We started in downtown Saratoga. It was an overcast day but fairly humid day, so I took off in shorts and a light jersey. The ride begins with a roughly 7 mile climb up highway 9 (AKA Big Basin Way and Congress Springs Rd.).
Part way up highway 9 it started drizzling and continued all the way to the top and for some distance on Skyline. When I got to Skyline Blvd. I had to clean the drops off my glasses because I could barely see.
We rode for about 10 miles, basically to the end of Skyline. Skyline didn't have too much traffic that day. After the turn off to Los Gatos, it turns into a narrow, curving road with very little traffic. It is a lovely and relaxing section. I believe we saw only one car, one motorcycle, and one bike on that section.
Just before we reached the turn on to Bear Creek Road the sun came out and it was quite warm while we were there waiting for the regroup. The ride on Bear Creek is mostly down hill for about 10 miles with a little bit of mild rolling. The sun went behind the clouds before we reach Boulder Creek and stayed there for most of the rest of the ride.
We regrouped and had lunch in Boulder Creek. After lunch about half of us took some residential streets to get on Big Basin Way, traveling the opposite direction this time, while the others took highway 9 toward Saratoga. Highway 9 cuts out about a thousand feet of climbing and some mileage also.
Anyway, the group I was in continued on Big Basin Way, which is mostly moderate climbing, to Big Basin State Park. The road has a limited amount of traffic, has dappled shade and is tree-lined. Just before arriving at the visitor's center we stopped due to a small tree down across the road. Apparently, it had very recently happened. The ranger who was monitoring traffic and people, said that the park had had quite a few trees coming down during the summer. They have mostly lost Tan Oak and Douglas Fir. She believes it is because they are stressed due to the drought.
We carried our bikes a short way over to a footpath and walked that briefly to get past the section of road where the tree had fallen. We continued our climb up Big Basin Way thinking that there would be very little traffic since the tree was across the road. It didn't seem to work out that way. Either the tree was cleared very quickly, which was possible as it wasn't very big, or the traffic was people who were heading south turning around because the road was closed and going back north. Although having continuous climbing is challenging for me, the grade is gentle and it is nice to be amongst the redwoods and ferns. The road narrows near the top.
It can be quite cold at the top, even on very warm days, but wasn't this time. After reaching the top, there is about 3 miles of twisting down hill road until the intersection with highway 9. We had a quick regroup there and then returned to climbing up Big Basin Way. We stopped at view point about 2 miles below Skyline Blvd. It was good to stretch my back. The last two miles went by fast and then it was 7 miles of sweeping, twisting down hill into Saratoga. This is an excellent road to go down. We were lucky to have limited traffic sharing it with us.
Stats:
57.17 miles
Garmin reports 6,999 feet of elevation gain, which seems too high. Ride with GPS reports 6,506; that's probably closer to being right.
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