Saturday, September 20, 2014

Day 3 - Boulevard to Brawley

Day 3 took us from near Boulevard to Brawley. 

For the first time on this trip I actually used my sleeping bag to keep warm as it cooled off nicely during the night.

This time I got the Garmin to work. The day started, with an uphill grind to get to Old Highway 80, which lived up to it's name as being old. The shoulder in places was unrideable because it was so badly cracked. More Border Patrol vehicles. There was some up and down to get into Jacumba which put us very close to the border. This is the best picture of the fence that I got. Off to the left. A rider coming down the road in the distance. Plus you can just make out a border patrol vehicle at the fence.


Then we had a bit more climbing. The following is close to the last hill before the big downhill on the freeway. Some cyclists are barely visible just going up the hill.

Then for the fun part. Down hill on the shoulder of the freeway. Which was well paved, but they did have a rumble strip. Mitch started down the hill just before I did. For awhile I wast sure I would catch him, but he slowed down for a police car that had someone stopped on the shoulder. I popped over the rumble strip and passed him. I passed a number of other riders on the downhill as well. At one point I saw a 50 MPH speed limit on a corner and checked my speed to make sure I wasn't going too fast. I think I was just over 45 MPH at that point. According to the Garmin I hit 50.3 MPH on the downhill along the freeway into Ocotillo.  Nice ride.

Unfortunately, the temperature continued to climb as we descended. It was well over 100 degrees in Ocotillo. I stopped as gas station and filled up with water and had a gator aid. From there until Plaster City the riding was fairly fast, but the road was quite rough. In plaster city Alicia and I sought out some shade from one of the buildings had something to eat and drink. We were soon told to leave and continued on our way.

From there until Seely I started to really feel the heat. I stopped in the shade of a tree for awhile. At one point the temperature on my bike computer registered 121 degrees. It was probably more like 105 but it really sapped my energy.



After that Max Phil and I stopped at a little air conditioned Taco stand in Seeley. Excellent tacos! They also filled our water bottles and my 64 ounce thermos. A cold drink on a hot day is really good.


From there Phil and Max headed into El Centro to stop at the bike shop.  I continued north along the designated route. Stopping frequently in the rare shade along that road.

About 1/4 mile out of town I had a softening rear tire. I tried adding some air but it was so hot I couldn't see myself fixing it. I proceeded to walk to town. In town I found an AM-PM mini mart and they were kind enough to allow me to fix the tire in the mens restroom. 

Refreshed after a nice rest in the AC I proceeded on to our Camp at the Lions Center. We actually camped inside of an air conditioned building. Although it again wasn't cold enough to use a sleeping bag.

We were also given some good information about the local fauna by Jack who was responsible for arranging the lodgings at the site.


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