Hiking in Bothe-Napa Valley State Park

On Monday, I made some sourdough bread.  I used just a bit of whole wheat to give it some color.  I tried using less starter than usual to give it a longer rising time.  This gave the bread a more sour taste, which is more like a San Francisco Sourdough.  We are taking a couple of loaves over to our friends house for use with some cheese fondu.

Yesterday, Claire and I went out on a great hike in Bothe-Napa Valley State Park.  There are over 10 miles of hiking trails in this park along with a campground and a swimming pool.  It is worth checking out.  They actually run a half marathon thru the park, which I assume must be a loop you do twice.  The trails aren't flat, but there is nothing too strenuous in there.  This was our second time there.   The first time I ran back and forth while Claire hiked, and this time we stuck together, which is much more enjoyable.

We are away from the shop until next Wednesday.  A1 is back at the shop, and alas, A2 has left us for some adventures in Southern CA.  We will miss A2's enthusiasm, and physical humor.  We are excited about having A1 back.  Oh, yea, we did have A0 over for dinner last week as he was visiting from CO.

A run and some rollers

Yesterday I went out on a great, hilly run around a neighborhood near our house.  Claire walked while I ran. There are some interesting single lane roads running up through the hills around Forestville that are just perfect for exploring.  Here is a link to my loop.  My goal was 5 miles.  I felt really good and didn't have any pains during or after the run.

This afternoon I went down into the basement and rode the rollers for a little over an hour.  I did my favorite workout.  This workout consists of a 15 minute warm-up (with a couple of 1 minute efforts), this is followed by 5 on, 3 off, 5 on, 3 off, 4 on, 2 off, 4 on, 2 off, 3 on,... all the way down to 1 minute efforts at the end.  Here is a picture of the graph of my heart rate.  I got it up to 192 on the last interval.  I was pretty worked over by the end.

A nice, cold 40

Claire and I went out yesterday on a tandem ride with our friends Bill and Debbie.  They took us out on one of their favorite 40 mile loops.  It was a very fun loop over Chalk Hill and Westside Roads.  Except for the chilly temperatures, it was perfect.  We saw lots of other cyclists on the road, which is always a good sign.

This photo was taken in the town of Trona, CA during the Furnace Creek 508.  Bill and Debbie, along with another couple, were in the process of setting the mixed tandem team record.  Claire and I drove support for them.

Very interesting "ride"

Well, I will try not to exaggerate when I write about this last adventure, but I am sure that it will sound like I am.  Anyway, Claire and I decided that since it was not raining, we would go out and do one of our favorite loops through Healdsburg on our Burley tandem.  We had the Garmin set up so we could race one of our previous times, and we were both JACKED about getting out there.  First thing that happened is that I turned the wrong way right out of our driveway.  We didn't realize it until we had gone about a half mile and we were getting farther and farther away from the "course" that the Garmin had set up for us.  When we stopped to turn around, I noticed that the front STI shifter was broken and we couldn't shift out of our big ring.  We rode back to our house and decided to hop on our Ibis Cousin It tandem which we have set up with big old cross tires.  When I pulled the tandem out, we had a flat rear tire.  We both laughed about how maybe we shouldn't be going out on the ride, but we fixed the flat and decided to go ride over Sweetwater.

We headed down River Road and turned into Rio Nido on our way to Sweetwater.  We were both feeling good and ready for a nice steep climb.  As we started to hit the steep part of the climb  on Sweetwater, we could hear screeching tires coming towards us down the hill.  Claire, being the reasonable one on the tandem, suggested that we pull off to the side and let whoever (or whomever) was coming down the single lane road in such a hurry to go past.  We both watched as a white pickup came careening around the corner ahead of us almost not staying on the road.  Claire gave a little arms up gesture (not finger, or hand) which suggested that the driver might have been going to fast.  Anyway, he screeched to a halt and started to get out of his truck.  I decided that the smart thing to do at that point might be to head in his direction at a run since I had the uphill advantage.  Thank goodness I had my Shimano hightop SPD sneakers on and not my road shoes.  The driver hopped back in his truck, and after exchanging some "pleasantries" with us and telling us that he could go as fast as he wanted since he lived on that road, headed on.  He even commented on the fact that we should go back to the city and ride instead of on his road.  Claire and I climbed back on the tandem and started back up the road.  About 10 minutes later, we heard screeching tires behind us, and again decided to pull over.  Here comes the same guy flying up the hill at full speed.  He didn't really pay us any attention as he went by, which was fine with both of us.  Remember, Sweetwater road is a very, very twisty, narrow road.  Claire pulled out her cell phone and dialed 911.  At first, the dispatcher just suggested that we should just find a safe place to get off the road.  As Claire was discussing things, another driver came down the road.  He lived at the top of Sweetwater, and told us that he had almost been hit by the guy in the white truck.  The dispatcher was listening a little more at this point.  And then a guy in another truck came up the hill behind us and when we asked him about the white truck, he said that he knew who owned that truck, and that the guy was on a rampage and was out to kill two people.  The dispatcher was definitely listening now and was sending some sheriffs out.  The new guy in the truck was telling the dispatcher quite a bit about the crazy guy and also mentioned that the guy was armed and out to kill people.  To make a long story short, we hung out until the sheriff arrived, he took our names, and then we headed back down Sweetwater.  We rode home after that and decided that we just weren't destined to get in a nice ride today.  Here is a link to our "ride".

Oh, yea, I almost forgot.  When we were on top of the hill talking to the sheriff, a call came in saying that the crazy guy had driven through someone's gate and into their mobile home at the bottom of the road.  That was before he came back up the road past us.  It will be interesting to read the sheriff's report tomorrow and see what happened.

Heading back to work

Well, today is our last day of vacation, and we will be heading back into the shop tomorrow.  It has been a very, very busy week since we had 19 people at our table for Thanksgiving dinner.  I started the time off with a couple of good rides, but haven't been able to get out as much as I would like with the dinner preparations and the such.

I got out the day before Thanksgiving for an hour long run through the regional park down the street.  I felt really good, and had to make myself head home after 3 loops around the park.  It was a beautiful day, as the whole week was.

On Saturday, my mom requested a bike ride through Armstrong Redwoods.  After a quick handlebar swap and recabling of her bike, we loaded the bikes up into the Hub Bus and drove down to Guerneville.  It was the perfect length ride for everybody.

Yesterday I hopped on my Cannondale R500 road bike and rode over to Occidental where I met Claire. We then switched to the Burley tandem and headed out towards the coast.  Here is a link to the ride. Like the rest of the week, the weather was incredible.  We had a tiny bit of a headwind on the way up the coast, but nothing compared to a summer day.  The Willow Creek climb was perfect.  Who could not love that climb?