the tour

So this was our first self supported bike tour and it makes such a difference when someone else carries your baggage versus hauling it around yourself. During several hill climbs, I found myself suffering more from muscle fatigue than cardio fatigue (though mind you I was still breathing quite heavily). Here is how our bikes were setup (mine is the one in back):

We took the amtrak bus down to SLO early saturday morning and they let us just put the bikes underneath the bus without any special handling luckily. Once we got to SLO, we had to hurry and get to the exciting city of Lompoc which was 60 miles away. So the elevation gain for this leg wasn't supposed to be that much but the only hill unfortunately was right at the end. It also didn't help that during all the flats, there was massive wind (my bike was being blown left and right) to the point that I was actually happy when we hit hills because usually the wind would lessen. I don't remember much of the first day of biking except a lot of pain - we weren't really near the coast on this leg so it wasn't all that great of biking either. What made up for it was the best western we stayed at in Lompoc. C was so impressed that he had to take a picture of our room which had a 50 inch plasma tv. The front desk also had 500 dvds to choose from. I think they were trying to make you feel better for having to stay in Lompoc.


The hotel breakfast the next day was also amazing. We made sure to gorge on as many calories as possible and got omelets and waffles. The second day of biking was so much better despite the muscle soreness we were feeling. The hill climb started immediately but at least that meant it was over by mile 16 and we biked on highway 1 along the coast. We also biked on 101 where it merged with highway 1 which was a bit frightening - I was as far right in the bike lane as humanly possible. We took a little break at El Capitan state beach 20 miles from Santa barbara where I had a moment of deja vu when I realized this was where we went years ago for U's bachelorette party kayaking trip. We reached SB mid afternoon to my great delight and had some awesome crab for dinner.

The next day was a travel day back to San Jose on the amtrak train this time. Unfortunately, we had to box our bikes which required some work to loosen handlebars and remove pedals. I was staring enviously at the people with folding bikes. I hadn't ridden the train before and found it quite spacious though now I know why it's a 7 hour journey back to SJ - it meanders slowly up the coast. So that was quite a learning experience for the first self guided bike tour. Next time, perhaps we'll cut down a little on mileage and not travel so far on the first day. Also now I really really want a folding bike. sigh.