Winter Solstice 200 km brevet

Friday 21st was the winter solstice and Kerin hosted her annual 200k brevet.

Twelve riders met at Pasadena's Sierra Madre Gold Line station at 7pm. The weather prediction was perfect with no rain, favorable winds, and temperatures in the 50's. Many riders decorated their bikes with tinsel and Christmas lights. I was just glad to be there.

Start of ride

After a tour of the lights of Pasadena we hit the San Gabriel bike path and flew to the beach with a strong group and a tail wind. My rwgps says we took 1h35m to cover 30 miles. It seemed faster in the dark. We passed through several bands of fog on the way to the beach - some of it very thick.

At Huntington Beach I rode on the beach path for safety but the fog was quite thick. One hundred yards inland on PCH, where the rest of the group was riding, there was almost no fog at all; so I moved over and rode with everyone else. Weird how fog works sometimes.

The second control is at the Harbor House which is a 24 hour restaurant with decent food and a great atmosphere. It always takes a while to get a large group through there - this year it took over an hour - but it's a great control for this kind of ride.

Harbor House at one a.m.

The control at Dana Point was closed with a sign saying "back in 15 minutes" - rando's dilemma - do you wait or push on? I pushed on, relying on the pro-bar in my top tube bag. If I had known I would miss the train by 30 seconds I would have waited.

It's 3:15 am and they "say" they'll be back by 3:30. 

We continued on the usual route down the coast staying more-or-less as a group. I split off at San Clemente to ride the beach path while the others went up PCH. After San Clemente I caught up with the lead group and we went through San Onofre state park and then onto the shoulder of the I5 for the last ten miles or so. The freeway shoulder is the only bad part of the route.

I got to Oceanside desperate to use the rest room and by the time I got out I missed the 5:37 train by about 30 seconds so I had to wait for the 7:00 instead. Ate at the terrible Burger King but at least I got to chat with Jeff and Lori Arita who are planning to ride PBP next year. I really hope it goes well for them.

My ankle felt sore at the end of the ride, but I knew it would. I probably set the healing process back a month but I really wanted to do this ride :-)

Total riding time was 8:43 (14.5 mph average) which wasn't bad considering it was dark and there was a lot of fog.

Riding with a sprained ankle

It has been a while since I posted. RUSA has entered and emerged from an insurance nightmare. I'm sure all the RBA's and ride organizers are now suitably paranoid about waivers. I suspect we will see more reluctance to embrace the risk of litigation considering there is no benefit other than helping our fellow randonneurs.

I sprained my ankle a couple of weeks ago and it's still too swollen to fit into my cycling shoes but fortunately I bought a pair of cheap Nashbar SPD sandals a couple of years ago and they are flexible enough to accommodate my foot.

I met Amber at the Anaheim Artic. She still had her Topeak MTX rack and panniers on her bike. This is a very cool rack bag that has side pockets that open into capacious panniers. We started pedaling, but I didn't know if I'd make it out of the parking lot, to the beach, or what. Fortunately the pain wasn't to bad so we got all the way to Seal Beach and I had an idea.

I have recently discovered a Danish mead but the restaurant I found it at wants $42 a bottle whereas Total Wine only charges $30. There's a Total Wine just off the San Gabriel bikeway (this shopping center would make a great control) so we rode there.

We tried eating at Charo's, a Peruvian restaurant, but the service was so slow they hadn't even taken our order after 20 minutes so we walked across to a PizzaRev which we had never heard of. We had a custom made pizza within 10 minutes of walking in. It was really good and we would definitely go back. There must be at least 20 places to eat in the Long Beach Town Center and you don't even have to ride on the road to get there - there's a bike path straight from the San Gabriel bike path into the shopping center.

PizzaRev - very good

After PizzaRev we headed over to Total Wine to see what meads they had in stock. I bought six bottles and we put them in Amber's panniers. They we very heavy so it's a good thing there were no hills on the way back. I can tell you that the MDX panniers can comfortably carry half a case of wine. I don't know why they don't put this in the documentation - it's a major selling point.

Six bottles of wine - perfect fit

We ended up with 66 miles and I gave Amber a bottle of wine. I hope she likes it. My foot hurt a bit the next day but it was totally worth it.

Another 200k

Greg, Stacey, Amber, and I rode my Four Rivers 200km permanent on Saturday. Greg and Stacey started from their house which is only three miles from the southern most point on the ride and headed inland to meet us at the official start. The new RUSA rules that allow a permanent to be started at any point works very well for them.

By the time they met us at 8:00 am Yorba Linda they had already ridden 24 miles. It was chilly and a bit breezy so I was wearing my RUSA vest to keep the wind from biting.

I have just installed a dynamo tail light, the Secula Plus, purchased from Peter White. I had trouble figuring out how to wire it because the spade terminal on my Edelux II was almost invisible, but with a lot of help from the seller, I was able to find it. It comes on automatically when the front light comes on and has a stand light so I feel very safe with it.

Secula Plus - the Plus means it has a stand light

The breeze died down quickly as we headed to the coast. Those of you who are familiar with the east end of the Huntington Beach trail will be pleased to hear they are repaving it. Currently the two miles between the Santa Ana river and the pier are ripped up and not rideable.  Your options are to ride through the parking lot, along PCH, or even Atlanta Ave. There is a rumor they are going to mark separate pedestrian and cycling sections. We shall see.

We ate at The Crema in Seal Beach and, as the wait was very long, we grabbed ham and brie baguettes to go with Thai iced tea and ate on the benches outside. Wonderful.

We then headed inland to El Monte where there was only one person working at the Subway there. Each sandwich took several minutes to prepare and pay for so I had to wait 20 minutes to get my sandwich. Poor woman - I felt so sorry for her.

Greg and Stacey outside the Subway as Amber and I eat inside

Headed back on the Rio Hondo bike path we saw a cyclist coming the other way while peeing out the side. Disgusting. I hope I never see that again. Actually I hope he crashes and has to ride home covered in his own blood and urine. Is that mean of me?

The head wind into Long Beach was quite mild for a change and we headed over to Belmont for our Chronic Tacos fix. According to the electronic counter there we were about the 3,000th cyclists for the day. One carnitas quesadilla later I was stuffed and ready to finish the ride.

Greg and Stacey stopped off at the Ballast Point in Seal Beach for a quick drink and Amber and I headed back to Yorba Linda. We finished the ride in 9:59 which is pretty good considering the amount of time off the bike. It was dark for the last 20 miles and my new tail light worked great.

The Woolsey fire is burning in Ventura county right now and the entire northern sky is thick with smoke. As the sun headed West during the afternoon the smoke started to obscure it and it got so dark that my automatic lights came on at three in the afternoon. I swear it even felt a little colder than usual.

When is a gate not a gate?

When it's ajar (a jar, get it?)

I expected to ride the SART to Katella and back twice last night because the gate at Katella is supposed to be locked at 6pm in Nov, Dec, and Jan. However, when I got there the gate was unlocked and open even at 8:50pm. I'm not sure if the city is planning on locking the gate any earlier now that the SART is "officially" closed at 6pm.

Perhaps I'll be able to ride my normal route down to the beach after all. If I try that, though, I bet the gate will be locked for my return trip forcing me to make a nasty detour. What a pain those homeless people are, even when they're gone. The good new is they aren't returning so perhaps the gate policy is worth it.

The take-away from this is that the City does not seem to be enforcing the early closing policy on the SART in any way.

Malibu Creek State Park

On Sunday Glen, Amber, Sherry and I went hiking in Malibu Creek State Park. There were many film scenes shot here over the years, the most famous of which being M*A*S*H, Planet of the Apes, From Here to Eternity, Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid, etc. We hiked 5 miles and back to the old MASH set which still has a few ancient trucks lying around.

Reservoir

M*A*S*H ambulance

Group of mountain biking unicycles - I thought I'd seen it all.

Bloody Tourists!

Nightmare before Christmas at the Hollywood Bowl

My daughter treated us to tickets to A Nightmare before Christmas at the Hollwood Bowl on Saturday. It's the 25 anniversary of the film and the orchestra was playing the music live as they showed the film.

There's a great scam you can do. You sell your event tickets to StubHub and then claim a refund from the issuers. Then some patsy buys your, now worthless, tickets and when they get to the gate they can't get in. If anyone reading this thinks this is a something you'd do, please let me have your name and address so I can drop by and PUNCH YOU IN THE FACE. This is what happened to us. My daughter spent 40 minutes on the phone with StubHub to get our tickets back. The good news is that we got incredible upgrades. We were now five rows back in seats costing about $200 :-)

I didn't realize Danny Elfman was going to sing the entire part of Jack. I certainly didn't expect all the original singer to perform their parts live. Amazing!

The singers from the original film

Danny Elfman sings Jack

Lock, Stock, and Barrel

Oogie Boogie

Sarah

Curtain call

As if that wasn't enough, Danny Elfman brought the members of Oingo Boingo out on stage and they performed a track live.

Oingo Boingo

Then, to cap it all, Danny Elfman brought out an inebriated Tim Burton who promptly dropped the F-bomb and stole Danny's microphone.

Another Friday night on the SART

I rode my last Friday night on the SART for a while. Starting next weekend the city will be locking the gates at Katella at 6pm which means I can't get past in time.

It was a great ride - cool (mid 60's) and with almost no wind. There were very few idiots on the trail for a change and I didn't almost crash into a cyclist with no lights on the wrong side of the trail at midnight - in fact I didn't even see one.

I rode down to Newport Beach but the new guy behind the counter of NBC wouldn't serve me pastries so I went to Burger Boss instead. The service and food were great but I thought $8.50 was too steep for a single burger. Coming back I didn't really feel any energy from the food.

$8.50 burger?