Fellow CR's, Yes indeed our 74.2 miler from the Irvine Amtrak Station, to Solana Beach,was a very chilly start at 8:30am 40 F, as the sun came out and we hit the hills of south east Orange county,we managed to climb 1400ft through Rancho Santa Margarita, to contiune through Mission Viejo,then yes what goes up must come down ,we headed west somewhere east of San Clemente on Ortega Hwy, to descend to almost sea level @ 180ft....Thank GOD! I bitched the whole way. We rode through nice residential neigborhoods ,only to take a break close to the old Western Whitehouse owned by ol Tricky Dick, Then we pressed on along the scenic (and Lately in the news) San Anofre Nuclear Plant,then due to the Sept 11 closure of Camp Pendelton we proceeded on the shoulder of the I-5fwy for 8miles, before arriving in Oceanside.
The last leg of our journey took us through many North San Diego (SURFER Towns) where when I was a teen spent many hours of the cliffs of "Swamis" in Encinitas surfin the big right point, Cowabonga...and finally to Solana Beach..where I finally got to chat with the renowened Brian B. along with Jim C, Of course our bikes didn't hardly compare, with our circa 80's Bridgestones,Motobecane Grand jubilee, and Mirage Sport, Khs ,old steel treks,My 68 PX-10, and many other downtube shifter bikes from the 80's,I introduced many of the 24 riders, Men and women that managed to ingest those 10" personal Pizza's and enjoy the fellowship, but the 60's something Chromed Cinelli caught my eye,indeed the fine Masi cycles and wow is that Scott from LA, and the other Cinelli guy from the Pasedena rides. We all enjoyed the fun and the ride on Amtrak was pleasant if you call riding backwards in a train while lookin out the window at the Pacific. Any way I would like to close with Hope we can arrange more of these rides in the spring!
Till we meet again!
Paul Grant
Riverside, CA