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3-second video: halfway through a very dark and foggy September butterlap with about 50 people.

In Bothe-Napa, after a day of riding and some wine tasting

Three planned rides: 9/11 Napa valley bike camping Sunday 9/19: Biking to the Nature Friends / Tourist Club Oktoberfest in Muir Woods. Leaving SF around 10, heading there for a few hours, back in the city by 4. Saturday 10/23: Biking to Point Reyes / Samuel P Taylor park from SF (30-50 miles), camping overnight, biking back. I’ve done no non-bay-trail peninsula riding– some day I want to (Pescadero? Montara? Stanford->the ocean and back?)

I’m planning on going self-supported bike camping for the first time the weekend of 9/11. I’ve had about 5 people say they might be interested, so probably at least a few of us will end up doing it. The rough plan is to take the ferry from SF to Vallejo Saturday morning, go on a 40ish mile ride through Napa Valley (Napa / Yountville / St Helena / Calistoga) at a steady but non-racing, no-one-left-behind pace (we’ll be carrying all our gear), stop periodically for wine tasting, and then camp in Bothe-Napa State Park. ...

Portland: a city that gets stacks of these signs printed up. biketoberfest luckytimingme

I almost never post links, but: more about google bike maps

I put together a last-minute city ride Saturday afternoon following the Butter Lap route (about 20 miles, through parks and along the ocean). Unfortunately, I had bike issues (two flats and a damaged tire– all due to the edge of my brake pad rubbing against my tire and finally wearing through the side wall) which delayed us an hour and led to the group splitting up. It was also cold and foggy all day, which made the beach less exciting. A few of us finished the loop and then headed to Speakeasy Brewery for their 13th Anniversary party.

…with a few dozen people heading to various companies around the peninsula, following this route: http://sf2g.com/bayway.html Getting up and active before 6 was painful, but the ride was very nice– misty fog, small animals, marshes, and the bay. Light traffic for most of the way.

I spent a week biking and camping across Iowa with 10,000+ strangers. It was one of the better vacations I’ve taken. Here’s a map of the route, about 450 miles (50-80 miles/day, only one day with serious hills). I emailed some updates and photos to this blog from my cell phone while I was on the ride– I’m combining all those updates into this post (link below). Saturday: Starting off the trip with a near-disaster: the airline (Fronteir/Midwest) lost my bag (tent, clothes, cycling gear, everything except my bike itself). The bag wasn’t even in their system– they had no idea where it was. Then an agent in Milwaukee called me because he’d found my bag and it had my number on it. He didn’t know I was in Omaha. They said they could get it to be a few days later– not useful since I was about to get on a bike the next morning. They said there were no flights left today to send it on. Then I asked someone else and he found a flight to put it on. 4 hours later, it showed up at the airport! ...

My 2nd butter lap. Cary joined for her first butter lap (and first bike ride in a while). Friendly unhurried group, as usual– everyone waited at the top of any major hill, even when someone had a flat tire and needed a while to change it. It got a little chilly and dark at the end, but I still made it to Bender’s for a fish taco and IPA-in-a-can. Photographic evidence below. Fun trivia: if you click through the map to the GPS trace and zoom in on the Palace of the Legion of Honor, you can see the GPS tracks from when I was biking around the fountain in circles to try to keep warm while waiting for someone. ...