PARTY UP & SPEED DOWN
A birthday dance party…
SPECIAL MEMORIES
At almost the halfway point of the ride, I get to celebrate my 66th birthday! That evening at camp we are all in a festive mood and dance to upbeat music until dinner is ready.
After dinner, it’s a nice surprise to be presented with a birthday cake that says ‘Easy Peazy’ on it.
Since I have a captive audience and it is my birthday, I treat my team to my “Trail Angels in the Czech Republic” story.
BEST RIDE!
My favorite ride is Holland Lake to Seeley Lake. Even though it’s an almost steady climb of 16 miles, the big payoff is on the downhill. This is the best stretch of downhill single track!
Even though its challenging to focus on the trail that is very close to steep drop offs with bumps and turns, the view is spectacular. The colorful wildflowers edging the trail are completely distracting. At one point, I’m going so fast that when I hit a bump my feet fly off my pedals. I quickly recover and continue speeding down. It’s absolutely exhilarating!
One day, I want to check out an alternate route to the alternate route, so I ride solo. I have a leisurely ascent and see a family of deer who don’t run off on seeing me. I think they’re as curious of me as I am of them.
Then comes a very long gentle descent. It is so peaceful and beautiful with the wildflowers alongside the dirt road, that I just pull over and take a nap in the woods knowing I won’t be disturbed.
It’s a lot of climbing and with each climb is the glorious downhill. I biked 12 named passes, each over 9,000’ and after summitting the highest peak at 11,910’ I know I can accomplish anything!
The steepest grade was 20%. The second photo shows what we faced. This was one to get off the bike and zigag down.
My fastest downhill recorded on my bike computer was 37.8 mph. Mike, one of my teammates, nicknamed me Gabriele Knievel for my fast descents. It gave me gave pleasure on the downhill to finally say “On your left” to my fellow cyclists who said that to me often on a daily basis!
Then, the mountains end…