Ride to Los Trancos Woods

Today’s ride was 39 miles, bringing the Thanksgiving week total to 74 miles! Woot!

I didn’t really have anywhere in mind to go today; I just knew it was sunny (and wouldn’t be tomorrow) and I wanted to take some photos.

I wound up visiting the Los Trancos Woods neighborhood, a tiny little area sandwiched between Palo Alto’s Foothills Park and Coal Creek Regional Open Space.

The Los Trancos area is incredibly beautiful on a fall day, but unfortunately the roads are very narrow and twisty, with no shoulders…so my photography goal was a little harder to come by.    I finally found a tiny shoulder, squishy with clover, that the bike could stay upright on.

Los Trancos Woods is in unincorporated San Mateo County and is very similar to my neighborhood.  The median house price is quite a bit higher — around $1.6M — but the hilltop views of open space preserve as far as the eye can see go a long way towards explaining that.

Yesterday was the coldest November 25 on record in over a century and today wasn’t a whole lot warmer; I think it was in the high 40s.  I bundled up in my winter jacket with my heated liner and gloves, though I didn’t turn on the electrics (the added padding was enough warmth).

I’m still tempted to get that Olympia AST jacket from the bike show; my Kilimanjaro is starting to show signs of age.  Mmmm, gear shopping.

This is my “I’m bundled up like Randy in ‘A Christmas Story'” face: