Day 56 – Kirkwood to Sacramento

Next to last day, and what a day it was! Wow. We started up near the top of Carson’s Pass, climbed to 8k’ feet, and we’ll  end up spending the night at 31′(that’s thirty one feet… 7,969 feet lower than we started) with a lot of beautiful riding in between. Craziness.

The ride out of Kirkwood was cold. Not just chilly, but proper cold. It was 41 degrees when we left the hotel, and I swear one of our descents was in the 30’s. I lugged cold weather gear all the way across the country and got to use it on the next to last day. JP, the eternal heat source, rode with shorts on. I had full length thermal leg warmers on. I’m not sure how he didn’t get frostbite.

We actually started with a few climbs this morning. The Sierra’s weren’t quite done with us. The views on the climbs where (once again) amazing.

Most of our route yesterday and today followed the Emigrant Trail. It’s a bit hard to make out, but at one point in our nation’s history, people went up and over this pass and they weren’t going skiing at Tahoe. They did it the hard way and were very serious about making it over these mountains. Having done it on a bike on a paved road, I still can’t imagine making the trek on dirt with horses and wagons.

Then came the downhill. The most serious, longest, amazing downhill I’ve ever done. There were a few small climbs here and there, but mostly we went downhill for nearly 40 miles loosing 6,500′ of vertical. The road conditions varied quite a bit, but for the most part they were OK. About halfway down we turned on to Omo Ranch road… the traffic disappeared but BOY was the road bumpy for a while. I got airborne a few times, which was a sign it was time to hit the brakes. Also, if you want to test the build quality of your bike, it’s a great road for that.. any defects will likely have a catastrophic failure at some point.

Needless to say, we had to take some breaks along the way.

JP has been struggling with his allergies the last few days. He made the descent down, but then SAG’d up to Sacramento. I stopped for lunch, then got a short ride up to the road and took a run at the last 40 miles in to Sacramento. I made it in to town around 5pm.. and WOW was I hungry. I’ve been pretty much eating non-stop.

Sacramento was the last stop on the Pony express. Just as we bid the loneliest road adieu, we now must say goodbye to all the Pony Express signs we’ve seen for the last week or so.

We had dinner in Old Sacramento… which as an bit of a New Orleans feel to it. Good food, odd people. I like it 🙂

Tomorrow we ride in to SF. Actually, we ride to Vallejo, then take the 2pm ferry to SF, then ride to the Golden Gate Bridge. For anyone looking to meet up with us at the finish, there’s been a slight change of plans…but only slight:  Be at the Warming Hut (aka: the new stopping point for our ride) by 3:30.

Warming Hut Café & Bookstore
983 Marine Drive
San Francisco, CA 94129
Presidio of San Francisco‎

We should be rolling in shortly after 3:30 and would love to see you there. If you’re interested, we’re having a small party at Heidi’s sister’s house (just a few blocks from the Presidio) after. Ping us for details.