I posted awhile ago about a local ride that I was thinking about doing here in my hometown of Newberg. It's called the Vine Ride (www.vineride.com) and it has several routes to choose from that wind through our beautifule wine country here in Yamhill Co.

DH and I signed up. He's doing the century and I'm doing the 35 mile route.

The problem? Well, Saturday we had an informal ride put on by our church. There are lots of cyclists of all levels and we call it the "Tour de Stake" (in the LDS culture what church building we call 'home' depends on our geographic area. The areas are called Stakes, and they consist of anywhere from 4 to 8 or so chapels) and we ride to all the chapels in our area.

Confused yet?? LOL...

So the first 'leg' is from McMinnville to Amity. Very nice, flat ride...tailwind...around 9 miles. Next is from Amity to Dayton. Again, very nice flat ride...around 12 miles.

Then comes the difficult part...Dayton to Newberg (which is where I stop...but the hard-core riders continue on to Yamhill and back to McMinnville) is 17 miles of hills. Large hills with not enough going down to make up for the ones going up. These hills are the same ones that end the route on the Vine Ride DH and I signed up for. Now I've ridden this road several times, but it's one thing to do these hills at mile 10 of your route...quite another to do them at mile 30.

So...if you happen to be doing the Vine Ride and you see a large 30ish woman walking...tha'll be me.

I think I'd back out if we hadn't already paid!