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Old 05-28-07, 07:12 PM
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SaiKaiTai
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Mori Point Part Two

Or is it three? I guess it is three, isn't it.

The Mrs let me out for a short ride today and being Monday (Happy Memorial Day, y'all) I'm back on the Kaitai's schedule. And I continue to explore the off-road world with. You may recall, I tried Mori Point once and it won. I tried it a second time and, while I still didn't pick the "easy" way up, I found the easy way up. And I took it down and figured the next time I'd try that and see how it went. Today was that day. I let some air out of the tires... got 'em down to about 70-75 lbs. Not that bad on the road at all, actually.

Well, crap the first thing I found was that I forgot my seat bag and my tools.
The second thing I found was my chainring wasn't dropping down to "low".
Well, I'm gonna be needing that aren't I? OK, guess I'll just have to be the FD and drop the chain down by hand. Yeah, that works. Not optimal but it works. Turns out the new bottle cage I added blocks the FD. Great.

So I get to Mori Point and I don't remember the way up that I found. This way? No. Back down and on to the next trail. Is this it? No. But as I stand there and look at this monster climb in front of me, I see the way up just don't below. It is pretty easy. I'm dodging ruts and following shoulders... doing great. No hurry... HR's in check and right at the top, it really kicks up for about 10 yards or so. I remember this spot. last week, I got my HR waayyyy too high climbing this. Today I crest at 161bpm and hit 166 right at the top when I stopped. One deep, cleansing breath and it drops right down again. The top of this point is just CRAWLING with trails but Mrs Kaitai only gave me an hour. Long enough to click off some shots and head back.

This is Pacifica weather.. one day it's like it was on Saturday -foggy, misty and cold- and the next it's like you see below. It's all about the adventure.

Here's a look at the last 10 yards up. The real fun is going down. In the middle you can a bit of the "road" I started from (it's actually called Mori Point Road. What a joke. It ain't no road). My form is really improving on descents. Feet at 9 and 3, out of the saddle, butt back. It might be harder going up than on asphalt but the downhill? Oh yeah.



Here's looking south again from the top. Beautiful.


And looking north. The Pier and the Berm... the mile-long, seawall "protecting" the golf course you see behind it. Great stretch to ride in. Just don't ride with your tongue hanging out


And here's a view of the climb -part of it, anyway- that I took out of town on Saturday.
It's pretty much that grade the whole way up for a mile.
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