Mid-Week Rides: Fremont Peak

28 January 2010

WWWobble writes:

Meet at Bobby’s, no Bobbie’s, yes Bobbi’s Coffee Shop, 10 am.

Crisp, clear, first dry morning in several days. We arrive Bobbi’s at the [reasonable] appointed hour. Jerry loses points for arriving moments before Zunkel who had the shortest ride. Jerry is supposed to arrive last. Oh wait, that’s SMBC. Sorry Jerry. Points regained. Let’s eat. Then let’s fuel up. Yeah, sometimes we don’t arrive with full tanks. Some choose Valero, some choose Shell. Nobody fuels at the COP (76)which maybe doesn’t bode well for Marco’s holdings.

Fueled, ready to ride, Captain in the lead south on 85 when a police motorcycle ahead of us begins “the weave.” The Captain engages his four way flashers and reduces speed. WWWobble considers this an inadequate response and pulls aside the Captain to suggest he join the CHP officer in the weave. Would not two weavers be more effective than one? Certainly. But the communication fails and the Captain Hazard Flashes slowly along until the Chipper ceases the weave.

Pretty exciting, these MidWeek rides.

Down the freeway toward Los Angeles we ride until slowed by a construction traffic jam an exit or two after one we could have taken to get to where we were trying to get to in order to get to where we were trying to get. Is that an awkward sentence? Live with it.

We ride up the San Juan Grade which become Salinas Rd on the San Juan side where we turn on San Juan Canyon Rd to get to Fremont Peak State Park. Most of us pay the fee for the privilege of visiting the park which is actually closed, or at least some of it is. Zunkel and WWWobble enter the closed campground area and enjoy the sunshine while Jerry and the Captain hike the paved road to the peak. Marco wanders along the sheep path which also gets to the peak, but I don’t think he got that far.

Soon the hikers return. Jerry opens “the sack” on the back of his bike and shares some of his treats, fresh orange slices and trail mix with yum yum chocolate – which reminds us that a hot cup of coffee would be nice right about now. Unfortunately Jerry has no hot coffee in “the sack” so we head down from the Peak into San Juan Bautista where all the cafes are closed but the bar is not. The proprietor brews a fresh pot and we relax over coffee and discussion of a future ride to Yosemite, or Hetch Hetchy, but it soon degrades into general disagreement as to whether the Nacimiento Road comes in north or south of Lucia.

Fun time over. Time to get home. Freeway return is easy, light traffic, no rain. No crashes, no tickets, no mechanicals, good cheer, nice roads even if a Wendy Punk to the Peak. The Captain scores 100 on this one in spite of his failure to weave with the Chippy.