Report on the excellent century ride loop (leaving the metric report for V) which Kim and I rode, sort of: Since Kim's been fighting the sniffles and I've been training my legs rather than my butt mtnbiking, we opted to cut out 20 miles which was easy since the route was a convenient figure 8. We ended up riding 83 miles with at least 4400' climbing.

Any way, the loop went west and then south from Yreka so we spent the entire day in the gorgeous Siskiyou mountain range. Elevation averaged over 3000 ft so we were up in juniper and pine forests and remote country. Only about 60 or so people rode this loop while the other routes stayed further east out in the valley. The morning was unexpectedly cold as a weather front came down from the Pac NW and brought snow in the high peaks! Kim looked up at the peaks at our first rest stop and said in disbelief, "Is that snow?" At least we now had an excuse for numb toes and fingers.

We had two good-sized but shallow steep climbs over the Scarface Ridge. The first was a little tough because we were really cold from the weather and because the climb started only 2 miles from the beginning. The climb was 3.6 miles long and steady but nothing steep (only 1358’ up) followed by “let 'er rip” downhill which would have been really fun except it was about 47 degrees minus wind chill. The temp sign at the bottom of the hill rose to a sweltering 55 degrees.

We then ended up in the Scott Valley and spun along almost flat roads past lots of ranches with active cowboys and cowdogs. This was big horse country with sheep, donkeys, burros and goats in abundance.

Lunch at the USFS station included the most luxurious accommodations ever. Not only was the food throughout the ride excellent, but this rest stop had great big deep and soft padded patio chairs. We came awfully close to just staying put, but after prying our posteriors aloft our saddles, we then faced a 14 mile climb. It sounded huge and intimidating but we only climbed 1800’ so there were lots of flat spots and easy rolling. The weather at last year’s ride was 20 degrees hotter so they stocked popsicles this year. The poor rest stop guy couldn’t pay us enough to eat them!

This last climb was followed by an intense steep descent on the only rough pavement of the ride that made me glad that I’d been practicing on Diablo. There were some vistas of the road that looked like the snaking high speed descents on the TdF. I let Kim show off her descending prowess while I did my best conservative crawl down.

This put us back into the main valley where we had some headwinds to battle on the way home but a lot of it was a very gradual descent into Yreka so it wasn’t the grueling fight we expected. We hooked up with a group of guys in a paceline and actually ended up dropping all but one (and that one kept drafting us, sprinting ahead and then getting reeled in). Guess they just couldn’t handle our blinding speed.

Post ride food was yummy. I think we all voted the baked potatoes and sour cream a brilliant addition to the menu and I, for one, would recommend the ride to one and all, not too hilly, not too flat, but just right.

V’s choice of a cabin at the Mt Shasta Ranch was great. Quiet, scenic and great for a group. We had a yummy dinner at Lily’s and a short drive back to the couch, brownies and champagne. It rained more Sat night and we woke to even more snow on the high slopes and the guess that snow may have fallen in the passes we rode over the day before. Great trip, ride and good company.