Echo Valley MTB tandem ride

Since Shelley and I were making a weekend of it, after yesterday's race we took the tandem out for one lap of the Echo Valley race course.

One word: fun!

• We slept in.
• The weather was perfect.
• These trails are very tandem friendly.

Did I mention that my legs were totally shot? Oh yes they were…

I wish I had some pictures of us riding.

Sleep	7
Waking HR
Body Weight
Body Fat
Breakfast
Lunch
Dinner
Workout Food	water
Injuries
Therapy
Time of Day	10:30 AM
Workout Type
Weather	70, sunny, dry, light wind
Course
Results
Time
Distance
Pace
Equipment	Ellsworth Witness
Clothing	bib shorts, sleeveless undershirt, sleeveless jersey, cap

Technorati Tags: Echo Valley,Ellsworth Witness,MTB,tandem

Arboretum run | Soaring Eagle MTB tandem ride

What a great day!

In the morning I got in a fun run with some great guys and then Shelley and I took the tandem up to Soaring Eagle Park on the Issaquah Plateau and rode some super trails.

Note to any MTB tandem riders - these trails are very tandem friendly!

Which was exactly what we needed as our skills seem super rusty this year for some reason.
I have met a few new running buddies through one of my cycling teammates Lane Seeley and these guys, in particular Jon Westerman who I have run with three times now, are fantastic company. On the agenda today was a 10-mile cruiser which did not sound too threatening but after yesterday I was just a tad uncertain about how my legs would bounce back. Turns out just barely enough to keep up today. :)

Lane wanted to keep the run on as much dirt as possible so I plotted a route that did just that. It's pretty cool how you can almost entirely avoid pavement for extended section right in the city!

Our pace stayed very steady with just a slight speed up on the descents and a slight slow down on the climbs. I wore two shirts which was too much. At the end of the run my left hamstring that had cramped yesterday was a little tender but overall it was a nice morning.

Here is the run.

After a quick rise-off shower and a snack Shelley and I packed up the van and headed east. Judging by the trail map Soaring Eagle Park is pretty small! It's about one square mile but there are tons of loops you can do and the ones we did were just moderately technical. Nice.

We started out just riding all the way through the park on the main trail which I thought would be a good warm up. Turns out this trail is one of the wettest and muddiest and more than once we had the rear tire churning through the glop like an egg beater! We slowed down so much once we almost bailed into the brown goo but managed to save it and only submerged one foot each. That would have been nasty…

We had a somewhat rough start but kept improving as we rode and by the end were middle ringing the trail and having a blast. And I only threw Shelley from the bike once. :( Luckily she had a good time too. We would both go back here any day.

Here is the ride.

Sleep	6
Waking HR
Body Weight
Body Fat
Breakfast
Lunch
Dinner
Workout Food	run - bottle w/1 tablet Nuun and 1 scoop HEED
Injuries
Therapy
Time of Day	run - 7:00 AM ride - 11:45 AM
Workout Type	run - endurance ride - fun
Weather	run - low 50s, mostly cloudy, dry, calm ride - mid to upper 50s, occasional light mist, cloudy, calm
Course
Results
Time
Distance
Pace
Equipment	run - Brooks Launch, handheld bottle ride - Ellsworth Witness
Clothing	run - Brooks Infinity Short III, Patagonia Capilene 1 Silkweight Stretch T-Shirt, Patagonia Merino 1 Silkweight Crew ride - bib shorts, short sleeve undershirt, short sleeve jersey

Technorati Tags: Soaring Eagle Park,mountain bike tandem

Japanese Gulch MTB tandem ride

We set out to try a new trail today - Japanese Gulch. This is a really cool ravine in Mukilteo with railroad tracks (the steepest grade in the state of WA!) running up the middle and trails on both sides. The loops are not super long but you could easily string together two, three or four for a full day of riding. And it's incredibly accessible. Some sections of the trail do not drain very well and the soil has some clay in it so be prepared to slide around a little, a lot if it's wet.

This was our first mountain tandem ride of the year and for some reason it takes me a while to dial in the bike handling every spring… Let's just say we should have had a helmet cam.

We parked, changed, pumped up the tires and headed out. The Evergreen Mountain Bike Alliance site said the east side of gulch was more technical but I was disoriented so we headed west. Mistake #1.

We rolled down to the train tracks and the only trail I could see went straight up at a precipitous angle so instead we opted for a road parallel to the tracks which was a great warm-up. The road takes you all the way to the top of the gulch and suddenly you are RIGHT next to the Paine Field Airport. There were even a few planes landing while we climbed the road and this enormous shadow would flick across us and then be gone. Pretty cool.

At the top I did not know where to go so we headed in the most likely direction of the ridgeline. After a couple of twists and turns on the road and a gentle roller we hit the trail. And then we hit the deck.

It was laughable really. About 20 feet after the trail started there was a mud puddle as you went through some sapling trees. As I saw the puddle I slowed way down. Mistake #2. There was a thick branch submerged in the mud at a shallow angle, our front tire hit it, got deflected and down we went. To be perfectly honest, Shelley went down - head first - into the trees and mud. I somehow managed to stick my foot out and just submerge my shoe in goo but didn't take a bath. Nice. Not the way you want to start the ride if more riding is what you hope to do with your spouse… I felt pretty bad to say the least. :(

To her credit Shelley was able to shrug this off. It took a couple of minutes in the fetal position (while lying in the mud) and then some walking around but we did get going again.

If you have ever had a bad fall you know that after you get up the natural reaction is to ride chicken. That's what happened to me. Mistake #3. Now we're riding along at about 4 mph and I'm grabbing the brakes every time there is the smallest little bump or corner in the trail. Dang.

ASIDE - we had our brakes cleaned, adjusted and the pads replaced by Wrench Bicycle Workshop and they did a great job. They even cleaned and lubricated the pistons and the action was utter silk. I highly recommend them.

After more halts and dabs than I care to recite I finally had the bright idea of lowering the stem. Being relatively tall I usually put a stack of spacers under the stem and run a pretty long one. This combination makes any bike steer like you are holding onto a rudder and it's only amplified on the tandem. I moved about 2 cm of spacers above the stem and instantly the bike felt better. I am an idiot. I am also wondering how I could have ridden this bike like it was setup for so long…?!

Anyway, now we slowly started to find our rhythm and actually ride. We still had to dismount for the occasional tight switchback but we also handled a few muddy sections just fine. Thanks to Shelley's encouragement. We'd be riding along and she would see the mud/root/obstacle and I would hear, "We got this! Go, go go…!" I love it.

We met some other cyclists, most of whom were quite impressed that we had taken a tandem on these trails. We also encountered several people running these trails. In retrospect they looked ideal!

When we got back to the car we thought about trying the other side of the ravine but after riding about 100 m up the trail we realized we were both pretty tired and since no fall had resulted in serious injury yet we decided to head back to the car and call it a day.

That was fun. I want to go back.

Sleep	6
Waking HR
Body Weight
Body Fat
Breakfast	5:30 AM - grapes, orange, tea 7:30 AM - Smoothie 2.0
Lunch
Dinner
Workout Food	nothing… it was a really short ride
Injuries
Therapy
Time of Day	10:00 AM
Workout Type	fun ride
Weather	65-70, sunny, dry, calm
Course
Results
Time
Distance
Pace
Equipment	Ellsworth Witness
Clothing

Technorati Tags: Japanese Gulch,tandem,Wrench Bicycle Workshop,mountain bike tandem,Ellsworth Witness

Snohomish tandem ride

Five hours of sleep last night! And I was pretty relaxed when I went to bed. Argh…

Today Shelley and I got out on our tandem for the firs time in 2012 and man was it nice.

In attendance at the start were Tony O and Marissa, Glenn E and Nancy E, Dawn and her hubby and half of another tandem couple of which the stoker was too hung over to attend.

I started the ride in knee warmers, sun glasses and by the end of the ride I had unzipped my vest and taken my gloves off. YES.

The pace today was very relaxed which was great! I was seriously worried that these guys were going to drill and then since I was pretty beat down we were going to be on a solo ride. Not so bad in itself but not when you start with a group.

We rode and chatted and chatted some more and squinted in the sun. Fabulous.

We did 'race' up the last hill (I think that last hill into Woodinville is always a race…) and I was happy that all the bikes were not so far apart. This got everyone pretty stoked and there was much talk of doing STP in one day this year on tandems. Yikes. For that to happen Shelley and I would both need to address some comfort issues on this bike, but it's kind of exciting so worth looking into.

Sleep	5
Waking HR
Body Weight
Body Fat
Breakfast	5:30 AM - 3 salmon patties, protein shake, almonds 9:30 AM - Promax bar
Lunch
Dinner
Workout Food	some Perpetuem, some Nuun, not that much of anything really
Injuries
Therapy
Time of Day	10:15 AM
Workout Type	fun ride
Weather	40-50, sun, dry, calm
Course
Results
Time
Distance
Pace
Equipment	Co-Motion Robusta tandem
Clothing	knit shoe covers, knee warmers, bib shorts, Craft short sleeve undershirt, short sleeve jersey, arm warmers, heavy vest, knit gloves, cap

Technorati Tags: Co-Motion,Robusta,tandem

Sunshine Coast MTB Trail Challenge day 2

Day 2 of this ride dawned clear and cool so since I tend to wake early I headed down to the beach and took some pictures.

Quite the contrast to what we were in store for later in the day which was this.

That's right, adventure racing here we go. Day 1 of this ride it seems was just the warm up.

We started out on some easy trail which then turned to dirt road and soon we were descending down a valley parallel to a river. Every few hundred meters there was a water bar (read: huge ditch) and luckily we were able to ride them all. A couple of times the tandem would high-center as we struggled to clear the mound of dirt on the far side of the ditch but we powered through them and it was actually a good time judging from the laughter right behind me.

At the bottom of the road was the river. Turns out the bridge had been somewhat unstable for ages and so just last summer the Parks Department had decided to remove it. Undaunted, the ride organizer hired some zip-line aficionado to show up and ferry bikes across. We had to climb down one side, our bikes got zipped across while we waded across and then we had to climb up the other side. I gotta say, this was fun to watch and to do. Enjoy.

Of course once we were reunited with our bike on the other side we were in the freaking jungle! This section of trail had not been cleared much less ridden since the bridge got removed so the brush was HEAVY. I am always amazed by the speed nature reclaims things and this trail was no exception. We were getting slapped by branches, there were overhanging limbs, stuff was grabbing our legs, it was kind of crazy.

After working our way through this wilderness for a while we finally popped out onto dryer terrain and our lunch stop.

We took a bit of a break here because right out of lunch the road went up. And I mean UP.

Pictures never do justice to the speed or slope but trust me, this was a grunt with the top being WELL beyond what you can see in this picture. And we made it!

It was here that the route turned into the woods and slowly, almost imperceptibly, the trail got tighter, twistier and narrower until suddenly we were walking the bike. For a while it was super fun. We were cruising through this dark, dense forest on earthy doubletrack with awesome traction and the ups and downs were very manageable. Then came a tight corner. And then a steep uphill. And the the bridges started.

BC/North Shore riding is nothing if not famous for man-made trails and teeter-totters and the like and that's super cool. But a tandem can't ride most of that stuff. The sheer length of the bike prohibits it from negotiating the turns even if you had the skills to balance on the ramps. Bummer. As we hiked more and more and rode less and less I was dying a thousand deaths. Each section of trail looked more spectacular than the last and I SO wanted to ride it all. Needless to say Shelley was not having the best time either. She had signed up for a ride and here we were hiking through the woods in our cycling shoes. It was a bit of a drag to say the least.

We finally got to the top and started descending toward the ferry and still we could not ride.

I'm not sure at what point we finally were able to get back on the bike but it was not soon enough. I didn't have many opportunities to take pictures during this section but here is one example of what we encountered.

And here I am walking the bike across this same bridge.

Eventually we made it out of the trees and coasted down to the ferry dock where the organizers had decided to give away all the remaining beers. That worked for me.

While I hydrated Shelley needed a little solo time. And I don't blame her.

Here is proof that we went through hell; note massive scratch on my right cheek.

Whew. I would love to do this ride again; on a single. Not on a tandem. It seems interesting to me (probably frustrating to Shelley) that practically every cycling trip or vacation I suggest ends up being this huge ordeal where we struggle arduously and encounter hardship after hardship. It's not my intention… If anyone knows of a nice, tame, scenic tandem trip they would recommend please let me know. We both deserve it.

Here are all the pictures.

Technorati Tags: Sunshine Coast MTB Trail Challenge,Elsworth Witness,tandem

Sunshine Coast MTB Trail Challenge day 1

This event is something I have been looking forward to doing for quite some time.

I first heard about it from a friend and so I asked him a couple of years ago if he thought it would be suitable for a tandem. He said, "Sure, I think that would work…" That's pretty much proof positive that people don't have a clue about where you can ride a tandem unless they have actually ridden a tandem. Here is ours.

Why is it so hard to ride there you might ask? Well, for anyone that has not heard about North Shore riding up in BC, our trip had sections of trail that were exactly like this.

Shelley and I took off Friday afternoon and drove to Horseshoe Bay where we parked and walked on the ferry to Langdale. From there the event organizers shuttled us up to the start where we camped.

Easy enough, right? Wrong. We were dropped off at a grassy field and some people are setting up tents pronto only to have the organizers pop out of the woods and tell us the field we were supposed to camp at was, "A couple of 100 m down that trail…"

Here is the 'bike truck' freaking packed to the gills…

Here is where everyone thought we were camping.

Here we are walking down to the real camping field.

Although dinner was technically provided the organizers did have cheese, crackers, fruit, cookies (for free) and beer and wine (for a modest fee). Nice. Shelley had the wherewithal to buy a sandwich at the ferry dock.

Breakfast was at 7:00 AM and you could roll out pretty much any time you wanted. We ate, hit the head, packed up our tent and gear and started riding. Only to get off the bike in about 100'! The trail that rose up from the baseball field quickly got super narrow, went up a steep hill while getting very rooty. Sign of things to come?

Yes it was.

At the pre-ride meeting we were told that today there would be several sections where you could opt for the easy trail or the intermediate trail. Of course I turned onto the intermediate trail at the first opportunity… and we had to walk.

I learned my lesson quickly but that first hike was not insignificant. A shame too as it was outstanding trail! The problem was just that the longer tandem can't make it around tight corners and across little bridges that turn; the rear wheel just falls off.

There was one time where I thought Shelley's patience was running low (and I don't blame her) but we managed. And we also rode some really fun sections of trail too. Like when we approached the lunch stop. The route took us into a park and we followed a hiking trail around and around and around that was just perfect for the tandem.

All the food stops were fantastic.

And by lunch we had made up.

After lunch the trail stayed interesting.

Camping after day 1 was near the beach. We had all the amenities including live music! The organizers even brought along beer and wine and sold it for a reasonable price. We dined on salmon, potatoes, corn, salad, way too many desserts and I forget what all else. Good times for sure.

Here are all the pictures.

Technorati Tags: Sunshine Coast MTB Trail Challenge,Elsworth Witness,tandem

tandem ride

The day just kept getting nicer and nicer and then Shelley asked if I'd like to go for a tandem ride and I said yes!

At first she suggested we head out to West Seattle but then she opted for Mercer Island which was perfect. It was really quiet (read: very few cars) and the weather was fabulous so we cruised along and chatted about all the different styles of architecture we saw along the route.

We had one flat but it was no big deal. Shelley helped and we got back on the road ASAP. As we were fixing it two people rode by and asked if we needed anything, that was nice. And one was a racer! :)

Sleep
Waking HR
Body Weight
Body Fat
Breakfast
Lunch
Dinner
Workout Food	water
Injuries
Therapy
Time of Day	10:30 AM
Workout Type	active recovery
Weather	mid 60s, sunny, dry, calm
Course
Results
Equipment	Co-Motion Robusta
Clothing	bib shorts, short sleeve undershirt, short sleeve jersey, cap

Echo Valley MTB tandem ride

Yesterday was so much fun Shelley and took our tandem out and rode one lap of the Echo Valley 30/60 race course.

What a blast! We were able to ride everything I rode the previous day and even tried the one section I had to walk – and might have ridden this as well – but I steered us off of the course. :( Dang.

We stopped a few times to enjoy the spectacular views.

[Is that a stiff pose or what...]

The bike did great, what a fun machine.

Once again I spazzed and did not reset my Garmin prior to starting this ride so the distance below is a couple of miles and a few minutes short.

Sleep	7
Waking HR
Body Weight
Body Fat
Breakfast	7:00 AM – muesli, yogurt, banana, water
Lunch
Dinner
Workout Food	water, Clif Bar
Injuries
Therapy
Time of Day	10:00 AM
Workout Type
Weather	70, sunny, dry, calm
Course	pretty smooth, mostly doubletrack
Distance	14 miles
Time	1:50
Power
Results
Equipment	Ellsworth Witness
Clothing	bib shorts, sleeveless undershirt, sleeveless jersey, cap

Technorati Tags: Echo Valley,Chelan,Ellsworth Witness

tandem ride on Tiger Mountain

Yes! Today was the first time this year that Shelley and I have gotten out on our Witness. It was a wakeup call (my tandem bike handling skills suck!) and it was also a ton of fun. We also learned a couple of lessons.

Lesson #1 – if you want to find a parking space at the Tiger Summit parking lot on a nice, summer day, show up earlier than 10 AM.

Lesson #2 – you know the expression, "It's like riding a bike." as in you never forget? Well that does not apply to getting the stoker handlebars around a tree on trails with tight switchbacks.

Lucky for us there is a place to park across the street. We had to descend all the way to Issaquah-Hobart and then drive back up to get there but lesson learned.

Tiger starts with three miles of UP. The fork on our tandem has 6" of travel and so on a steep climb you are kinda darting left and right while struggling to maintain your direction. The payoff of course is that once you go down the ride is, in a word, plush.

We got off to a rocky start and I was too heavy handed with the brakes but the longer we rode the better I got and the long rooty section of the trail was not so bad. WE only had to get off for a couple of drop-offs (the bike tends to high-center unless you are willing to haul ass and get air off of ledges, we are not) and for two tight corners. Not bad if I do say so myself.

The second road climb was cake and the second section of trail was also good; we only had to dismount once.

This guy on a freeride bike with platform pedals caught us here but kept wanting us to ride ahead of him. He said, "I'm no peddler..." but he sure was a damn good descender!

Pretty much everyone we met be they rider or hiker made a remark about the tandem. I realize that MTB tandems are rare and ours looks especially bad-ass with the huge tires and full-suspension.

By the end of the ride Shelley and I were a team again! She really loves this and even forgave me for tossing her into a tree at one point. I think it was the worst wreck she has ever had mountain biking and bruised both knees, scraped her shin and whacked her head against the tree trunk. Ouch! What a trooper. And thank you helmet.

I keep thinking it would be cool perspective if Shelley wore a GoPro Hero on her helmet but I suspect it would just be one log movie of my ass. :(

Sleep	7
Waking HR
Body Weight
Body Fat
Breakfast
Lunch
Dinner
Workout Food	water, half a PowerBar
Injuries
Therapy
Time of Day	10:30 AM
Workout Type	FUN
Weather
Course
Distance	10 miles
Time	2:05
Power
Results
Equipment	Ellsworth Witness 22/32/44, 11-34
Clothing	bib shorts, sleeveless undershirt, sleeveless jersey, cap

Technorati Tags: Ellsworth Witness,Tiger Mountain,mountain bike tandem

training-team ride | tandem ride

Sleep	6
Waking HR
Body Weight
Body Fat
Breakfast	6:15 Am – cereal
Lunch
Dinner
Workout Food	team ride – 1.5 large bottles each w/2 scoops HEED, gel tandem ride – water
Injuries
Therapy
Time of Day	team ride – 7:15 AM tandem ride – 12:30 PM
Workout Type	team ride – 6-8 min hills tandem ride – first one of the year!
Weather	team ride – low 40s to mid 50s, dry, sun tandem ride - 60+
Course
Distance	75 miles (total)
Time
Power
Results
Equipment	team ride – Road Bike 39/53, 12-25 Neuvation wheels
Clothing	team ride – knit shoe covers, knee warmers, bib shorts, Craft long sleeve undershirt, short sleeve jersey, arm warmers, OR Gripper gloves, cap tandem ride – bib shorts, sleeveless undershirt, short sleeve jersey

What a great day...! So great that I rode once with the 'boys' and once with the wife. Can't beat that.

I left home around 7:15 and headed north. On the way I hooked up with Dean J and Jeff W and we joined Tony B, Greg K, RC R and Lane S in Bothell.

I held back on the first hill (96th) as my legs were still not warmed up but not Greg. He surged once which gapped me and then really turned it on towards the top. I sorta kinda ramped it up and pulled everyone to within 50' of Greg by the top.

We turned left and headed up the south side of Norway Hill and again it was Greg going hard but this time he was joined by Lane and in short order Lane took the lead in what was to be par for the course for the remainder of this ride. These guys gapped me but I kept a little in reserve and shifted up across the top and managed to haul them back in.

Next up was the north side of Norway and this time when Lane went I went with. We had a gap right away. Mentally I was trying to psych myself up for a move half way up and shortly after making a right at the intersection there is an uphill right hand corner where I wanted to go but when we got there Lane accelerated too! Ouch. I went anyway. Instead of shifting up once I had to shift twice and in spite of a good push on my part Lane was having none of it and was right on my wheel. And then I started to explode... He passed me and even put 10' into me but as we neared the summit I got out of the saddle one more time and just managed to edge him before we slowed down. Whew.

Then we tackled Juanita from the Kirkland side. We were only going up to Holmes Point Dr so I knew it would all be big ring until then. I put in a big effort as we rounded the right hand corner and RC went with me but I could not quite maintain it all the way and died about 100' from the intersection where you turn. Greg, Lane and Dean went roaring past me and got a head start on the descent.

On the downhill I caught Tony and pulled him all the way along the water and made the junction just as we started to climb. I opted to keep right on going so rode through everyone except for Lane who was already scooting off the front again. No way was I catching him this time. This is a hard hill and although I closed a hair with my initial surge at the bottom he slowly pulled away from me all the way up. This was a huge effort. I tried standing twice and both time had to sit back down pretty much damn quickly. Too steep for me I guess.

Next up were four hills north of Bothell Way that I don't remember the names of. The first one ended in a wicked steep pitch and for a bit I was able to control Lane but he is so damn strong compared to me and I faded back by the top. As we hit the false flat near the top Greg came roaring past so I did my best to accelerate again and got close to him by the top so felt a little better. No full on explosions yet, just regular old fatigue.

Greg was really coming on now and the next two hills he and Lane gapped me. I would put in a good effort about half way up, not be able to maintain it and then Lane and Greg would pass me and I was not able to hang. It was partly mental but I was also pretty beat!

The last hill started out the same. I figured throw caution to the wind and stood really early and went hard. I gapped everyone but then first Lane and secondly Greg passed me when I faded. Greg said something to the effect of, "C'mon!" as he went by so I tried as hard as I could and got on his wheel. This time I managed to stand one more time near the top and we finished close together instead of me off the back.

WHAT A HARD WORKOUT. These hills are almost all longer than three minutes, most are in the six to eight minute range and so super stuff. Lane is strong! Greg is tenacious! Rolling home I joined Dean and we went along the Seattle waterfront for the views and it was postcard perfect.

After shoving food in my face and resting for a bit Shelley and I headed out for a spin to Seward Park in what was our first tandem ride of the year! By now it was nice and warm and we even stopped at Starbucks in Leschi on the way home. Damn there were a lot of people with expensive bikes there... One guy in a white Mellow Johnny's jersey and his girlfriend (daughter?) were all decked out riding carbon everything and both had on yellow Livestrong bracelets and the whole nine yards. You know...

• He had on this crazy expensive looking wrist watch.
• They both had iPhone 4s.
• He had his arm warmers pushed down although it was much too warm to have them on at all.
• White Oakley glasses.

Good times. I am so judgmental.

Then we crawled up Madrona (hello triple!) and up Union and home. And I promptly hit the deck in the prone position. It was my first day lying out in the sun this year.

back of the bike

Thanks to Shelley for being much more creative than me and for taking the time to splice together this compilation from our ride at the Travessia de Portugal and for finding the perfect song to accompany all the images.

back of the bike

The song is: LCD Soundsystem - All My Friends

Technorati Tags: Travessia de Portugal,CICLONATUR,back of the bike

Travessia de Portugal-part 18

I wish we had taken even more pictures.

Not much left to report. We had to get up at 4:30 to catch a taxi at 5 to make our 7:30 AM flight. I will say that checking the bike box with KLM was a freaking dream compared to when we left Seattle and had to deal with Delta… We simply walked up to the counter, told them we needed to check our bike and they charged us 55 Euro. Compare that to the $500 we paid going the other way; doesn't it just make you sick? Why the airlines can't pull their collective heads out is a mystery to me.

This ride will forever be a part of me. Having ridden the route twice I am amazed at how much I remembered from the first time. Almost every day we would ride past some small feature and I would blurt out, "I remember this from the race!" You can't do something like this and not be changed forever. Judging by Shelley's lunch selection in the Schiphol airport on our way home that goes for her as well.

Bread, meat paste, and beer. Sometimes it's the simple things.

If anyone reading this is considering doing this tour for the first time here is what I learned.

• Take a CamelBak. You will need it. Not just for the water bladder (don't get a cute little small one!) but also to carry some spare clothes and tools and food.
• Bring spare parts for everything. We brought along a spare tire, one chain, a complete set of chainrings, and spare cycling shoes. It was not enough. I also needed a cassette and should have brought spare cleats and spokes and more tools. I also brought spare derailleur cables and a spare rear derailleur but luckily did not need them. Bring an extra derailleur hanger if your bike uses one.
• Disk brakes – you will need them. Any rim brake (cantilever or V-brake) will be inadequate and you will go through several sets of brake pads. Hydraulic is better than mechanical but disk is required.
• In the Pacific NW tubeless tires with sealant are not so crucial. In Portugal they are. Each day you will ride through thistles, thorns, and sharp stones not to mention all the glass and bits and pieces of crap and metal on the farm roads. The best (and messiest) sealant is Slime. Second best is Magik Seal. We used straight latex but were told it does not seal in extreme heat. Luckily it never got too hot.
• Pack lots of oil for your chain. And some rags to clean it with. Pouring on the lube will only accelerate the demise of your drivetrain as it collects dirt and sand.
• Bring a real pump. CO2 is fun and racy but what will you do when you need to just top off your tires? Or when you get your fourth flat because you did not bring tubeless tires with sealant?
• Two words: chamois cream. Bring enough.
• Get a real mount for your GPS and forget about the plastic one you can buy in cycling stores. Touratech is the only way to go. Then ask Antonio for the adaptor so you can attach this mount to your handlebars.
• Use rechargeable batteries and bring a charger – it's the green thing to do.
• A pre-paid SIM card that works in Portugal might be nice. All the staff carry mobile phones and if you are alone and have a problem what are you going to do? At least bring an international phone and be prepared to pay the long distance fees if you need to. Oh yeah, don't forget to put it in your CamelBak each day!
• Sun block – need I say more? I love the sun, had a base and was needing to coat myself in SPF 15 for the first several days.
• Bring a camera and put it in an easy to reach spot. Ours was in the back of my CamelBak and I wish it had been in the front. When you are tired it's amazing how difficult it is to just get your camera out. A water-resistant camera is also a huge bonus; when it rained we did not take any pictures…
• Do yourself and everyone around you a favor and bring along some Sport-Wash. We did and it really works. If you do laundry every night you can survive on two sets of cycling clothes. We still brought three just in case.
• Bring some of your favorite ride food. We did not thinking we could subsist purely on what we packed at breakfast and purchased at cafes and it would have been nice to have more for variety and emergencies.
• Leave your attitude and expectations at home. Long rides will usually mean that you encounter some sort of adversity along the way and if you can't deal with it you are done.

This was an amazing journey. Thanks to Shelley and CICLONATUR for making it possible.

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Travessia de Portugal-part 17

Here are all the pictures.

Ah… the day-after blues, the physical relief and the drive back to the big city.

After sleeping in I boxed up the bike. We don't have any pictures or movies of this but as I was trying to box it up outside of the hotel the wind was really blowing. After thrice retrieving objects from the underground parking garage where the wind was blowing them Shelley suggested we just move down to the garage… Genius. Once down there we were able to finish up without interruption.

Breakfast was yet another example of how the organizers go all out to make your experience special. By now most of the clients had left. They invited those few clients that remained INTO THEIR HOTEL ROOM where we had bread, butter, jam, cheese, cold cuts, cereal, yogurt, juice, tea and coffee. I mean c'mon, where else can you get this kind of service? Nowhere, that was rhetorical.

Then we loaded up the van (which had the seats installed again now that all the duffel bags were gone) and headed north.

A car ride is a car ride for the most part. Sure the scenery was nice but Antonio did us a huge favor and instead of taking the freeway all the way to Lisbon he stayed on the coast and we took a ferry over to Setubal on the mainland. Beautiful! The ferry connected an idyllic, sandy peninsula (obviously a wildly popular vacation and summer fun spot) with the main land mass. They had passenger only ferries and car ferries – all of which were painted a very high-visibility green. 

Once back on the road we drove across a massive, 16 km bridge on the A12.  

I felt like I was on the set of one of those build it bigger shows.

Kevin and Lesley Anne were getting dropped off at the airport so we took advantage of the 'left luggage' office and paid them to store our boxed bike. That was the best 8 Euro ever spent. From here it was back to Hotel Barcelona and then off to the market below the bull fighting arena for beer and breakfast food.

Finally we indulged in what has become a Lisbon tradition for us (if you can call doing something two times in four years a tradition); we went to the Pizza Hut next door to the hotel and ordered a large pie. Armed with this and our beer we watched television in bed and relaxed. Truly, there was nothing I would rather have been doing at the time.

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Travessia de Portugal-part 16

Here are all the pictures.
Here is the ride profile.
Here is the official newsletter.

Today was all about sticking together, savoring the moment and taking pictures. Usually there were more or less two groups and even though people might start with one everyone kinda rode at their own tempo but today we regrouped several times and no one was pushing the pace.

There was a mechanical this morning but it was not us! Thank goodness. And it was resolved relatively quickly.

In fairly short order we finally got see the Atlantic ocean.  

The route skirted the edge of a plateau above the water and several times we would descend to a beach and then climb back up to the top of the plateau.

The top of the plateau was littered with boardwalks so tourists could enjoy the view. Many times you could just ride right out to the view platform.  

One of the times we descended to the beach the path the tour used to take had been washed away by the winter rains so we had to walk along the sand for about 800 m. It must have seemed strange to the people at the surfing contest we interrupted to see all these people pushing bicycles…  

How easy is it to push your bike through soft sand? Not very. You can see how much our feet sunk into the sand.  

At the end of the beach we finally got to back onto a firmer surface.

Exiting the beach.

And were immediately faced with the hardest climb of the day.

As luck would have it, this hardest climb was soon followed by the hardest descent. Only a handful of people even attempted to ride this and of that handful not everyone made it down. One person that did ride the whole thing was Louize Hill. Way to go.

Pink power!

This descent was followed by a climb (of course) and then we came to the G-String descent so named because it runs along a spine with significant exposure on both sides. As we approached the descent I was about to warn Shelley that it was coming up and she replied, "I got it, go go go!" She was filming!

G-string

Here I am scouting out the descent.

We were not able to ride the beginning as there were some fall-away corners with only inches of trail and the back of the tandem would have slipped off but we did ride most of it. At Shelley's insistence! Nice.

The cafe at the bottom was where we all regrouped for lunch. It was a tiny surf community and i bet this establishment rarely gets as busy as when we all rolled in.

After lunch the final climb was on pavement and then we all rolled to the finish together as a group.

It was really fun to finally ride with everyone and we finally got the chance to let someone else take our picture.

The dirt road was covered in washboards and littered with potholes. On a tandem it's crucial that the captain and stoker communicate – here is what we said on that section of road.

Bumps.

Just before descending to the finish we stopped for the obligatory group shot.

Then we rode over the last few rocks, down a short section of road and finally down a wood ramp right to the beach. We were done!

The Atlantic is not exactly a tropical body of water but this far south it was warm enough to jump in and I did exactly that. After tons of well wishes, hugs and thanks we eventually worked our way back up the hill to the hotel. I washed my ride clothes one last time, hung them up and then we all (all that clients that hung around that is) went to dinner for our final group meal and the awards ceremony.

Dinner was a traditional sort of seafood gumbo with rice, tomato and three different kinds of fish and prawns all in one big pot. Yum.

I think we drank a little more wine tonight than usual…

Antonio goes all out for his clients. Not only did everyone get a certificate of completion, he also had a special t-shirt made up for each person that rode all 14 days.

To quote him, "We could have written the words on this shirt in English but they have greater meaning in Portuguese." I like that.

Everyone got called up and recognized. It felt so good to get a hug, my certificate and to know that Shelley and I had completed this together!

I'm pretty sure Shelley was very proud of herself as well. This smile looks very genuine.

At the awards diner everyone was saying that I was a hero for riding a tandem over all these roads and over all these hills. If there is a hero in this story it's Shelley for the entire ride with me. She usually could not see what was coming up, she was sitting on the less comfortable end of the bike and she has never done anything like this or this hard before. I am so grateful for her company, her encouragement throughout the ride and her tenacity and will to finish what we started. Amazing.

When it was finally time to leave the restaurant we got a final shot of the 15 clients that rode all 15 days.

Thank you Antonio, Berta and all the staff at CICLONATUR; we had a wonderful time.

Technorati Tags: Travessia de Portugal,CICLONATUR