It was foggy when we woke up this morning. There was quite a bit of condensation along the walls of the tent, it was almost like it rained, but I'm pretty sure it didn't. There was so much fog that we couldn't see the water or the rock with the arch this morning. After we got packed up and had some oatmeal and a muffin, the fog was starting to clear and the sun was coming out. The view of the rock in the water was just beautiful. As we rode out of town, I saw the really cute little restaurant/pub that the boys went to last night and we also found out there was another church in town (probably where the other guy on the bike went looking for us, and obviously didn't find us). Not too far into the ride, we had a really steep "c" hill with some short switchbacks. It was a doozy, that's for sure. Luckily I was able to ride up it ok and didn't have to walk (which is what I was worried about when I first saw it). The ride along the ocean continued. It was just another amazing ride- can't be beat. Just like yesterday, the road was curvy and had lots of "c" hills that made it a lot of fun. About 15 miles into the ride, we came to the town of Manchester. We saw the sign for the KOA, which is where Fred probably stayed last night. Across the street was the state park. Just as we were getting there, the couple (from Oregon) we had seen yesterday very briefly, were just getting ready to start the day's ride. I think I forgot to mention this couple yesterday, but the cool thing is that they are touring with their dog Rex. He runs/walks when they go uphill or slow and they have a trailer for him for when they are riding fast. I thought it was the coolest thing- they looked like they were having a lot of fun- and Rex did too! The girl (I don't remember names unfortunately) asked us how that really steep hill was for us. She said that yesterday when she did it, she couldn't unclip and ended up falling over (been there before!). I don't know if her chain derailed or if she was just in a bad gear, but in the end she said that she ended up walking up. It was a tough one, so I don't blame her! For a little bit, the road wasn't right next to the ocean anymore. Instead, we were riding through a bunch of farm fields. There were quite a few free range cows in the one area, too. A couple of those cows decided it was a good idea to stand in the road. When they saw us coming however, they decided it wasn't such a good idea anymore and began to slowly run away. It was pretty amazing to see so much farm land right along the coast. Also- so many itty bitty little towns. For some reason, I pictured the entire coast to just be packed with houses, kind of like in Florida. But it's quite the opposite, which is actually pretty nice. We passed through a few tiny towns before we decided to stop for lunch. We stopped in a town called Gualala and found a nice picnic table next to a pizza shop. The people who worked inside didn't seem to mind that we were using one of their tables. We were pretty hungry for some reason today so we had a double serving of Mac and Cheese. All 3 of us are starting to get excited because San Francisco is getting so close. The hills continued this afternoon. We rode about 30 miles before lunch and around 10 miles after lunch we saw a sign that said Jenner was still 30 miles away. We were all pretty bummed, but still wanted that to be our goal. As the ride went on, I became pretty tired again, but was still plugging along. Loic was feeling it too by the end of the ride because he usually stays within 50-60 miles each day. Just when we were saying we only had 10 miles left to go, the ride went from a little hard to pretty challenging! The road went right along a cliff with the ocean below. We went up and up and up. It was a little scary in some places because there was no guardrail-you look down and there were just the crashing waves below, yikes! After climbing for a while, we had a little descent. I took that very slow. If one was going too fast, in a bike or vehicle, around some of the turns, they would go flying off over the guardrail down the the ocean below. I didn't want to take any chances, and plus, the view was too spectacular to go too fast and miss it. We had another section of climbing after that. It was so beautiful, and by far one of the coolest sections of roads we've ridden on. Both Loic and I were constantly stopping to take pictures.. it was pretty funny. At one point Loic said "poor Joey" since he had to wait for both of us because of our pictures. I thought it was pretty funny! Exhausted, the second climb seemed to take more effort and take way longer. As we were reaching the top, we had some incredible views of the sun starting to set over the ocean. This was a ride I will never forget. Not only was the ride along the cliff amazing, the descent and then short climb over the hill to Jenner was amazing too. When we were at the top, we could see the road winding around way below and then up the small hill. There were some amazing switchbacks in a very open, treeless area. What a fun ride! We came into Jenner about 30 minutes before it got really dark. Unfortunately we didn't see any churches in town. There was however a really nice visitor center with a covered picnic table and even vault bathrooms. We knew that we weren't going to ride much further since we were all tired, so we decided to eat our dinner at the tables and then figure out where we would park our tents for the night. Joe and I made some rice for dinner and relaxed for a bit. While we were sitting there, a guy came out of the visitor center with a huge thermos dispenser for hot water. He said he had some hot water left if we needed or wanted any. It was perfect- it was getting a bit chilly and we had nice hot water to make some hot cocoa! After we ate, the boys went on a little walk to find a home for the night. Behind the gas station was a little fire hall. They scoped it out and there was a little area next to/behind it that would be out of the way and looked nice and safe. The guy who owned the gas station saw us sitting across the street at the picnic table and offered us the last of the coffee if he wanted it before he tossed it, even though it might keep us up. Although we appreciated the offer, none of us drink coffee, so we didn't have any. Later on though, Joe got talking to him and the next thing we knew he was walking back to where we with a bag full of salt water taffy! The guy who owned the gas station gave us a bunch of candy! What a treat after a pretty long day. We headed over to our little camp spot for the night and got everything all set up. All 3 of us went to bed pretty much right away since we were whooped. A tough day, but a beautiful ride. Our miles totaled 72.40 today.
|
|