The Call of the Road...

Or, conquering the Altamont.

Yesterday the sun was shining bright, daylight savings time had just begun, and I could hear the road beckoning me to come out and ride. I had been contemplating making the ride all day, even after logging 16 miles earlier in the day. The train arrived at the Vasco rd. station at about 5:40 p.m. and I answered the call. I quickly put on my helmet and gloves, grabbed my bike and backpack, and got off of the train. My first thought was, OMG! what have I done? The train is gone and now I'm forced to either ride (which is what I had intended to do anyway) or punk out and wait for the next train. So I got on the bike, started my Stava cycling app,(or at least I thought I did) and headed out on my journey.  I pretty much knew my way around out there, after all, I learned how to drive out there. After leaving the station I headed down to Altmont Pass rd. This was the original highway over the Altamont before I-580 was built. It's a little two lane windy road that connects Livermore to Tracy and has connections to Brentwood as well. I does have a fairly wide shoulder with enough room for cars to get by without taking you out.  The first 8 miles of the ride was a pretty long and boring climb to the summit.  Had I known my cycling app had turned itself off after 30 seconds, I would have stopped and taken some pics along the way. Once I passed the summit the ride got really interesting. I started rolling downhill gaining speed as I went up throught the gears. At one point I was keeping up with the cars on the road. Once I got towards the bottom, I turned onto Midway rd. This was a nice little departure from Altamont Pass rd and all of the cars whizzing by. This was where the one MONSTER of a hill on the whole route was, but thankfully there wasn't any traffic to speak of here. I ended up walking the bike up this beast hill for a couple of minutes to catch my breathe and take a drink. Once I got to the top, it was roller-coaster time again YEEHAW!! I rode on to Patterson Pass rd ,which is pretty flat (maybe slightly downhill), and into town to the train station. All total, it was a nice 23 mile ride which put me just 1 mile shy of 40 for the day.