Fuimos a Monterey a buscar mi bici nueva… y volvimos con dos!…
Queriendo pasear un poco y manejar el jeep por un buen rato!, Denis busco un camino chico hacia el sur! La 35 va todo por arriba de una cadena montañosa que costea el mar desde el sur de la Bahia de San Francisco hasta casi Monterey.
El camino es hermoso!, mucha curva, mucha subida y bajada, mucho verde, árboles de todo tipo!, y encima un cielo celeste más celeste imposible!!
Cada tanto algunos claro con una parada para apreciar la vista panoràmica de la bahía y los cerros del otro lado!; o el mar y cerros dorados por los pastos secos debido a la época! Una belleza!
Mucho ciclista… por dònde miràramos había ciclistas! En el camino por dònde íbamos, en los estacionamientos de los parques que íbamos pasando! Ciclista, ciclista màs ciclista!!!
Chequeamos un parque para parar a la vuelta con las bicis, impresionante la cantidad de mountain bikes! Toda la zona parece un paraíso para el ciclista! Ya sea de ruta o de montaña! Y un paraíso para Denis que le encanta manejar camino sinuoso!, màs curvas imposible!…, sòlo faltò que fuera de tierra y algo màs aventurero…. Ja! Ja! Ja! No, estuvo espectacular!!
Juntamos las bicis a la tarde y a la mañana siguiente partimos ansiosos de ir a probarlas en el bosque!
Casi no había dònde estacionar…, y había autos ya estacionados en la calle… a medida que nos acercábamos, cruzamos montones de ciclistas de montaña! Preguntamos un poco còmo eran los senderos y tal cual, por lo que se veía del terreno… las opciones eran pocas… para arriba, un descenso espinoso y una subida larga y costosa hasta el estacionamiento; o… para abajo unos 8 km/5 millas para volver a subir el mismo camino.
Nadie hablò de subir por el descenso empinado… parece que el circuito famoso es el primero!
Nosotros bajamos por el camino del parque apenas un poco estando seguros que podìamos volver fácil; creo Denis estaba muy ansioso de probar el circuito que todos iban… pero yo sabìa que ni èl, ni yo podìamos atacarlo esta primera vez…
Chequeamos la primera opciòn solo para saber que no la podìamos hacer!, subimos la 35 hasta llegar al camino de tierra sobre la derecha que ya es parte de este sendero tan famoso! Ya subiendo bastante, Denis tuvo que caminar un par de metros, decidimos volver. Justo había un ciclista que estaba llevando un grupo de 30 personas, la mayoría o todos… jovencitos y varones… muchos ya caminaron esos primeros… Según Denis a mi me sobraban 5 cambios todavía!! Ja! Ja! Gracias a la bici nueva y que ando todos los días, normalmente buscando cerros! Me encanta subir!, no me gusta la bajada…
Contentos con lo que ya conquistamos!, volvimos al auto y seguimos viaje en busca de un sendero màs fácil y un lugar lindo para almorzar!
Paramos en el dique Crystal Springs, no mucho espacio para almorzar… parasitos contra el auto estacionado en la calle… pero dimos otro paseo con las bicis contra el dique muy lindo! Muchaaaa gente, chicos, ciclistas, perros pero hermoso lugar!
Contentos con todas las aventuras del finde!, emprendimos la retirada a casa a descansar antes de que empezara la semana!
We went to Monterey to pick my new bike up, and we came back with 2!!!… Denis bought one for himself!
Denis was in need of driving the jeep in windy roads so he picked a small, very windy one through the mountains! route 35 runs from south of San Francisco to very close to Monterey.
Beautiful scenery, very green, lots of trees and gorgeous vistas to the ocean and/or to the south end of San Francisco bay and the valley!
As we approached 35 we started seen cyclist, as we drive on the amount of cyclist on the road and parks in incredible! Cyclist everywhere of all kinds! Parking lot at parks were packed with cyclist’s cars, in these areas predominated the mountain bike type thou one had to be in the constant look for the road cyclist riding on 35.
We stopped a couple of times to admire the views, at one occasion we had a little hike up to the tallest hill for better views! Stepped at a small, less crowded little park for lunch, only 1 car at the parking lot!, though 10 minutes later a group of like 15 very loud asian hikers walked into the area a bit disoriented of where to go next… glad they didn’t stay long…
We checked another park as we saw more cyclist everywhere, mountain bikers, to see what was all the fast about! Was no room to park… we looked around and moved on.
As we are picking my bike up, Denis looks around and he finds one that will suit him, so we ended up getting 2 bikes!…
Next morning we decided to go back to the last park we stopped by the day before for a “test bike ride”, man!!!… cars everywhere!, parked on the road by miles but we kept on going and find one of the past spots in the parking lot. We asked around how the trails were, what was available and so on. We decided to try the fire track first but not for long because it was a 5 mile/8 km down hill meaning… we were to peddle a steep up hill to be able to come back to the car…. No today! So Denis is very enthusiastic wanting to do the loop that everyone else is going to… but the way out of that loop is this steep hill… So we just went to check it out! We rode up hill on 35 to the first dirt road to the right, other cyclist are passing us very quickly wanting to do this loop! As we still going up hill on the dirt road, I’m very comfortable riding my new bike with no drama! (I still have 5 gears to change to!!…), most of the young men that passed us before are walking their bikes up, Denis walks a couple of meters… and this is only the beginning…. We know we turning around soon! At a corner we stopped as this is our turning point, there was a mature cyclist waiting there so we chat with him about the loop and so on… he was guiding 30 cyclist through the loop that day!, and that was only him… we think that there must of have been like 200 hundred cyclist in that small park at that particular time… crazy!!!
Returning to the car was fast and fun! Bikes worked wonderfully well!
Choose another area to stop for lunch and give another go to our “test bike ride”!, this time is a reservoir close to San Mateo, had lunch right next to the car parked on the street… but the bike ride was nice and flat!, though lots and lots of people, children, dogs walking, running, cycling! Very pretty area!
Happy with our bikes and ready to have a bit of a rest before starting the working week again…, we headed back home!