Hilly Ride up Smith Grade

This morning, I finally rode the hilly route that I posted about a few weeks ago. I rode up Empire Grade to Smith Grade over to Bonny Doon Road down to Highway 1 and back home. I deviated from the map above at the end of the ride. I rode down to West Cliff and rode along it home. It came to 25 miles and about 2400 feet elevation gain.

I left at 7am to get an early ride in. Note that today is the start of daylight savings time, so my watch (and my body) thought it was still 6am. There was plenty of light, however the sun had not risen yet. It was also pretty chilly. It was between 40 and 45 degrees most of the ride. At the start, only my fingers were cold (I use fingerless gloves), however they warmed up quickly after I hit the first hill and got my blood pumping. Overall, I stayed warm through most of the ride.

Leaving that early, I was able to see several signs of "wild life." I saw some Wild Turkey and a house that had been tp'ed. On the roof of one house, was a cutout of Santa wearing an old T-shirt! I saw all these signs of "wild life" before even leaving the city limits! :-)

There was a pretty stiff wind coming back on Highway 1. After all of that climbing, it was a struggle. Generally in the summer the wind is going in the opposite direction, to give a nice tailwind coming home. Not Today! For the last couple of miles, I rode on the Wilder Bike Path that I worked on about a month ago. With all of the rain, the grass has grown back quickly. Looks like it will need another trim soon.

It was a tough ride, but not as bad as I thought it would be. I was pretty tired but not too sore when I got home this morning. Since then, I have recovered well and feel good now.