06-16-07-Mt Hamilton-The Junction-Mt Hamilton.gpx-t0

Another fun Death Ride training route with Ed, Chimene, and Sheila – the weather was almost perfect – a little hot on the backside – we took our time, had lots of fun talks, saw some beautiful country – real nice! Sheila had a new PB to the top of Hamilton from the front side – just 2:11 – about 10 minutes faster than her previous PB – and she wasn’t even going all that hard – she thinks she could have probably taken off another 5 to 10 minutes, which would put her very close to her sister’s (Kirsten) best time of 2 hours. This was the first time for Ed and I to see the backside of Mt Hamilton – and Sheila and Chimene had never been as far as The Junction, where we had lunch at the Junction Cafe – we saw a bunch of totally wild characters at the cafe – and those 4 wild boar heads mounted on the walls were something else! The return climb up the backside was pretty tough – the final 5 miles climb up 2000 feet – and the grade is fairly consistent – just a couple of spots where it eases up for a short time – not quite as hard as Bohlman or Alba or Sierra Rd or Jamison Creek – but certainly, hard enough – especially since it came after having already ridden 50 miles and done about 6500 feet of climbing! And, it got a little hot on that backside, but we did have a nice mild headwind on the climb that helped keep us a little cooler – at the top of Mt Hamilton (the second time), we all got some nice cold drinks from the Coke machine at the observatory – a Mtn Dew for Ed, a Coke for Sheila, and a Mango Nectar for me (actually 2 of them!) – I wasn’t sure what Chimene got from the Coke machine – she may have just downed more water from her Camelback – it’s amazing how much liquid Chimene consumes on a ride! Sheila had 4 water bottles – 2 mounted on the back of her seat – and she was gracious enough to let me have one of the extra water bottles on that long, steep climb up the backside, when I ran out of water about half way up – thanks, Sheila! The backside was really nice and picturesque – beautiful cattle ranch land, complete with cattle! And we saw lizards, squirrels, rabbits, and deer – I even saw some peacocks while going up the front side of Mt Hamilton – what a super fun ride and a really fun day – and the company couldn’t be beat – a real pleasant group of people to ride with – I’m sure we’ll all do more rides together in the near future… :)