The century ride was quite nice if you eliminate all the traffic we had to deal with coming, in the middle, and going back!

Veronica was right! The Calveras wall wasn't that difficult especially since it came in the first 15 miles of the ride. As we rode past Sierra Rd (sign said it was closed 5.5 miles ahead)I thought of the Tour and how lucky they were to have done it before the road caved in.

The tour around the Calveras reservoir was quite beautiful as it is very green right now. Since it was cloudy, the colors were somewhat muted. No wildflowers yet, but soon I would imagine.

The 2nd big climb over the Altamount Pass was pretty interesting. When we started at the bottom, one of our riders mentioned that we would be going over the freeway above (it looked pretty high!)and then on over the old pass. After a long not so steep hill we made it over the freeway and then eventually over the pass (that was a bit steeper). It was interesting to hear the windmills cranking away in the wind. Of course we knew that active windmills meant strong westerly winds going back to the start and indeed that's what happened!

Au contraire the hardest hill (at 90 miles) was getting out of Palomares Canyon. (I think my top speed towards the top was 4.2MPH and I managed to pass a few other riders who were also suffering!) To reach the canyon we had to go due west over the Dublin grade (parallel to HWY 580). The headwind was pretty strong so it took a bit of work to get over that grade. Fortunately we had a reststop just before going through Palomares. A guitar player serenaded us as we stocked up for our final climb of the day.

I recommend this ride. The food was great, there weren't thousands of riders so we never really saw a lot of pacelines and such, and the volunteers were most helpful. The only downside regarding the route was at times it was difficult to follow. Fortunately, I was with my club guys. 2 of them had done the ride before so they were our guides when a route question came up.

I managed to make a wrong turn at the end of the ride which resulted in a 5 mile detour, but that was my fault not the ride directions!

So Kim and Biker Gal - how did you do? I looked for you, but we started late (around 7:15). Maybe you saw us! We were best identified as the ones with the argyle socks (our latest trademark)!