This is a report of one of the most scenic bicycle rides in the world, our annual Big Sur Loop. The 2007 loop was one of the best rides, ever. There was 70 honest-to-god miles of tailwind on the way to King City.
Jerry Schonewille has organized this annual ride for several years for buddies in the Almaden Cycle Touring Club of San Jose, CA. Recently, Connie Nielsen has provided sag and support for husband John and ten to sixteen club riders. Joyce and Bill Keckler assisted with sag this year.
The ride is usually scheduled on the last weekend of October. There’s the best chance for decent weather and light traffic at this time of the year. It’s a weekend over-nighter loop from Carmel, CA to King City and back. Saturday is 101 miles south, mostly along Highway 1. We bivouac in King City at a motel that’s got a hot tub. Sunday we return 72 miles across the Salinas Valley, over the Santa Lucia Mountains to Carmel. About 7500 ft. climb day 1 and 4500 day 2.
John Dektar, Douglas Gillison, Scott Riddle, Tom Nguyen, Ted Rosario, Peter Waite, and Holly Wong gather with Jerry, the Nielsens and Kecklers at the Carmel Middle School before dawn. It’s mostly cloudy this year. The dawn is gory gold and pink. It’s like a glittering Turner skyscape with jumbled pink sheets and exploding yellow streamers.
We start down the coast at Carmel beach. We’re sheltered by the Santa Lucia Mountains, however, and it takes about an hour of dawn patrol before sunbeams begin to ray through gaps in the ridge. At the mouth of the Carmel River you’re at sea level. You look across the beach and see breakers overhead. There’s 50 miles of road, South to Lucia with the prevailing northerly wind. The road’s as close to the beach as possible, even when it’s hundreds of feet above it. When you hug the right stripe and there’s a gap in the guardrail, it’s like you could spit in the ocean. You’re that close, but you‘re 200 to 800 feet above.
Astral rays beam through gaps in the ridge. They come from the high left and begin to illuminate the top of rocks on the low right. The beams are like spotlights scanning the seascape from the side. The rocks jut from twilit cobalt surf. They’re topped with white cormorant guano. The caps of the rocks are lit-up by the brilliant light beam. You’ll rarely see such pretty birdpucky, anywhere. Scanning beams highlight the foamy peaks of combers. Just here. Just now.
Soon, the lighthouse of Point Sur is visible at the end of the chain of ridges that form the jagged skyline. Every 13 seconds, there’s a tiny flash of light from the grayest dome of rock at the end of the string of rocky earth. We’re on the edge of the earth, of course. The land is loosely associated with the continental plate here. It juts-up in the form of cones with absurd talus angles. The road sags, the asphalt fissures where subsidence, slide, and quake keep things equivocal between the Pacific and Continental plates.
Awesome arch bridges span arroyos of the Garrapata, Palo Colorado, Rocky, Bixby, Little Sur, and Big Creek creeks. On Bixby bridge, surf begins to break on the beach on your right, 200 feet below. It passes under the bridge and booms onto the beach on the left side of the bridge.
There’s a good tailwind, but it’s not like you don’t get some huffing exercise. There’s about 1800 ft. of elevation to our first rest stop in Big Sur, mile 25. There’s 3600 ft. of grades to the lunch stop in Lucia, mile 50. Then it’s a turn inland on Nacimiento Road, and about 3000 ft. of climb up the side of Cone Peak to the summit, mile 62.
Here we enjoy rootbeer floats created by Connie. She keeps hard the homemade ice cream with a chunk of dry ice. She’s so right about that.
The 40-mile blast to King City is probably the best, ever this time. It’s pretty sketchy in the decent of Nacimiento canyon. Brilliant yellow maple leaves litter the swervey road. The oaks were stressed by drought last year and a cool, dry spring. They’ve had a mast of superabundant corn production. Large acorns litter the swervey road. Chunks of rock have fallen onto the road, littering the swervey road with clusters of gravel right where your wheel wants to track. It’s a challenge to see through the leaves, hit the acorns without swerving, and swerve around those rock clusters.
The canyon opens-up, we curve to the North and enjoy a booming tailwind into King City. Connie and John greet us at their suite. It’s an auspicious arrival. As I open their door, a double rainbow appears behind me.
There’s plenty more adventure and fun on this ride. We tub, compare wine and cheese, enjoy rellenos, get slammed at Denny’s, fogged along Metz Road, tour sunny Arroyo Seco Road, repair my flats, bellow at the cattle, ascend to the summit of Carmel Valley Road (2400 ft.), enjoy Connie’s mini cheesecakes, soar down Carmel Valley Road, climb the Cachagua Ridge (800 ft.), and regroup in Carmel Valley.
The descent from Cachagua Ridge is just about perfect. Holly cannot suppress her whoops. We’re feeling great and have just enough energy to enjoy the 10 miles of rollers on the way to Carmel. There’s an onshore headwind coming-up the valley, so it’s important to hang with your buddies at the end.
We gather-up to carpool home. Connie opens the tailgate and invites us to load-up on left-over fruit, beverages, and candy. Holly loads a trick-or-treat bag of fruit, crunch bars and butterfingers for me. We ride to eat. Connie enables us.
There are many awesome roads to ride, no doubt. Some are truly world-class. Dawn, rugged earth and sea, artistic bridge construction, good companions, a 70-mile tailwind, and a rootbeer float have added this year’s Big Sur Loop to my list of the best rides, ever, worldwide.