It is really easy to do long climbs in the bay area. Sunday, we rode to the coast. We climb over Skyline 2000 feet and ride to the coast and then we ride back and have to climb over Skyline again. So that yields approximately two 30 minute climbs plus rolling terrain. The key climbing metric is VAM. And my VAM will be lower on easier grades. For me, it takes a steeper hill to get a bigger VAM.

What is interesting in our local area is that we have a lot of cyclists on the road every weekend on the silicon valley side of Skyline (ridge just to the west of San Andreas Fault) and many climb to top of Skyline and descend back down. Very few climb over Skyline and ride to the coast into the head wind and then cycle back and climb Skyline again. We go from seeing a cyclist every few seconds to seeing one or a small group every 15 to 20 minutes after we begin descending toward the coast. However climbing and descending in the redwoods and riding to the coast is a very special ride that is worth the effort.