sonia | Grizzly Peak Century, 75 mile loop

I am proud of my body's finely tuned sensors for changes in steepness. As the road grade changes minutely, I reach automatically for the gear shifters. Today a lot of the time I was already in the lowest gear, and just had to pedal harder or slower or both.

I am proud of completing the Grizzly Peak Century 75 mile loop today, with 6,200 feet of climbing all over the east bay hills. It's been at least 20 years since I did it, and I thought it was too hard for me these days. I had signed up for the 50 mile loop, but when I got to the split-off point, I was standing there in indecision, and another rider encouraged me to go for it. It was a gorgeous sunny clear day and I didn't want to miss out on the northern loop out to Carquinez, so I decided to do it.

I was biking slowly but not miserable by the end of it, so apparently I'm in good enough shape for that. The steepest road, McEwen, really is as hard as I remembered. I thought maybe it wouldn't be as bad. The scenery was wonderful, the Bay and green hills and yellow wildflowers (probably mustard?) and some purple lupine and orange California poppies. I saw two deer and two wild turkeys and a lot of crows and red-winged blackbirds and scrub jays. I heard a couple of mockingbirds singing their imitations of car alarms.

A bemused friend said, "You sure know how to set a challenge for yourself." I wouldn't do it if I didn't love being out there. The happiness outweighs the hard work and "will this hill ever end??"