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Pacific Coast - San Fran Loop Ride Report (Long)

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Pacific Coast - San Fran Loop Ride Report (Long)

Old 06-14-07, 02:47 PM
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Pacific Coast - San Fran Loop Ride Report (Long)

Touring Report - Pacific Coast Loop

Just got back from 8 days on the Pacific coast, and wanted share my experience and some
lessons I learned along the way. I had been searching for some place to tour this summer, and
when I got into the Escape from Alcatraz Triathlon via a random drawing, I decided to combine
two once in a lifetime opportunities into one trip. I shipped all my touring gear to a friend two
weeks before the trip and dragged my S&S coupled bike on the plane with me. My plan was to
start out from my hotel on Fisherman's Wharf the day after the race, leaving my luggage, bike
box, etc for when I returned. From the Wharf, I went to Half Moon Bay, Santa Cruz, Big Sur, King
City, Pinnacles Monument, back to Santa Cruz, up to Big Basin, and back to San Fran. In no
particular order, here are some thoughts on my trip:

- Ca Coast – Just incredible! Maybe I caught the flowers just right, but there were fields
and fields of them everywhere along the coast. The views were incredible, and most
surprisingly, none of it was lined with condo’s, pizza shops, arcades, and 100k people
clogging the roads with their SUV’s. I did find it surprising that so much of it was
agricultural, but hopefully there is zoning that prevents it from being anything else.
- Devils Slide – Maybe I missed something but I was expecting a white knuckle ride but
really never encountered anything even remotely scary. The drop-offs were lined with
barriers, which may have been something new, but certainly provided some security. I
did see where they were working on the tunnel, so maybe it’s only a matter of time before
the road becomes safer.
- Nacimiento-Fergusson is one grueling back-breaking road. I walked, I slogged, I cried. I
guess it probably took me on the order of two hours to get to the top. You know it’s tough
when you keep hitting the brifter for more gears, and they just aren’t there. On more then
one occasion I looked back at Kirk Creek and just thought, screw it, I can be back down
there in 15 minutes, and I’ll just change my plans and wing the rest of the trip. But I
persevered. My lowest gear was 26x27, and this was the only hill that I really missed
lower gearing.
- The wind. It can just crush your spirit. I don’t know why, but it’s so much worse then
hills. At least with a climb you can expect some payback in the near future. With the
wind, who knows? Sometimes it helped. When I left Half Moon Bay I was off to a rough
start. I really wanted to explore Ano Nuevo, so I took the hike to the beach, and ended
up spending about two hours their. I knew I was going to get in late and wasn’t looking
forward to working as hard as I did in the morning. All of the sudden, I’m going up hills in
the big ring, wondering what the heck is going on. I probably averaged 20 mph all the
way to Santa Cruz thanks to the wind. Mostly it hurt. Heading to King City after the
wonderful Nacimento-Fegruesson climb I cruised through Hunter-Liggett flying along with
the wind at my back. I got to Jolon road, where the sign said something like 18 miles to
King City. I figured the way things had been going I’d be there in an hour. Rightttt.
Turned left onto Jolon into 20-30 mph gusts. Spent the next two hours grinding my way
to King City, where I promptly got a hotel, a Domino’s pizza, and a big ass bottle of Sierra
Nevada from the Grocery store (another CA bonus). I’d say the net-net is that the wind
hurt a lot more then it helped. I had convinced myself that heading North off the coast
would get me out of the wind, but no luck.
- Worst decision – bringing a U-Lock. This trip I wanted to do more exploring and I figured
I’d be leaving my bike more. In the end, I never felt like it was necessary, and even if I
did, there was no where to hook it to. Can’t hook it to a picnic bench in a campground, or
a fence while you have your panniers on. I carried that 1.5lb POS for the whole trip, and
never took it out of my bag.
- Best decision – buying some strong wheels. Last year was my first tour, and I went out
on some Velocity Aerohead OC’s with 28 spokes. I was nervous the whole time, and
was even afraid to stand when climbing for fear of overstressing the wheels. I never had
any issues, but it caused a lot of worry. That was on the Blue Ridge Pkwy, which is of
course a pretty good road. I figured this trip would involve more urban streets, which I
could only imagine would not be in perfect condition. So, this year I had Peter White
build some 36 spoke (32 front) Velocity Synergy wheels. They are 3mm wider then the
Aerohead’s, and use an offset rim in the back. I never even gave them a second thought
the entire trip, rough roads, standing, etc. They performed perfectly, and came back as
perfectly true as I when I left.
- Lesson learned – Never drive a lightweight aluminum tent stake into hard ground with a
big ass log. I was beating on the stake like I was driving a railroad tie, and the top of that
sucker just snapped off. Not fatal or anything since I could still make due with it, but not
something you want to repeat.
- The campgrounds in CA are awesome. They all had showers, the bathrooms were
clean, the sites weren’t piled on top of each other, they were dirt cheap for bikers, and
most importantly, the settings were just stupendous. I’d have to say my favorite was
Manresa in Santa Cruz (not a hiker/biker campground, but Sunset was closed due to
wind, so it was my only option). I thought the view and how each site was in its own
little bluff was really cool. An extremely close second would be Big Basin. Sleeping in
the redwoods was just great.
- Where are all the bike tourists? I was really looking forward to talking with some other
bikers this trip since when I did the BRP I only saw one guy going in the other direction.
On this trip I saw maybe 6 people going north, and passed one grizzled vet going south.
I was the only person in the three Hiker/Biker sites I stayed in.
- Best view of the stars – Pinnacles. I’m not much of a star watcher, but I popped out of
my tent at 2 AM to hit the bathroom, and it was like blam, what’s with the sky. It just
jumped out how clear and crisp the stars were. Of course I didn’t dawdle to long because
I was afraid I was going to be eaten by Raccoons. If you turned your back for a second
those suckers were up on the picnic table looking for something to eat.
- Scariest moment – I enjoy a good descent as much as the next guy (or gal), and I’m
pretty comfortable even with a loaded bike (not to heavily loaded). If the road is clear I’ll
use the entire lane and work it pretty good, but if it’s busy I’m pretty restrained since it’s a
lot harder go fast when constrained to one edge of the road. For whatever reason, I had
a car right behind me on this descent, and even though I was riding the white line I was
not holding back. Going into a turn which coincided with an overlook I got into some
sand that had been spread on the road as people exited the parking. I was feathering my
brakes, and even locked up the rear for a second, but somehow stayed upright and kept
right on going. By far (and I mean by miles) the closest I’ve ever come to wiping on a
road bike. I attribute the fact that I came out unscathed to the fact I took up mountain
biking last year. That’s just a situation your run into a dozen times on any MB ride, and I
think the fact I didn’t overreact probably saved me.
- Best meal – I love to eat on tour. I’m just so hungry all the time that when you finally
chow down it’s a real pleasure. There were a lot of good meals, but the one that sticks
out was at Flap Jacks on Old Airline in Tres Pinos (just south of Hollister). I had an egg
and ham burrito with avocado and salsa and fresh cilantro that was just over the top.
Throw in two pancakes with bananas and pecans, and your set for a whole afternoons
worth of riding. Honorable mention goes to a slice of apple strudel I had at the Tyrolean
Inn in Ben Lomond. That was the real deal. It also looked like a pretty cool place to drink
some beer if you were inclined. If I ever make it back there I’d consider making it an
overnight stop.
- Gear – All my gear performed well on this trip. The only glitch I had was the igniter on my
Jetboil died. I had to go with matches the whole trip but no big deal. The Jetboil worked
great for what I needed it for, which was oatmeal, coffee, Ramen noodles, and macaroni
and cheese. My Tarptent worked great, although I had a lot of trouble setting it up in the
wind. I ended up having to stake the back, then throw a bag into it to hold it down while I
staked the front. For tires I used some 30mm Schwalbe Marathon Racer’s at Peter
Whites recommendation. No flats and they seemed to roll pretty fast to me. For gearing
I went with a 26 front and 27 rear, which was adequate for all but the worst climbs given
that I was only carrying 30 lbs of gear. I felt like the 27 provided just enough extra gear
over the 25 I used last year making it work the cost.
- GPS – I recently purchased a Garmin ETrex Legend Cx for dual purpose of car
navigation and use on this tour. I think it’s an awesome piece of technology, and has
been excellent for car navigation. I was mainly using it on this trip to navigate in the cities
and capture my daily route, speeds, feet climbed, etc. I had pre-programmed all the
routes and waypoints prior to leaving, and downloaded them to the device. The routes
worked ok, although a couple of times they appeared to take me off course, and I was
never really sure why. Overall though they did the job in getting me where I was going.
Unfortunately the “track” feature which kept a daily record of my travels had some
glitches. Each day I would reset my track log, and begin a new. As I took breaks or went
to eat I would turn the unit off to save batteries. At the end of the day I would save the
track to a file so I could download it when I returned. Apparently the act of saving the
track causes it to be compressed, losing the timing information which means all the
speed information is now lost. Additionally, it can no longer be uploaded to MotionBased
since it won’t accept a track log without timestamps. Not the end of the world, but kind of
a bummer.

If I had to second guess anything on this trip it would be looping back north instead of continuing
down the coast. While the variety of King City and Pinnacles was nice, I think continuing down
the coast may have been a better option. Of course that would of involved finding transportation
back to San Francisco.

All in all a great trip. I ended up doing around 440 miles for the 8 days and seeing ton of sites.
The bay area is just incredible in every aspect. The scenery, people, food, parks, breweries, I
mean it’s got it all. If I wasn’t tied down to the east coast I’d be gone in a second.
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Old 06-14-07, 02:51 PM
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Pics?
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Old 06-14-07, 03:02 PM
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Great report! Next time go north along the coast from San Francisco, and up into the Redwood forests along the coast, Mendocino and Eureka, very beautiful also.
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Old 06-14-07, 03:46 PM
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Originally Posted by Megamax
If I had to second guess anything on this trip it would be looping back north instead of continuing
down the coast. While the variety of King City and Pinnacles was nice, I think continuing down
the coast may have been a better option. Of course that would of involved finding transportation
back to San Francisco.
Yes, nice writeup! Glad Devil's Slide treated you kindly. I hate to ride that section during rush hour.

I think you made a good choice. It would have been a hassle to box your bike for the Amtrak/plane ride back up to SF. It's still a nice ride from Big Sur to Santa Barbara, but you already tasted the best of the coast and got some mountain riding thrown in for variety.
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Old 06-14-07, 04:03 PM
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Originally Posted by Megamax
- Where are all the bike tourists? I was really looking forward to talking with some other
bikers this trip since when I did the BRP I only saw one guy going in the other direction.
On this trip I saw maybe 6 people going north, and passed one grizzled vet going south.
I was the only person in the three Hiker/Biker sites I stayed in.
20 years ago when I rode this stretch, I lost count of the bike tourists I met. All types...solo woman, a trio of deaf college girls, 17 year old German kid biking the entire coast alone, group of kids riding with a chaperone, etc. It was like a big party.

Now, I see a few foreign bike tourists and some semi-homeless types. I also ask, "Where are all the bike tourists?"
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Old 06-14-07, 04:10 PM
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Oh that is so awesome! I've done all those roads - I used to live in Santa Cruz. I have done that same loop, from Monterey over Nacamiento, to the Pinnacles. Those are some truely excellent roads, and not well known in the touring community.

Nacamiento is..... kinda steep I did that in May a few years ago, and the flowers were insane. DId you sleep in one of those campgrounds above Ft. H-L? I had that same deal with the wind on Jolon Road. We stopped in King City for lunch, and I got a "BLT" - turns out, the "B" in "BLT" was..... "B"read. WTF? after all that riding, a lettuce and tomato sandwich! Dominos sounds waaay better.

If you do it again, there is a back road, "Cienega Road" that cuts off between Hwy 25 north of the pinns to get you to Hollister. It is one of the best cycing roads I have ever been on - green, rolling, no traffic, nice pavement.... sigh. I guess I kind of miss California.



anna
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Old 06-14-07, 08:13 PM
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Here are some select pictures from the trip. Personally I don't think pictures (at least mine) do the coast justice.

https://home.comcast.net/~lundstudios/album/index.html

1-5 are the trip to and at Half Moon Bay.
6 is Mansrea at dusk.
7 is Monterey
8 is Nacamiento looking down at Kirk Creek campground
9 - 10 is Pinnacles, including my furry little friend.
11 - Big Basin hiker/biker site. Just me.
12 - Not sure (on the way to Big Sur I think), but I liked it.
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Old 06-14-07, 08:21 PM
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Originally Posted by valygrl
Nacamiento is..... kinda steep I did that in May a few years ago, and the flowers were insane. DId you sleep in one of those campgrounds above Ft. H-L? I had that same deal with the wind on Jolon Road. We stopped in King City for lunch, and I got a "BLT" - turns out, the "B" in "BLT" was..... "B"read. WTF? after all that riding, a lettuce and tomato sandwich! Dominos sounds waaay better.
If you are referring to Ponderosa or Nacimiento campgrounds, I did not. They looked beautiful, but as far as I could tell they were totally deserted, and I'm not big into being the only choice on the menu in mountain lion country.

BTW, you are one of the folks who gave me some advice early on, so thanks for the help.

Mark
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