It felt like only five minutes had passed. My alarm must be wrong, it can't be 5:15 already! I woke up in a bed, in a ranch, in Mineral, in Lassen Volcanic National Park, in California.
Our host, Ann, made breakfast for us, including homemade zucchini bread. This week I am on trailer crew, which consists of me loading the trailer up with everyone's bins and bags. However, the van has broken down and now the trip leaders are driving a U-Haul, which made my morning chore infinitely easier.
I've noticed that other people's complaints or negativity can really be contagious, especially while in close quarters on a feat that is often more mental than it is physical. This is another reason to ride alone. I was ready to leave the amazing host site, so I was the first to hit the road at 6:30. As it turns out, the rest of the team hung out at the host site for another three hours while waiting for the temperature to rise. The cold morning didn't affect me, and I just put my rain jacket on. I found that cruising through mountains at sunrise on a Sunday morning in California to be incredible. One thing Boston biking doesn't provide are huge mountain descents like this, so I cherished it as much as possible.
Today's ride was 77 miles, and it was easy. The first 40 miles were downhill, as we dropped in elevation from about 5,000 feet in Mineral to just 180 feet in Chico. I was especially hungry at lunch, I think due to such serious climbing the day before. Climbing 6,400 feet yesterday also took a toll on my legs, and I just went very slow up even the slightest hills today. The second half of the ride I cruised at 16 mph with Rae and Kevin. We stopped at an ice cream shop in the middle of endless fields of orchards.
The small city of Chico is great. The showers at the gym were luxurious, the potluck provided by the community was delicious, and the local Habitat chapter was excited to learn that we granted them $3,000 from the competitive grant program.
The night ended with a movie at Mr. Hully's home theater. This guy really went above and beyond, and it actually was a cinema in his home. He also had lots of arcade games in his kitchen. From what I gathered, he was a quirky retired teacher who has hosted many exchange students from Asia, so he has knick-knacks from all around the world. A map on the wall was filled with tacks marking where his many visitors have been. We watched a British comedy and got to not think about biking for a while in the middle of our thirteen consecutive days of riding.
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