On a mission to the Mission

Nim and I had a micro-adventure on Saturday while Chad was making his way back home from Santa Barbara -- I figured the potential for a one-way bike ride south with a rendezvous with the truck for a motorized ride back was too good to pass up.  Thus, the San Jose to San Juan Bautista scheme was born.

As far as kid motivation went, it was just an excuse to get coffee and eat!  A few highlights:

1.  Breakfast egg and cheese sandwiches on English muffins at home before riding over to the light rail station.  Mmmm.

2.  Overly long ride on the light rail down to its southern terminus in the south part of San Jose.  They do have bike facilities on the train, but said facilities consist of hooks that are too high for anyone of my height to reasonably attach the bikes to, especially while trying not to disturb the person sleeping on the neighboring seat.  It is easier to just hold one's bike the aisle.

3.  Nice riding along the Coyote Creek Trail.  First snack needed about 8 miles in, due to great slowness of light rail.  Lucky kid got to eat *my* seasonal flavor Clif Bar.  She knew I had a vested interest in avoiding having her bonk.

4.  Second snack in Morgan Hill.

It shouldn't have surprised me that the Peet's there was swamped with cyclists on a Saturday morning, given that that town is home to a major bicycle company.  I fought my way through the line full of riders in their fancy bike kit to get the kiddo a delicious ginger cookie, and was most amused when another rider went out of her way to compliment my scruffy cycling plaid.  Clearly Nim and I were too cool for that crowd.

5.  Nice riding along quiet farm roads.  (not pictured because we were enjoying the ride too much to stop and take pictures)  Declared that the "Wine Trail" signified by the road signs was not allowed to be the "Whine Trail" since the latter was not needed at this point.

6.  Third snack in Gilroy.  Not surprised by the line at In-N-Out given the proximity to the outlet mall; I braved it because the kiddo really needed a burger.   I might have enjoyed mine too :)

7.  More nice riding along quiet roads, until ending up on Frazier Lake Road, at which point the wind turned against us along with the arrival of lots of traffic and a slight upgrade.  Whining might have happened at this point, but we really just both wanted to get to the next turn onto a different road, so we put our heads down and pedaled.

8.  Short dirt interlude through somebody's farm around mile 38-39 to escape the traffic.  We got to chase a flock of geese!

9.  Happy discovery of gigantic enormous wide shoulder on highways 25 and 156, making these roads way better to ride on that one might have expected.  (I might have already known there was a big shoulder, given pre-trip spying on the Google satellite images...)  Return of tailwind.   Yippeee!

10.  Kid 'fessed up to being determined to make it all the way to San Juan Bautista because she had "complained" about having to do it to her friends earlier in the week.  "Mom, you can't say you're going to do something badass and then not do it!"  A good use of peer pressure :)

11. We finally met up with Chad at the mission in San Juan Bautista.  I was most thankful that there was enough phone service out there for texting to work, so the timing of this wasn't too horrible.

12.  One more delicious coffee, at a roaster in San Juan Bautista, before loading up the bikes on the truck for the drive back.  Nim was quite pleased with her celebratory affogato (espresso poured over ice cream, if you don't know of this lovely confection).  Including the ride to the train in the morning, we ended up with about 55 miles in the pleasant California sunshine.