the nature of the roads winding this way and that, in and out of canyons, there where times when the winds were calm or I even had a tail wind every now and then. Having a little mental break from the wind make a big difference. Napa was another story; it was howling there.
Still, tomorrow's weather promises to be calmer and warmer. I'm looking forward to another fun day with the Trucker, who is resting comfortably in our little room in Calistoga.
So, until tomorrow,
Karen (and the Trucker)
Vital Statistics
Miles 61
Hours on the bike--6 hours
Hours on the road--8 hours
Calories--3285
Number of cheeseburgers consumed--1
Number of macadamia nut clusters consumed--2, and counting! ;-)
Number of Lattes: 0 Zero!? Something needs to be done about that. That will have to change tomorrow!
Today's ride: 61 miles (98 km)
Total: 61 miles (98 km)
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