What I did this summer vacation 8/11/12

People say that the best part of being a teacher is a long summer off, right? At college, we are even more spoiled. This summer I had no AP exam grading, no summer school, no wedding to plan and no names to change and I immersed myself into three separate vacation trips with lots of riding.

First trip: Hawaii
As soon as I got done and turned in grades, I got busy with preparing for Hawaii. This was a special trip. My family from Japan and me from US planned to meet up half way in Hawaii for about twenty years. Hawaii is a very friendly place for the Japanese and even though my mother speaks fair amount of English, it is nice that things are catered for them.

My husband, Tony and I decided to rent bikes from The Bike Shop in Honolulu. Both of us got Specialized Allez and the information from the shop eventually led us to local riding group, Hawaii Bicycling League and we joined their Monday morning Start the Week Off Right" ride. I gathered they are a group of retired people, real estate agents and travel-related professionals and they love Hawaii and are so eager to tell you local secrets. They deviated the regular route to accommodate our sightseeing interests with checking out famous people's houses, beach side rest stops offering us tons of tips what to do in the island. We started out not so far from Diamond Head, passed famous Hanauma Bay and went as far as Sandy Beach. Honolulu traffic is very busy, but nobody really gave us hard time and locals knew when to go in and out of the main highway for safe routes. Another location we heard through the bike shop was Mt. Tantalus. The climb is about 4 miles, but elevation gain is over 1,500 feet! It is a famous spot to see night lights of Honolulu overlooking Diamond Head. Later we were proud to take both Japanese and US family with a van and impressed them we completed the climb.

Second trip: New Mexico
It is our first anniversary! Lady accompanied us as well as our own bikes. Last year, we did Tramway climb and we did it again, this time trying to tuck in Juan Tabo picnic ground climb. It is to the beginning of La Luz trail, that climbs all the way up to the top of Sandia mountain. I knew this was not very long, but very steep. This ended up being the first climb I gave up. Grrr. We will conquer this and Sandia mountain itself in the future! Our epic ride was from Tony's mother's house in North Valley in Albuquerque to Santa Fe. We first drove to Santa Fe, got permission to leave the car overnight in the hotel, took the train back to Albuquerque with bikes. (Pictured above.) Stayed with Mom and took the first light to make the ride. Another destination we frequented was Bosque trail along Rio Grande. We got to ride with Tony's old friend Patrick and he served as a guide to south half we never did.

Third trip: California
August in Dallas is dreadful. It is half health hazardous to be spending time and riding outside. Since Tony has many stores to take care of in Northern California, he cleverly tagged me into his assignment schedule and didn't come back to Texas for the weekend, making a handy get-away for me. We started out cool Monterey and took well-maintained trail between Marina and Canary Row. Unfortunately, I was busy being scared with unfit bike, but did enjoy the beautiful scenery. Tony kept telling me about American River trail in Sacramento and we did whole route (well, technically we didn't make it to Folsom Lake). Then Tony surprised me of an idea of Sunday visit to Lake Tahoe! I am a lake and mountain gal and Lake Tahoe has been my dream bike destination since my local coach trains participants for Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation (JDRF) Ride to Cure Diabetes. We came from California side from south and drove the west shore. The lake was gorgeous and I think we saw the big hill he had to push his bike. Since it was a recovery day, we had a short ride close to Kings Beach, where Iroman Lake Tahoe's swim starts and finishes. But the highlight of my riding in California was with Bill, Tony's colleague from near Fresno up to Sierra Nevada. Being the first time, I did only commit myself to 40 miles with 2,700 feet of climbing, but I told Bill, next time, I will try to go all the way up to the top of the mountain adding another mile.

Well, all good things come to an end. I will try to survive the fall semester, then Spinervals Winter conference awaits in January! I can't wait to meet with Coach, Nancy, Spinervals crew and my friends there!