Day 2: Kentfield to Napa
( Kentfield, CA -> Napa, CA)
Hi everyone! This is Asia and this is my first blog post! I woke up around 6:45 this morning but decided to snooze for a bit given our long Day 1. Super thankful to Cole’s parents for all the expert biker advice they passed to us last night over a super nutritious dinner and all the bike help (especially with my super annoying bike shoes that didn’t have the cleats attachment place installed). We had an awesome breakfast with pancakes (secret ingredient: cottage cheese for an extra fluff!), a colorful berry trio, and of course, coffee. We did a little reorganization in the car: added boxes to separate the different meals (breakfast, lunch, dinner) so we don’t spend half an hour looking for bread. We added a roof box so the car is a little roomier. YAY. We started biking at around 9-ish, maybe 8:30? The first task of the morning was to go down a super steep hill to get down to the main roads and the entire time I was praying I wouldn’t go over a pothole and flip over the handlebars. Fun times! Our morning ride can be summed up in four words: Rolling Hills and Cows. Each painful climb was rewarded with long stretches of speed as we whipped by Betsey’s and Daisy’s (slang for cows) at 30 miles an hour. Our first stop was 20 miles out at the Marin French Cheese Company where we were greeted by endless glorious cheese samples.
Travis, Cole, and Sean cheesin’ at the cheese company
just hangin’ out
They had interesting flavors like Mustard Brie and Jalepeño Brie. Cole and Maceo seemed to like these cheeses a lot but to be honest I could not taste the flavors. Still extremely thankful for cheese in general though. Those delicious creamy suckers. We had a feast outside of that cheese company in a nice picnic area in front of a pond. Sean tried to set up his slackline but the trees were too far apart.
pretty floweees
Sad. I tried the clip-in bike shoes after lunch! Clipping in for the first time while the bike was moving was super cool and it made going over those darn hills less intimidating and awful and soul-sucking (but I still fell haha). While riding, Maceo and I found a nice smooth strip of pavement that our bike wheels indulged in for a solid 10 minutes.
Maceo and Asia enjoy some smooth pavement
We experienced an unfortunate mishap after lunch: the death of Sean’s right shoe. Cole and Sean headed back to the car (Anna drove!) to tape it up real good. Nothing that some solid duct tape can’t solve. Maceo, Travis, and I continued forward, taking our sweet time with the lovely hills and Sean and Cole caught up in no time. With all the cattle around us, we played “Cows,” a game where each person tries to collect the highest number of cows by claiming the cows they see along the side of the road. However, any other person can “drown all their cows” by pointing to a body of water (pond, lake, ocean) rendering their opponent *gasp* cowless. Our next stop was in Petaluma where I would switch to be the driver–we are trying out a new system where we would switch drivers throughout the day to reduce group exhaustion. Having driven the car for the second half of the day, I can for sure confirm that driving is a lot faster than biking for all those who are wondering. We made a third stop at Sonoma in front of a spa and had a nice trail mix and shade party. I got to Wendi and Rob Moore’s house (our lovely hosts for the night!) at around 4:20 and took a refreshing cold shower. Woohoo. Wendy and their daughter Marina made us 4 WHOLE TRAYS of enchiladas tonight and they tasted of literal ambrosia. Rob and their other daughter Rosemary joined us for the delicious dinner and some gluten-free beer (it’s a thing!). We then settled in for a night of relaxation and bloggin’! Looking forward to Day 3! WAHOO!
Much love,
Asia