Around Town and Some GMR

 31 miles with 2500 ft gain. 4 miles up GMR. With Tony and met Jose. I asked if he was a cycling forum member. Nope, but he watches my videos on youtube ha ha ha! Must be a cool guy.

Tony and I were just starting out heading west when we saw Jose ahead. Caught up then he rode with us for a bit. At a stop light, he and Tony were chatting when he looked ad me and asked, "are you Mr. Beanz?". Yup that's me ha ha ha! I thought maybe he was a forum member but turns out he just watches my videos on youtube. 

He had just rode up to Shinn Rd, tough steep climb. I avoid it myself ha ha ha!. Not really the climb but I worry about the fast traffic on that narrow section of Baldy Rd. I used to ride up to the tunnels fairly often back in 05'ish. But getting older and a few ghost bikes kind of tell me to avoid that road. Though it's a good one! Not sure how far Jose rode that day but it had to be a good ride if it involved Shinn Rd.

Jose turned south on San Dimas Cyn Rd so with a wave, Tony and I continued straight on Baseline. Figured we'd give GMR a try, at least some of it. The road was still closed to traffic so why not? Tony is prepping for the Rosarito Ensenada ride so figured we'd get in a bit of climbing too. Maybe 2 miles but once we got up, why not 4? 

Max temp that day was 100 degrees and sure enough when we got to the top of our climb, my Garmin showed 100.  Average temp of 82 but it was so much cooler on the lower roads. But it's good to torture yourself on GMR once in a while just to see if you can! We did have a bit of a late start, about 11 am so once we hit GMR, it was empty. But I really don't think many people rode it that day as all the parking places were empty. Usually when the road is closed to traffic, there are 20 cars on Sierra Madre, 20 on Boulder Springs, other streets and just as many at the dirt lot. But there were NO cars anywhere other than the dirt lot, about 5. And we only saw about 5 riders on the climb that day.

So we did some of GMR then headed back down to Bonita finishing off the ride on local streets back to Euro Cafe on Mills and Baseline. Good ride and Tony was pretty impressed with the facilities at the equestrian center. Sure glad I found out they were there, perfect location for a refill rest stop.