because y'all can't get enough horses.
Click the pretty horsie for the rest of my pictures from today's ride.

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I don't know if I've mentioned how much I love living in Palo Alto, but I do. It's close to work, close to "downtown areas" (by which I mean "somewhere that I can get a mocha"), and close to the foothills. If I feel like twisties, I can go up Page Mill; if I feel like something a little easier, like I did today, I stick to the side roads and residential areas in the foothills. To start off, I mostly tootled around near Stanford; there are some nicely paved roads over there that swoop a little but aren't twisties, per se -- very relaxing, and I enjoyed being able to look around at the scenery.

After leaving the Stanford area, I rode through the horse farm on Deer Creek road. I love seeing all the horses graze and prance around. There are lots of stables in the residential areas a few miles from my place, I'm discovering. I came across couples on horseback in the road two or three times this afternoon, not counting the equestrian practice areas (I'm sure there's an actual name for those) that tend to pop up from time to time. It's neat to be riding along a gently swooping two-lane road with no other traffic, sun shaded by the trees overhanging the road, with horses prancing along and practicing jumps next to the road. Very cool. I have a feeling I'll be riding along those back roads a lot this summer.

On my way back through Deer Creek road, I stopped to take some pictures near the horse farm. Three of the horses were grazing by the road, and they eventually all wandered over to check me out while I was there. They didn't really seem very concerned by my presence at all, and were wonderful sports about having their pictures taken.

At some point while riding around, I decided that I'd like to see the ocean. There are two practical places to do this: Santa Cruz and Half Moon Bay. Since I was already as far north as Palo Alto, I opted for the latter. Due to it being a Saturday, and therefore, a squid day, I took the interstate up to Highway 92 instead of going over the hill via the twisties. For some reason, I was finding it hard to relax my arms, and wasn't really feeling up to the stress of forcing myself into turns while squids came up my butt at 60mph. So, the highway it was.

The ride into Half Moon Bay was sort of annoying -- I got behind the car you always get behind on roads like this; the one that goes really fast through the straights and then slams on their brakes and crawls through anything resembling a turn. I don't understand how people can even drive like that. I stopped for overpriced gas along Main Street in Half Moon Bay, considered stopping for food but decided I wasn't really hungry, and headed south on Highway 1 along the coast.

It was much colder in Half Moon Bay than it was in the Valley, and overcast, due to being right on the coast. When I found a well-paved road with coastal access, I took it and parked in a little vista area. I left my earplugs in and gloves on as long as I could before they got too annoying, since there was a pretty chilly wind down on the beach. I sat for a while and watched the ocean. There was a man tossing a stick for his dog -- it was one of those pretty black and white dogs about cocker spaniel size, with long and soft-looking hair. I could just barely hear him encouraging the puppy to "go get it! That's a girl!" through my earplugs. A couple of kids ran down to the beach, daring each other to put their feet in the water. I don't think any of them did; it looked pretty darn cold. I took a cue from them, though, and wandered up to the water looking for rocks. I found a couple of pretty ones and put them in my tankbag.

The way home from Half Moon Bay was wonderful -- I still didn't want to take the twisties over, but really didn't want to end my ride on the freeway, so I took Caņada Road after crossing the hill. I took Caņada for the first time on my lunch ride with Ceej, and then promptly forgot about it as a pleasant alternative to the interstate. It was gorgeous riding today; very little other traffic (mainly bicyclists), sunny weather, the works. I took Caņada south to Highway 84 (aka Woodside) and then to Alameda de las Pulgas. I mention the latter specifically because I love its name, which, according to Babelfish, means "tree-lined avenue of the fleas".

Alameda de las Pulgas took me back to Stanford, and I headed home. All in all, about 50 miles in about three and a half hours. Not too bad.

have a good ten days.
I'm off tomorrow afternoon, so you kids be good while I'm gone. I'll try to send updates on the Buell to the mailing list, but my mom's internet connection is sketchy at best, so no promises. ;)